EA Sports has confirmed it's looking into potentially renaming its world-renowned FIFA series of football (soccer) games in the future, as the company is reviewing its naming rights agreement with the sport's governing body.
The news was revealed in a press release celebrating the successful launch of FIFA 22, where it was hinted that the franchise could be getting a new name entirely in the not too distant future:
"As we look ahead, we’re also exploring the idea of renaming our global EA SPORTS football games. This means we’re reviewing our naming rights agreement with FIFA, which is separate from all our other official partnerships and licenses across the football world."
EA Sports has been producing FIFA games since 1993, so this would mark a huge change for the series.
Of course, FIFA's former competitor Pro Evolution Soccer was finished off earlier this year by Konami in favour of a new (and heavily criticised) free-to-play experience called eFootball. With these changes, we could be looking at a situation where FIFA and PES are no longer being talked about in just a few years' time. Crazy!
What do you think about this? What will the new name be? Give us your thoughts down below.
[source ir.ea.com]
Comments 9
Or reading between the lines, EA think as they have an effective monopoly on Football games they will be fine without hte FIFA branding so they can renegotiate the naming rights at a lower price
@elpardo1984 Yep I get the feeling FIFA want a high price, and EA are using this as a negotiating tactic.
Saying that it's difficult to think who you'd want to win that negotiation - EA Sports with their predatory FUT rubbish or good old corrupt FIFA...
@Widey85 yup bit like the European Super League over the summer, who do you prefer greedy clubs trying to create a closed shop or greedy UEFA who've been on the take for years.
FIFA are a grubby outfit, I would actually be pleased if they moved away from using the name. As long as all the other licenses are present who would really care?
Don't know who's worse. FIFA or EA. Both as bad as each other!
So EA are leaking this info to help them negotiate with FIFA over the next few years contract 🤷♂️
EA should change the name to International Superstar Soccer or Pro Evolution or Winning Eleven... I don't think anyone else is using those names...
I mean, without any competition they could literally just call the game "Football". Everyone would still call it FIFA anyway.
@SacredPYRO Nah, EA's American. They'll just call it Soccer.
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