EA Sports FIFA is undoubtedly the greatest soccer game ever created, with all its latest innovations across the pitch and everything. But, the age old problem of EA’s servers still remain a huge issue for the franchise and continue to enrage fans from all over the world.
It seems to be a simple problem to fix for a company that has made close to a billion dollars just from its FIFA franchise. Then why does it still constantly bug the millions of players every single freakin’ year?
Kagawa was voted to appear on the cover of FIFA 16 in Japan. (Photo via Getty Images)
Only people from EA can honestly answer this question, but to tell you the truth, I believe it’s just a result of their ignorance to this department. I feel as if they are focusing on developing the features of the game every year and making it look more ‘realistic’ and ‘innovative’ rather than shifting their attention on the crappy servers that they run their game on and really, the core values of this record-breaking video game franchise.
A negligence in this matter seems illogical, however, as they unquestionably have received thousands, if not millions, of mails from people who are boiling with frustration over this. So, the more logical stance seems to be that they are currently ‘working to fix this issue’ for the next edition of this hugely popular video game.
Just in case you’re not a FIFA player, let me summarize one of the thousands of terrible encounters I’ve had with this server problem: I was playing FIFA on a rainy day in my bedroom, and my ultimate team was up against a really tough opponent in the top division; can’t remember which club, but could’ve been Barcelona. I was in Division 1, so the match was set to take place in ‘legendary’ difficulty. At this point, let me just mention the fact that I consider myself to be a mediocre player in this game; when I get my team going, I am invincible, but when I don’t get going, I get destroyed. During this game, I actually got really lucky and just ran with the ball at the feet of Sergio Agüero, who dribbled, at pace, past the entire defence of Barca, and shot the ball into the back of the net.
I was really hyped, but told myself to keep calm and defend the lead. And so I did. Until the end of the game, believe it or not. But just as I hit ‘Continue’, it said that there was a problem connecting to the EA Servers, and that I will be returned to the main menu. When I reconnected myself with the stupid servers, it didn’t save my progress for that game, and when I played the game again, I lost.
It was the most frustrating moment I had suffered that week on FIFA, but just one of many that I came across in my FIFA career.
EA’s servers are not only this crap for this game, however, as many of my friends have stressed to tell me. They say that the other major franchises of EA, like NBA or Madden, also suffer from these problems.
It’s not just the servers, either, that’s wrong with this game. Consumers are constantly outraged with the packs, as they often get only one good player that makes up for the cost deficit of the pack itself once every 50 to 100 packs. Obviously, this can differ from person to person, but the general idea is that the algorithm that EA uses to compute the items in a pack guarantees that they make way more money than the user themselves from this process, and seldom do they make anywhere close to the money that they invested into that pack.
EA needs to fix its server issues and the way in which the packs are distributed for its three major franchises, FIFA, Madden and NBA because its consumers are at the edge of losing it and going out at the company with all their might. And this can only spell disaster.
