Five reasons not to buy FIFA 23

FIFA 23 finally hit store shelves last week. The latest installment in the famous football series promises a couple of subtle innovations, but above all, it’s another way for EA to make money. While the game is getting a lot of attention and marketing support, there are many reasons why not to buy FIFA 23. Here are five of them.  

1. Little innovation

Let’s start with the most logical reason not to buy FIFA 23: fan complaints. For years, fans have been screaming that FIFA isn’t a good game anymore, yet the football sim title sells millions of copies every year.

EA is the prime example of the fact that many game publishers understand only one language: money. In such cases, it seems that as long as the game is making money, there is no reason to change anything. But when disgruntled fans stop buying annually developed and released FIFA 23, EA should recognize that something needs to be done to keep fans happy, for example reintroducing popular features or improving gameplay.

The gameplay of FIFA offers little innovation. Minimal steps are taken each year to bring change to the game because EA ultimately doesn’t find it necessary, as money is being made anyway. However, by not buying the game, you’re just making EA realize that they need to listen to the fans.

2. Bugs

A notable trend in the FIFA series in recent years is that the games come with a conspicuous number of bugs upon release. It’s difficult to say exactly why, but it’s definitely uncomfortable and even frustrating for players. Nothing is more annoying than conceding an unjustified goal due to a bug.

Needless to say that given how much EA has already made on the series and the fact that we’re talking about an annual series containing nearly 40 editions with minimal gameplay changes, the game should be polished close to perfection.

Of course, FIFA 23 could be different, but the recent releases just don’t speak for the new game. Buying FIFA 23 at launch is therefore not recommended for a while. Moreover, if you wait a few weeks, you can also save some money, as there will be undoubtedly better purchase deals at a later date.

3. Pay to Win

The third reason not to buy FIFA 23 is a well-known one. As with the game’s predecessors, the most popular mode in FIFA 23 is the “pay-to-win” mode FIFA Ultimate Team. The only way to quickly get good players on your team is to invest hard-earned money in the game.

If there’s one aspect of games that gets denounced by the vast majority of the gaming community, it’s a predatory monetization model where you pay full price for the game first but then need to invest even more to have fun. This is a stranglehold EA has been using to capitalize on players for almost a decade, and unfortunately, it still works fantastically. However, even that can be changed, if a big part of FIFA’s player base would stop buying the game and putting money in microtransactions for some time.

4. Free competitor eFootball from Konami

The fact that you have to pay more for your games since the launch of the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox Series X does not fall into everyone’s lap. Many find it absurd that games cost almost as much as return flights around Europe.

However, dissatisfied fans don’t actually need to spend money on FIFA 23 because there is another free AAA soccer game — Konami’s eFootball. The predecessor of Pro Evolution Soccer has been completely free to play since last year and is constantly being improved through updates. Where the title was unplayable last year, right now it is very cool and a more than capable FIFA replacement.

5. FIFA for Switch

Lastly, there’s the Switch version of FIFA, which has been a big problem since the inception of the console and has only gotten worse with each passing year. EA has been releasing the same game for the Switch every year since 2019, only briefly changing the title and replacing players in teams based on the respective season.

It’s a bit like EA was duplicating its annual report, briefly changing the date, and swapping out a few words to make it look like an entirely new report. EA is just lucky there isn’t a supervisor to check the report, while they laughingly make money off what they call the Legacy Edition every year.

The only legacy these versions will have in a decade is that they reveal the abyss of publishers’ greed.

Header: EA