Business | It’s in the game

How FIFA was outplayed by Electronic Arts

The video-game publisher called the football chiefs’ bluff—and won

EA SPORTS FC 24 is the successor to their FIFA video game series
Photograph: BACKGRID

A new football season will begin on September 27th: not the Premier League or La Liga, but the annual update of the world’s favourite football video-game. “FIFA”, as the franchise was known from its pixelated debut in 1993, sells nearly 30m copies a year. In-game spending pushes its annual revenue above $3bn, estimates MoffettNathanson, a firm of analysts, which calculates that the title contributes nearly two-thirds of the profit of its publisher, Electronic Arts (EA). Gaming has few bigger names than “FIFA”.

This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “It’s in the game”

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