EA SPORTS FC 25

EA SPORTS FC 25 is the latest update in the massively popular sports series. In this game, players will be tackling soccer (football in other corners of the world) to rise to the top as a sports star. Although the goal is to become a legend, players must start humbly as a beginning player, and prove themselves from there.

The game offers four major modes to play in, Kick Off, Ultimate Team, Career, and Clubs, and also a new mode, “Rush.” Rush is the newest feeling addition to the game, with the rest of this sports game being minor improvements to EA Sports FC 24.

What Rush Offers

Rush is a 5v5 mode, with the goal keepers on both sides controlled by AI. It’s perfect for those who don’t have a full squad at their beck and call, allowing them to still play with fewer players. The faster gameplay and different number of teammates makes this feel refreshingly different from the rest of the options available.

Lack of Community Support

One downside to this game is that most of the problems it has—and all 24 previous games have had—is that bugs and quality of life issues are generally ignored by EA. The next version of the game is unlikely to have these bugs fixed, or a major UI issue repaired.

This has lead to many loyal players leaving the series, as games continue to have the same bug over several reiterations of the game. The game gets more broken over time, frustrating many players.

Mixed Efforts in Gameplay

It’s clear EA spent a lot of effort in making actual matches as good as they can possibly be. The graphics are incredibly sharp, and they offer broadcast style interlays that make you feel like you’re watching the game on television as well as playing it. Players who have been scanned for their CG counterparts have incredibly detailed characters, but even those who have simply been modeled (or the players own character) are relatively good.

This truly amazing effort, however, doesn’t extend to outside of gameplay. The menus are particularly awful and are hard to navigate with a controller. This can make gameplay rather frustrating.

One nice feature they did add back in from past games is the Team Walkout option. This was available in the past but was removed for EA SPORTS FC 24.

Very Similar to EA SPORTS FC 24

Despite the new Rush addition, most of the additional tweaks aren’t worthy of note. This is essentially the same game with a few minor enhancements. EA SPORTS FC 25 does slow the pacing down slightly for the game, so you have a chance to process what is happening and kick the ball, but these changes are overall relatively minor.

Pros:

• New Rush Mode

Cons:

• Very similar to past games
• Still has the same bugs as past games

It is crazy that EA SPORTS FC 25 is the 32nd football game from the folks at EA! I thought that last years game had some great ideas, but as a person who mainly plays career mode, there were more than a few frustrating parts of the game. With the next game, EA has tried a few different things and I wanted to talk about a few of the features that I am most excited about and that I feel could make this a step up from what we got last year.

Live Start Points

This is the feature that made me suck it up and pre-order EA SPORTS FC 25. The idea here is that we can take charge of a team or an actual player and relive a specific portion of their career. The example that they give is playing a career as David Beckham who I have been a fan of since he scored that goal from the halfway line back in the mid-90s! They give other examples such as a team is really struggling, they get their manager sacked and you are called in to fix things.

Rush Mode

Back when FIFA 23 came out, Volta Football took over my life! I loved this mode in multiplayer, it was the kind of mode that even those who were not massive football fans could have fun with. I actually think that it was way more accessible than Mario Strikers Battle League was! In EA SPORTS FC 25 they are giving as something called Rush Mode which offers 5 vs 5 action packed matches that are just so much fun to play. I can see EA having a huge hit on their hands with Rush Mode, especially as it ties into all the other modes that the game has to offer which brings me to something else that I am very excited about.

Getting The Youngsters Ready

One of the things I love to do in the career mode of the FIFA and now EA Sports FC games is to build a team with players from the youth team. I love to scout for youth players and get them into my team. The thing is, the process of getting them good has always been so slow. EA SPORTS FC 25 and its Rush Mode allows you to play 5 vs 5 matches with your youth team players and this can help level them up and get them into your first team much quicker. I love the idea of having a way more hands on approach with my youth team.

How Smart Is Too Smart?

The AI in last year's game could be so frustrating to deal with! The AI would all of a sudden start passing the ball around like they are an in prime Barcelona, just running circles around you. Your own team will all of a sudden not be able to put three passes together and your goalkeeper will drop every shot that comes to him! With EA SPORTS FC 25, EA has said they have something called FC IQ which will make individual and team tactics better. Of course, they say that they have improved the AI every year so this is one aspect that I am taking with a grain of salt! My problem is that World Class is just far too easy, but Legendary is just unfairly hard!

Pros:

• The Live Start Points sound amazing
• I like how you can play as legendary players
• Rush Mode is such a game changer
• I have high hopes for the new IQ AI

Cons:

• They claim that AI will be better every year
• From what I understand David Beckham is only a pre-order bonus!