My FIFA History
While FIFA is the governing body for soccer (or football/futbol) associations all over the world, many know it as the popular video game franchise — EA Sports FIFA. On one hand, it’s kind of sad to think that EA will be moving away from “FIFA,” in 2024, and move onto the EA Sports FC (Football Club) model. On the other hand, FIFA (the organization) has been pretty horrible in recent years, so maybe it’s not such a bad thing.
EA Sports FIFA is a brand that’s been around since I was a kid — the 1990s. I have played a great deal of FIFA games since then. Whether at friends’ houses in the 90s, or when I would purchase the FIFA World Cup Edition in the early 2000s (every four years), and later on when I would purchase the new FIFA every year.
It wasn’t until the mid-to-late 2010s that I really got into soccer (aka Futbol) and EA Sports FIFA games. During my time at the Miami Ad School we had an Xbox 360 in the lobby, and because many of the students were international, FIFA was the main game we played. We held daily FIFA tournaments. This was the main reason I purchased FIFA of that year (2013) for my own Xbox 360 — so that I could practice for these tournaments at home.
For the next five years or so, I continued to upgrade to the latest FIFA game. Best Buy even had a great upgrade program where you could trade-in last year’s game and end up paying almost half price for the new one (using a buddy’s Gamers Club Unlocked membership also helped lower the price even more).
My last EA Sports FIFA purchase was most likely in 2017.
The Return
Last month, FIFA ‘22 was one of the FREE PS Plus games, and after downloading it and starting a career with Chelsea (my favorite team) I am once again obsessed with this franchise. Like many of the annual release games, mainly sports franchises, we only see small upgrades and changes year to year. After taking a couple of years off from FIFA, I see some bigger changes.
The cool part is that even after my five year hiatus, I was able to immediately jump back in and feel like I never left this franchise. There were only a few large changes. Mainly how penalties and free kicks can be taken with the thumbstick. Other than that I am still using many of the same strategies I used in previous year editions.
Another big change is that back when I played FIFA religiously, I knew the players on my team — Chelsea. At the time I was watching most of their games. It’s funny how some of the young guns from back then are now the older, more established players. Players like Romelu Lukaku.
Game Highlights
Let’s see some FIFA 22 highlights from my first month back on the pitch.
After completing my first match, the game instantly showed me a highlight reel from that match. It was not just made up of goals, but penalties, some close calls and other big plays. These feel like an ESPN SportsCenter summary. After most matches I would stick around and watch my highlight reel.
Anytime you can score a goal from outside the box, that just feels legendary.
Even after a failed corner kick you can still put together a nice play, and even score a sick Chilena goal!
Still to this day, my favorite way to score on a breakaway is with the boop goal (lob shot) right over the goalie.
Once you pass all of the defenders, it’s all about timing the soft shot to hit it right over the goalies reach.
Those are just a few of my top highlights after playing FIFA 22 for one month. Make sure to check out the others on our YouTube channel.
FIFA 22 is out now on PC and consoles. It was FREE on PS Plus for the month of May, and may still be available if you hurry.
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