During E3 this year, we were excited to learn that playable women’s teams would be available for the first time ever in FIFA 16, but now EA is taking its representation of lady players one step further!
EA announced today that North-American and Australian versions of FIFA 16 will feature female players on the cover for the first time ever. The Canadian version will showcase team captain Christine Sinclair alongside Barcelona’s Lionel Messi, and American boxes will feature Messi and US forward Alex Morgan, and Steph Catley will appear on Australian covers.
In a press statement, Morgan explained:
It is an incredible honor to be one of the first women featured on the cover of EA Sports’ FIFA. I know people all over the world play this game and I’m really excited that FIFA 16 is putting such an important spotlight on women’s soccer. And now to share the cover with today’s greatest player is surreal.
FIFA executive producer David Rutter promised way back in 2012 that representing female players was a priority, but not something that EA wanted to come at the expense of realism.
At the time, that answer seemed like a pretty flimsy excuse for failing to represent incredible female athletes (the time frame required to “do justice” to female characters vs. male characters is always pretty telling), but it’s awesome to see EA following through on that promise and making playable female characters that actually look like their real-life counterparts a selling point of FIFA 16.
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