We're coming to the end of the FIFA 23 campaign, with the title the last between EA Sports and FIFA before they go their separate ways, and EA launches its new flagship football game EA FC!
The upcoming game will effectively be a continuation of the FIFA franchise, but with a new name, keeping many of the aspects we have grown to love over 30 years, while also innovating.
Lately, leaks have come out regarding changes set to be implemented in EA FC Ultimate Team, so take a look at the major updates below.
Women in FUT
The biggest change set to come in EA FC Ultimate Team is the introduction of women in FUT!
This has been rumoured for some time, with chatter online seeming to confirm that it will be happening.
Obviously, we can only speculate on how this will be done, with some suggesting there will be women's FUT and men's FUT, however, we don't think that will be the case.
There is no point in splitting up the game mode, as the whole point of growing women's football in the game is for more integration.
We could see some issues at the start, with EA needing to create a fine balance between the male and female players.
EA has previously talked about differences the HyperMotion2 technology is able to capture in running style between the men and women, which is fine if that is purely an aesthetic detail, but could be problematic if it affects ability on the field.
If the community is able to identify a bonus to using either male or female cards over the other, then they will always opt to play with the more powerful players, which could see a massive chunk of the player pool deemed unusable.
We already have men's and women's players in Pro Clubs, however, that doesn't claim to be the most realistic game mode around. Although promo cards in FUT sometimes take away from the realism of it, the base sets still ground it in some sort of reality.
EA will also need to decide how chemistry works between male and female players. It would make sense that if they share a nationality and also a club then they would link well. But what about a league? Will Premier League players link with Women's Super League players, as they are both in the top tier of English football? We will have to wait and see.
READ MORE: Women in EA FC Ultimate Team
No Position Change Cards
Chemistry had a total re-work in FIFA 23 Ultimate Team, which also affected the way you could change player positions.
We're a big fan of the updated position changes, where, instead of being able to move players within a left, central or right line, you can only change them to an alternate position that the card holds.
To do this, you had to use generic position modifier items that work on any card.
It looks like EA sees these items as pretty redundant, and in EA FC you will supposedly be able to move cards to any alternate position they hold, without having to use a position modifier item.
This minor change would surely go down well in the FUT community, as you will no longer need to waste time applying consumables to your most-used players when experimenting with different formations.
FUT Moments Revamp
Another new introduction in FUT 23 was FUT Moments, a new game mode that allowed you to play mini-challenges to earn Stars, which you could then trade in for packs and consumables.
It seemed like a great idea when announced, however, the fanbase didn't really take to it.
This may be due to how easy the difficulty is, how long it actually takes to complete some tasks or the lacklustre rewards on offer.
EA will apparently revamp the game mode, including bringing co-op to it so you can power through objectives with mates.
We would also like to see more difficulties introduced, maybe resulting in increased star rewards the harder you go.
Challenges that require you to play until the end of the match also need to be scrapped. We want to load up a challenge, complete it as quickly as possible, and then move on to the next one!
FUT Academy & Mastery
Finally, FUT Academy and a Mastery Objecitve system are leaked to be included in EA FC Ultimate Team, which would be another massive innovation for the mode.
It appears that this would include a new game mode called FUT Academy, where you can use certain players to complete Mastery Objectives, which in turn would level up that card.
Of course, we need to find out more details on this before passing judgement, but it could prove to be a top inclusion that will help make lesser-used cards more meta.
So long as cards stay within the current power curve of the game at the time, then it could produce some really interesting results, giving FUT players the chance to gain a top team by grinding through objectives as opposed to buying and trading cards.