The engine would go on to be used for several projects by Konami, from Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain to a number of its Pro Evolution Soccer games, which would eventually be rebranded to eFootball. The year 2020 saw its use coming to an end, however, with Konami switching to Unreal Engine for future titles.

“Julien is known for football games people loved because they were built with fun and feel at the center,” said Delphi Interactive partner and executive producer on the game Theodor Tang-Peronard in a statement, according to GamesMarkt. “That way of thinking is core to how we’re reimagining FIFA in simulation for a much broader audience. Julien’s experience brings a level of clarity that sharpens our decisions and helps ensure the game is easy to pick up, yet still has depth.”

The studio will be working on the FIFA project with Refactor Games, with the two companies sharing “a very specific approach” for the project, according to Merceron. “With small, elite teams of top-tier designer and developer talent, we can stay true to the core creative vision and serve the great fandom of football. In a way, we are returning to the principles that made the great football games of the past.”

The FIFA project was unveiled during Netflix’s Tudum event back in December, and is slated to be released in time for the FIFA World Cup 2026. In its announcement, Netflix described the title as being a “newly reimagined FIFA football simulation game.”

“Football is the biggest thing in the world,” said Delphi Interactive founder and CEO Casper Daugaard during the announcement. “As lifelong FIFA fans, we’re honored to help usher in the bold next generation and reimagine the future of the franchise. Our mission is simple: Make the FIFA game the most fun, approachable, and global football game ever created.”

The last major video game release under the FIFA banner was EA’s FIFA 23. Since then, however, the company has gone on to release more football games under the new label EA Sports FC.

In the meantime, FIFA has also teamed up with Solace to unveil a new football game dubbed FIFA Heroes. The title is being developed for PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo Switch, iOS and Android, and is slated for release sometime this year. Developer Enver Studio has confirmed that it will be a 5-on-5 football game with a focus on mascots and legends from the sport.

FIFA Heroes will have dynamic physics powering its core football gameplay, which will lean more on the arcade side of things. After building up their squad with football personalities, recognisable fictional characters and the official FIFA mascots, players can partake in single-player and multiplayer matches. There will also be a career mode with its own player progression system.

It is also slated to be the first time that official FIFA mascots will be playable characters in a football game. At launch, it will include three mascots from host nations—Maple for Canada, Zayu for Mexico and Clutch for the US—with more roster additions planned for later.

According to Tarno “the decision to do Rematch happened way before Sifu was released.” He also went on to talk about how the studio isn’t particularly risk averse, which would explain how it was able to pivot from working on more action-based martial arts-centric titles like Sifu and Absolver to a multiplayer sport game like Rematch.

“It was not a question of ‘oh, Sifu did very well – what are we doing next,” he continued, noting that prototypes for Rematch were already being developed by a small team at Sloclap during the development of Sifu. The decision to work on a game that is completely different from its other offerings came about because, for the studio, “chasing the safe bets is a death sentence,” Tarno said. “I think gamers are on the lookout for new, original experiences.”

When it comes to drawing inspiration from other titles, it could be easy to see how games like the older FIFA franchise and even Rocket League could have inspired Rematch. However, Tarno noted that “these games are different giants in all these fields, and they do what they do super well. And so I think we just want to do something different.”

Rematch was released just a few days ago on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. While the PC version is available via Steam, PC and Xbox players can both also play it through Game Pass. The title puts players in control of a single footballer in matches that could be 3v3, 4v4 or 5v5. Rematch also features a 5v5 ranked mode for players that might want to get more competitive with their football.

Since its release, Rematch has proven to be incredibly successful. The studio revealed that, in just a day, the football game had gotten more than a million unique players across PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.

Back in April, Tarno had spoken about how Sloclap had never considered a free-to-play business model for Rematch. When asked about the game’s $30 price tag, Tarno spoke about why it didn’t need to go free-to-play to find success. Rather, he believed that the unique skill-based gameplay would be something players would find interesting enough to pay money for.

“I never considered free-to-play,” said Tarno. “One of the things I love about making games is that there is no secret formula or anything, but the best way—or maybe actually the only way—to make a commercial success is to just make a very good game.”

Speaking about the core gameplay of Rematch, Tarno had also mentioned how Sloclap wanted to respect its players by offering them challenging gameplay that would also be fun.

“One of our cultural pillars at Sloclap is respecting our players, respecting their intelligence, respecting their skills,” he said. “We like challenging gameplay and gamers are a very discerning audience. They are often very analytical, very precise in their assessment of mechanics and what works, what doesn’t, what’s balanced, what’s not balanced, etc.”

For more details about Rematch, check out our review.

Konami has announced that it has entered into an agreement with FIFA that will see the two entities collaborating on esports development worldwide. For starters, two FIFA World Cup esports events will be held over the course of this year, including one that has kicked off this year, with players competing against each other through Konami’s free-to-play football sim, eFootball, on PC and consoles.

Whether we can expect Konami and FIFA’s collaboration to extend beyond esports at any time in the future remains to be seen. Stay tuned for more details in the coming weeks and months.

The report was seemingly further corroborated by Insider Gaming’s Mike Straw, who took to social media platform X to say that an announcement could be coming soon, but that no one seems to be willing to go on the record with him about the game, so details are currently scarce.

It is worth noting that this is in no way an official confirmation, and neither 2K nor FIFA itself have made any announcements. If the rumours do turn out to be true, however, this will be the first real competition EA will have seen for its football games in quite some time, especially with Konami having taken what was once Pro Evolution Soccer into a very different direction in its new free-to-play eFootball form.

For context, the last football title released by EA under the FIFA title was FIFA 23. Since then, the company has been working on football games with its own branding, with EA Sports FC 24 being the first release under the series’ new name. Going by its traditional release cadence, EA is also expected to release EA Sports FC 25 this year.

EA and FIFA’s long-standing partnership came to an end after the latter demanded the former pay over $2.5 billion to extend the agreement between the two entities by another four years. EA decided to end the partnership instead, following which FIFA confirmed plans to partner with other developers and publishers for future officially licensed FIFA titles. In March last year, FIFA president Gianni Infantino said the company’s next game was in development.

2K has secured the official license from FIFA to create the next FIFA video game!

The partnership is confirmed, and 2K will be developing a new football game series.

👀✨ FIFA 2K25 is set to launch this year, just in time for the FIFA World Cup 2K26!

Get ready for FIFA 2K25!… pic.twitter.com/3jsu2XQu2a

— MohPlay Inc🎮🎮 (@mohplay_inc_) May 24, 2024

More smoke to this. No one is willing to talk to me on the record about it, but we could be getting an announcement of a new partnership sooner rather than later https://t.co/cy6gqGGftl

— Mike Straw of Insider-Gaming.com (@MikeStrawMedia) May 26, 2024

The court found that with the contents of the packs being randomized and potentially being worth more or less than the monetary value for which they are purchased, they do indeed constitute gambling and potentially offer a financial benefit to those who could purchase them. As per the court’s judgment, Sony has been ordered to refund a value of €338.26 to the plaintiff of the case.

It is, of course, relevant to a single incident and pertains to a fairly small monetary value, though it could set an interest precedent going forward. EA and Sony have yet to make any official statements in response, but the former has previously dismissed claims that loot boxes constitute gambling.

“We’re definitely interested in expanding our opportunities in sports, and FIFA has a great brand and incredible clout, but we have no current plans to discuss,” said Zelnick.

While most sports games popular these days tend to be EA releases, like FIFA (EA Sports FC from next year onward) and Madden, Take-Two has an essential monopoly on basketball and pro-wrestling games with its NBA 2K and WWE 2K franchises. Considering the reported costs of the FIFA brand are what ultimately drove EA to continue the franchise without it, Take-Two could be primed to license the brand for its own future football games.

In the wake of EA’s original announcement, FIFA itself has stated that it will look to keep moving forward without EA. In an update, the organisation revealed that it has projects under development with other studios and publishers. FIFA also revealed that it will now be adopting a non-exclusive model, which will essentially mean that companies won’t be able to license the brand on an exclusive basis.

EA announced its severed ties with the FIFA branding in the wake of reports stating that the football organisation was demanding licensing fees upwards of $2.5 billion from EA for every four years.

The only other major football games publisher, Konami, has yet to make any statement on the matter.

As you may have expected, the organization is going to attempt to keep moving forward without EA. In a recently published update, FIFA confirmed that it already has “number of new non-simulation games” in development with other partnered developers and publishers. One of these is described as “a tailored gaming experience featuring the biggest event on earth”, i.e. the World Cup, and will launch in Q3 of this year, ahead of the tournament, which is scheduled November and December of this year.

In addition to that, FIFA says it is now adopting a non-exclusive model that will see its yearly annual series continuing in partnership with other gaming companies. In a strongly (and bafflingly) worded statement, FIFA president Gianni Infantino has said that the FIFA series will remain the premier football sim on the market, even in the absence of EA Sports.

“I can assure you that the only authentic, real game that has the FIFA name will be the best one available for gamers and football fans,” Infantino says. “The FIFA name is the only global, original title. FIFA 23, FIFA 24, FIFA 25 and FIFA 26, and so on – the constant is the FIFA name and it will remain forever and remain THE BEST.”

Saying that making games is a difficult and complicated process would be a massive understatement, but Infantino seems to wildly underestimating the scope of that task. It will be interesting to see what publishers the organization partners with moving forward, and how that will impact the FIFA series with future instalments.

This year, at the very least, will see EA Sports’ FIFA 23 launching for PC, PlayStation, and Xbox.

It seems the rumors can officially be laid to rest, as EA has announced via an official article that the company and football giant FIFA will be officially ending their long-standing partnership, and that future titles will now be called EA Sports FC, starting in 2023.

As per EA, everything which fans have experienced from the football series over the years will stay same, including the various game modes, teams, tournaments, clubs, etc. all thanks to the exclusive partnership between the Premier League, LaLiga, Bundesliga, Serie A, the MLS, and more.

“Everything you love about our games will be part of EA SPORTS FC – the same great experiences, modes, leagues, tournaments, clubs and athletes will be there. Ultimate Team, Career Mode, Pro Clubs and VOLTA Football will all be there. Our unique licensing portfolio of more than 19,000+ players, 700+ teams, 100+ stadiums and 30 leagues that we’ve continued to invest in for decades will still be there, uniquely in EA SPORTS FC. That includes exclusive partnerships with the Premier League, LaLiga, Bundesliga, Serie A, the MLS – and more to come,” said Cam Weber, EVP, Group GM EA SPORTS & Racing.

Weber further stated that, “This new independent platform will bring fresh opportunity – to innovate, create and evolve. This is much more than just a change of symbol – as EA SPORTS, we’re committed to ensuring EA SPORTS FC is a symbol of change. We’re dedicated to meaningfully reinvesting in the sport, and we’re excited to work with a large and increasing number of partners to expand to new authentic experiences that bring joy, inclusivity and immersion to a global community of fans. I look forward to sharing more detail on these plans in the coming months.”

EA also mentions that they will be delivering the most expansive game ever with FIFA later this year. “We are committed to ensuring the next FIFA is our best ever, with more features, game modes, World Cup content, clubs, leagues, competitions, and players than any FIFA title before,” Weber further added.

EA has promised more details on EA Sports FC in Summer of 2023.

In a recent episode of Giant Bomb show GrubbSnax (via ResetEra), journalist Jeff Grubb stated that EA will indeed soon be renaming its FIFA franchise. With their licensing deal expiring with this year’s game, Grubb says EA will instead rename the series as EA Sports FC (the “FC” stands for “football club”, in case you’re wondering), while FIFA will instead go ahead with its own football games- though whether they’re on the lookout for other developers to partner with remains to be seen.

If that names sounds familiar to you, that’s because last year, EA registered trademarks for EA Sports FC. 

Reports in October of last year suggested that not only was FIFA asking EA for $2.5 billion every four years to extend their agreement, but was also looking to place restrictions on in-game monetization. More recently, EA said that its FIFA license has actually precluded the company from expanding the franchise in the ways that it wants to.

How exactly would this affect EA Sport’s yearly football sim series though? Effectively, the only thing they’d be losing out on is the FIFA World Cup license itself- licensing for every other international team, club, player, and stadium that’s already in the FIFA games will remain largely unaffected. Read more on that through here.

Known industry insider Tom Henderson has stated in the report that players across Xbox, PlayStation, and PC will be able to play against each other in FIFA 23. Additionally, it’s also been stated that FIFA 23 will feature both men and women’s World Cups,, alongside major improvements to the game’s Hyper Motion technology. This is all information coming from unofficial sources, and as such, should be taken with a grain of salt.

EA CEO Andrew Wilson recently talked about how continuing to stick with the FIFA license is precluding its soccer franchise from expanding, and letting go of it will allow the developer to expand beyond 11v11 soccer, introduce more digital ecosystems. To read more on the ongoing dispute between FIFA and EA, click through here.