Electronic Arts will reportedly be going ahead with rebranding the FIFA franchise to “EA Sports Football Club” after FIFA 23 has been released, according to sources confirming the decision to journalist Jeff Grubb.
If true, FIFA 22 and FIFA 23 would be the last titles with the FIFA branding, as FIFA 23 will incorporate several FIFA World Cup tournaments. That said, this decision would not be much of a surprise given the tumultuous negotiations in the last six months between EA and FIFA over the licensing of its annualized football franchise.
When will EA drop the FIFA name for EA Sports Football Club?
Grubb, on his premium show on Giant Bomb called Grubbsnax, claims that “EA Sports Football Club” will indeed be the name of the franchise moving forward:
“EA Sports Football Club, EA Sports FC, that’s the name of the game. I saw trademarks for it, I thought that could be just a feature like an online mode. I asked around [and] that’s it, that’s the name.
They are ready to move on, they have another name lined up.”
Grubb believes that there should have already been a trailer with the rebrand and that “we should hear about it here pretty soon.”
Over the last six months, EA has been mulling about changing the name of their FIFA franchise primarily due to FIFA allegedly demanding that EA pay $2.5 billion for the license over the next decade.
In late November, EA executive David Jackson said that the publisher doesn’t “foresee major risks” in changing the name. By then, EA had already trademarked the name “EA Sports F.C.” in preparation in case the licensing deal fell through.
Then in February, EA CEO Andrew Wilson released a more aggressive statement, saying that FIFA was “impeding” EA’s FIFA games anyway. He states that FIFA is responsible for preventing other brands like Nike to be in the franchise because of its existing partnership with Adidas, and did not want the franchise to go “beyond 11v11 and different types of gameplay.”
In other news, the GTA+ subscription service for GTA Online has been lambasted by fans, and PlayStation Spartacus is reportedly arriving next week.
