They have however, implemented a tactical retort to the greedy gamers by means of an all-conquering in-game statistic. The main challenge in building your own unique super-squad is balancing chemistry within a side of potential superstars. Your team’s chemistry can have a serious effect on how you perform on the pitch with players feeling sharper and quicker if your meter is high. Indeed, if your chemistry is high enough it’s easy to brush off nigh-on any competition regardless of the famous faces that the opposition manager has pulled together. A side including Kaka, Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Franck Ribery and Robin van Persie may sound like the ultimate dream team but they’ll falter against a balanced side consisting entirely of just one nationality. If your back four, midfield and strike-force are all countrymen then you’ll see that chemistry bar skyrocket. Add in a manager from the same shores and you’re laughing.

And this is where Ultimate Team begins to feel somewhat silly. As of 2008, the best team in the world is officially Manchester United, and on most match days Sir Alex will put out a team sheet (including subs) consisting of thirteen different nationalities. A defence including Patrice Evra (France) Rio Ferdinand (England) Nemanja Vidic (Serbia) and young Rafael (Brazil) stand in front of Edwin van der Sar (Holland) and are arguably the best defence in the Premiership. But stick these guys together in Ultimate Team and you’re looking at a chemistry disaster. The whole idea seems far too simplified; that fellow countrymen playing alongside each another makes chemistry better. Kieran Dyer and Lee Bowyer are a shining example of why this isn’t true.

EA’s thinking has to be praised as they obviously saw the inevitable hordes of teenage morons cluttering up the charts with a team of unstoppables and decided to throw them a curve ball. But they surely could have refined it to make such an all-important statistic not based on something so frivolous, basic and, for the most part, plain stupid.

Of course, none of this actually matters if EA’s servers give up the ghost. See, for the best part of a month a cacophony of bawling, reckless forumites have been labelling Ultimate Team a “broken” game. And for the most part, they aren’t wrong. Our own experience has shown sides completely wiped out, entire trophy cabinets filled with hours of hard work lost, players deleted, disconnections at vital times, machine and game hang-ups, glitched names and graphics and a host of headshaking evenings where even getting a single game has been a monumental task. Even the trading section suffers from lag and a series of glaring design goofs. It’s shocking, and while EA has been aware of these problems since launch, it seems very little has changed for the majority of people. The current experience is more like that you’d find in a beta test than any finished product.

But ignoring any technical issues, the biggest problem with Ultimate Team is that it’s far too easy to manipulate and abuse. When it works, it’s great fun and, just like the stickers, will undoubtedly hook many people in – as long as they accept its shortfalls.

Pages: 1 2

Have you downloaded the latest issue from GamerZines yet? Check it out here!