The EA label head pointed out the three things that EA Sports have focused on in an effort to emulate the success of the previous instalment in the series, FIFA 12.
There was a time when the FIFA series was under the immense shadow of Konami’s Pro Evolution series and that time was not all that long ago. However, EA moved to secure the services of David Rutter to take over as the head of the FIFA games and since then the series has seen a turnaround in fortunes.
In fact, last year, FIFA 12 turned out to be the best-selling sports franchise in EA’s history, losing out the fastest-selling game to Battlefield 3, but it did give DICE’s game a run for its money.
In a recent interview the label head, Andrew Wilson, pointed out the main points on which the developers were focusing on for FIFA 13. His first order of business was
to point out that the game was not going to be an absolute game-changer in the way FIFA 12 was. Instead the game was going to be an enhanced, more polished version of FIFA 12.
He said, “At EA Sports we have three core pillars that we go after every year and I think we have a bigger challenge than most people who build games, because we do do it every year.”Andrew Wilson highlighted the ethos of EA and how it was a special challenge for the developers to build on the success of their previous title.
In addition, the EA executive also pointed out how the development team was hard at work ensuring there was enough value in the game to warrant a purchase, instead of just re-packing the same game and selling it at full-price.
“We have to demonstrate real value and compelling reasons why you would purchase again – especially in a year where you’re coming off a 90-rated game and people are pretty happy with the last one that we made.”
A number of improvements and tweaks have been promised in the next instalment of the hugely successful series and Andrew Wilson highlighted the three major areas of interest that the development team was focused on.
On a side note, one factor that was evident to see was how EA is trying to incorporate some sort of compatibility with console peripherals.FIFA 12 on the PlayStation Vita uses the touch screen and rear touch pad to add new elements to the gameplay, while the Kinect’s voice and speech recognition system allows players to make changes on the go.
However, those new features take a back seat to what Andrew Wilson is teasing will take the FIFA experience to a whole new level.
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