FIFA 21 Switch and the sports game scam

FIFA 21 released on the Switch this week to the collective groan of soccer fans. The game is, for all intents and purposes, just FIFA 17 with a fresh coat of paint haphazardly splashed across the pitch. Even the box admits that it only features minor updates to kits, squads, and stadiums. All this for the low, low price of $50 USD, which I suppose is cheaper than other console versions. So, I guess it has that going for it.

So far the game is being absolutely eviscerated on Metacritic. FIFA 21 currently has a user score of 0.1, making it the second lowest scoring Switch game on the site, just ahead of some crummy mobile port I’ve never heard of. In a rare show of unity, even the games media agrees. Nintendo Life called it “FIFA 19 with a new pair of knickers on”, stating the price is obscene for what it offers. IGN took the cheekier route by copying and pasting their review of FIFA 20. Both sites scored it a 2/10. Again making it one of the lowest, if not the lowest, rated games on the Switch from a major publisher.

Unfortunately, this seems to be par of the course with sports games. 20 years ago, there was a lot more competition in the market. NASCAR alone had at least half a dozen different games by half a dozen different publishers at one point. And the games were actually good as each studio tried to outsell the other. Now EA has exclusive rights to professional hockey, football, and soccer. If you want to play as your favourite players, as part of your favourite team, there’s only one way you can do that. With no competition in the marketplace, there’s very little incentive for them to innovate.

How lazy is it? Well, hand egg elder statesmen Madden came under fire earlier this year for a mediocre release. So lazy that it still included logos for past versions of the game, neatly tucked away in the stands in hopes that nobody would notice. Just so they wouldn’t have to create a whole new asset for their full priced game. Five minutes in Photoshop would take far too long and cost far too much. And here’s the thing, it came under fire for doing the same thing last year as well.

Sports gamers now pay full price for annual releases that amount to little more than updated player rosters. Now, I’ve never been big into sportsball, but apparently some folks do care about that a great deal. Thing is, such things could easily be added as a patch, or even paid DLC, for existing versions of the game. However, companies like EA have successfully convinced these players that they need to fork out $60 each and every year for that luxury. Which you know, fool me once…

Well, it seems a lot of people are still being fooled. FIFA 21 has shot to the top of the Switch charts, because those crazy Europeans really love soccer for some reason. I’m not sure what’s so appealing about watching a grown man crumple like a cheap lawn chair after being gently caressed by their opponent, but I digress. All and all, this makes it really hard for me to get behind sports gamers. You know exactly what you’re getting, but you still keep buying it. So, I can’t really help you there other than to suggest you close your wallets for a change.