EA Sports FIFA

"If there is anything close to a universal game, it is association football, also known as soccer, football, fussball, fâutbol, fitba, and futebol. From the well-manicured and wealthy parks of gleaming metropolises to patches of asphalt, grass, or dirt that are commandeered by players in cities and towns around the world, a ball is always being kicked, fueled by a multibillion industry that promises entertainment and drama pass after pass, goal after goal. And this ball has now moved from the physical to the digital, with profound impacts on the multibillion sports and digital game industries, their cultures and players. We are talking EA's football simulation series FIFA, and the impact that this single series has on the culture of football and its surrounding spheres. Throughout its development history, EA's FIFA has managed, to adapt to and adopt almost all video game industry trends, becoming an assemblage of game types and technologies that is in itself a multi-faceted probe of the medium's culture, history, and technology. Feeling the Game is the first scholarly book to address the importance of EA's FIFA. From looking at the cultures of fandom to analyzing the technical elements of the sports simulation, and covering the complicated relations that EA's FIFA has with gender, embodiment, and masculinity, the collection provides a comprehensive understanding of a video game series that is changing the way the most popular sport in the world is experienced. In doing so, Feeling the Game serves as a reference text for scholars in many disciplines, including game studies, sociology of sports, history of games, and sports research."--