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Addition of women’s teams on FIFA 16 sparks sexist jokes

SINGAPORE — EA Sports’ latest announcement that it will feature 12 women’s national teams in its upcoming FIFA 16 game – a first for the popular video game franchise – has been greeted by cheers and jeers.

Women's national teams being featured in EA Sports' FIFA 16 football game. Photo: FIFA

Women's national teams being featured in EA Sports' FIFA 16 football game. Photo: FIFA

SINGAPORE — EA Sports’ latest announcement that it will feature 12 women’s national teams in its upcoming FIFA 16 game – a first for the popular video game franchise – has been greeted by cheers and jeers.

The video game maker announced yesterday (May 28), that the women’s national squads of Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, England, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Spain, Sweden, and the USA would be in several game modes including Kick Off, an offline tournament, as well as Online Friendly Matches.

The announcement, however, drew strong criticism — with comments such as “nobody cares” and “FIFA is officially dead” — and sexist jokes from some quarters. Some said that the female players’ highest statistics would be for “cooking” and “cleaning”, while others quipped that the players would need nine months’ off due to pregnancy.

Patrick H (@Who_8_Depay) tweeted that the players would probably “stop half way through the game to go to their nail/hair appointments”, while Hugo (@Hxgo__) tweeted: “Your top scorer refuses to play cuz the second kit makes her look fat #FIFA16”.

Other gamers, however, felt that the game maker had not adequately addressed problems in the previous version, such as lag issues when playing online and users getting locked out of their accounts.

“Have EA actually made any improvements to the gameplay, game engine, physics, passing, etc?” questioned Felix Sanchez on the EA Sports FIFA YouTube channel.

YouTube user Arsenal Runtigzz commented: “What is the point really, there are already fundamental problems with the game and introducing women’s football won’t do anything to appease your consumers.”

Still, others commended the move.

“There are actually some women soccer players (like myself) who are really excited about this … Women soccer players have been fighting for a long time to get this type of recognition, and should be respected. It’s sad and immature that a lot of boys are upset about this. Just stop,” said YouTube user belloballs.

YouTube user Poppy Marjoram said: “Finally some respect in girls football, girls are so under-estimated its unreal … Finally I can enjoy something I love with this.”

Paolo (@chopmunky) tweeted in response to the announcement: “Awesome. My 7 year old daughter loves FIFA and great to have role models for young girls right here - nice one!”

USA all-time leading scorer Abby Wambach said: “We’re all excited to see ourselves in the game, but even more excited to see the reaction from all of the fans, including the fans of our team that maybe wouldn’t be expecting something like this from EA Sports.”

FIFA 16 will be launched on Sept 22 in Asia on PC, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4. The last edition, FIFA 15, was the top selling game in the UK last year.

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