EA had a recent controversy that's angered some fans enough for it to reverse its decision. No, this isn't in reference to the poor Metacritic user scores for the ironically best-selling Madden 21 football game, but an advertisement pushing microtransactions in a magazine marketed toward children.
FIFA 21 is coming out in just over a week, and many soccer fans are on the edge of their seats awaiting their chance to play 2020's take on the popular pro soccer/European football game. And as is true for many modern video games, FIFA 21 will have microtransactions in addition to the flat rate fans pay to play the game, and both the marketing and the egregious nature of the FIFA Points microtransactions have angered a lot of gamers.
EA advertised microtransactions for kids, especially loot boxes that cause real-world money but don't even guarantee an in-game reward, and even more blatantly advertised these purchases as a necessary part of playing the game. While in reality, players can enjoy FIFA 21 without paying a single cent after the initial purchase. People got angry on social media, and EA is now pulling the magazine ad in response to the outrage.
EA told Eurogamer in an official statement that the games company is reevaluating its marketing policies and future media outreach, especially those targeted towards children. It also admitted its own wrongdoing by saying the ad should never have appeared in a magazine for kids, specifically a toy magazine. Players can pay as little as $60 for FIFA 21, and while that's a lot of money (thanks to the next-gen price jump), it's important for all players to know that they are absolutely not required to pay any more than that to have a fun time in the game.
This isn't the first microtransactions-related controversy that EA has faced, as many fans will remember the infamous Star Wars Battlefront 2 loot boxes and a justifying Reddit post from EA breaking a record for Reddit post downvotes. Other people have noted that The Sims 4 DLC costs several hundred dollars to own every pack, and that's just too much for a lot of people. Kids, especially, often don't have a lot of extra pocket money and it's unethical to mislead them into thinking they can't enjoy a game if they don't have money for microtransactions.
It's good that EA is making this change to FIFA 21, even if its Star Wars and The Sims games didn't get any sort of apology or backpedaling. Hopefully this will signal a new move in the company's PR plan to be more customer-friendly.
FIFA 21 releases on PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One on October 9, with support for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S planned.
Source: Eurogamer