In an interview I had with one of the producers in EA Canada at the fifa 15 demo: convention he had this to say
David Rutter: “We want to introduce the life of humans playing sport, rather than
this idea that they were robotic in the past. So first up we have True Player
Emotion, which is really about the depth and breadth of animation the players
have. We’ve got roughly ten times the depth of animation [in the next gen
versions]. So for every animation you have on the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3, we've
got hundreds more.
"The second part of it is what we call Human Intelligence. We have roughly four
times the decision making power for the players, so they behave a lot more
realistically. They’ve got a lot more behaviours too.
"And then the last part is the living world. We’ve got the ability for the players to
operate in the theatre of sport. Everything from the way the camera pans into it
to the believability of the crowd's behaviour towards the match going on around
them, and the way the players don’t ever come out of AI. In previous FIFAs there
would be cuts all the time to reset positions and stuff. That doesn’t happen
anymore.
"So it's the believability of the players’ emotion; the believability of the players’
action; and then they believability of the whole scene."
What does that mean for the current gen Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions,
then?
“It’s by far the best one we’ve ever made, but we have to take priorities first. For
years I’ve been asked, ‘When are we going to have good crowds?’ but our focus
has always been on the pitch. That's the same, so you won't get all of the new
crowds or presentation stuff, basically because we haven't had room to get it in.
[On Xbox One and PlayStation 4] we've got room due to the power of the new
consoles and the EA Sports Ignite engine.
"So it's not that the game's not as good, it's just slightly different. Behaviours
are there but we don't have the depth of animation to cover them. Some of the
behaviours aren't quite as advanced, so multiple people challenging for headers
isn't possible on the current consoles."
A lot of our readers asked what information would carry through if they started
playing on current gen consoles but then upgraded to next gen ones when they
came out.
"Your Ultimate Team will, as will your coins. Your EA Sports Football Club level and
XP will carry through too. If you play Seasons online, anything from that will
carry through. But this is only FIFA 14 to Fifa 14. It's not from FIFA 13 to FIFA
14. So if you buy the 360 version when it comes out while waiting for your Xbox
One then your progress won't be lost.
"One thing it doesn't cover - just to make sure people know - is Career mode.
That's an incompatibility in technology. Ultimate Team and Seasons are online;
Career mode is more complex."
Back to your questions: What new stadiums will be in the game - specifically, Villa
Park? (via Dan Sidaway)
"We're not talking about stadiums at the moment. We did release news at
Gamescom about the fact we've got 33 leagues, 600 teams and 16,000 players but
we're not talking about stadiums yet. We're definitely doing a big roll out of all
the news about that soon."
Can you instead talk about how you decide which ones go in?
"It's all different ways. More than anything, what we try to do is make sure the
teams that affect the most players, are the ones that get treated best. It sounds
unfair - I'm a Leicester City fan, so I think it's incredibly unfair as nobody plays
as them - but at the same time we're trying to make sure the big clubs where
most people play are as authentic as possible, and then it slowly trickles down."
Will the Welsh national team be in FIFA 14? (via Tom Hadstone)
"It's another thing we're not talking about yet, but there will news soon. Everyone
asks about the Welsh!"
We had lots of questions about other leagues too. Are there any plans to include
more clubs from the likes of Scotland, Turkey, Ukraine and Africa?
"We're not talking about any of that stuff apart from what was said at the EA
press conference. Sorry everyone!"
With you massive database of teams from earlier versions, have you considered
offering classic tournaments? (via Stephen Terry)
"We talk about that quite a lot, actually. The problem we would have is [not] being
able to roll back the kits - you end up with historical players playing in
contemporary kits, which feels a bit weird. Generally speaking we're only allowed
current kits in the game. That said it's something we talk about a lot . For us the
closest we're every going to get is the [FIFA Ultimate Team] Legends stuff, being
able to transplant heroes of yesteryear into current times when they're at the
peak of their career."
Announced at Gamescom, Legends is an Xbox exclusive that introduces 40 or so
legendary players into the FIFA Ultimate Team mode, ranging from Pele to Alan
Shearer to Paulo Futre and, er, Freddie Ljungberg. It's an eclectic list of players
to say the least. How did they decide who was on it?
"Believe it or not, it was actually an email at work! We were all naming our
favourite players and then we got it down to a manageable list. I'm on record a
few years ago saying I was a big fan of Teddy Sheringham, and he got in.
Obviously being a Leicester fan, Gary Lineker was going to be on there too. But
beyond that, we've got an amazingly diverse team of people at work, and we tried
to hone it down to a list that matters."
Everyone will have their own list of players who should have been on it but, come
on, no Bobby Moore?
"These are people that aren't on the list right now but you never know for the
future. We're definitely doing the 40 or so we've mentioned now, but for the
future? Who knows…"
Back to less contentious matters: Why don't tattooed players have their tattoos in
the game? (Stuart Maughan)
"It's a long and complicated story but all different reasons, really. Sometimes we
don't have permission to use them; there's a bunch of different reasons for that.
We actually get emails and messages from the players more than the fans saying,
'Where's my tattoo?' The copyrights around tattoos is really interesting, you'd be
surprised."
How many players email you asking where their tattoos are?
"Tim Cahill actually sent us a video message about his, which was strange, but
quite a few, believe it or not. We get a lot of messages from players as well
saying, 'I'm faster than such and such, I can't believe you're saying I'm slower
than him!'"
On a related note, Jerry Mwitti wants 'real life things like buying cars, houses,
girlfriends, going to parties and frustrating the manager'. Have you ever
considered going down the lifestyle route?
"Yeah we talk about it but again it goes back to priorities. For us, it's what
matters most to our fans. We're focused on gameplay and for Career mode, we're
focused on making a good 'scouting, transfers, management of players, and
squads and formation and playing the game' kind of Career mode, rather than all
the other stuff that goes on the side. For me, it's a peripheral of what the core
mechanic is. But at the same time, in the future I'm not sure. We talk about it,
and we have this massive list of all the different things that have been
requested, but there's always something more important."
Will FIFA 98's indoor 5-a-side arena ever come back? (via Darren Fisk)
"No, not right now. It's a really popular request, we know that. In Germany it's
almost the number one request for things that they're after. We talk about it a
lot but it's not something we've got plans to do."
Talking of which, what's happening with the FIFA Street franchise that was
rebooted last year?
"We love working on it, cos it's really cool and you get to do some fun, cool stuff,
but it's something that we don't want to keep doing over and over again. We'll
wait until there's something we want to do with it."
Every year it seems the referees get every offside call correct. Will they
occasionally get them wrong this year, leading to additional commentary and
complaining from the players? (via Gerard DeLorenzo)
"It's a weird one - and we talk about that a lot too. So… they won't get it wrong.
And the reason for that is basically we have a lot of people who get quite anxious
playing FIFA, and if they get annoyed enough about losing, to lose because the
game made a mistake ends up with broken things and unpleasantness. So we try to
make sure the game is vanilla about those kinds of things."
Joe Edmed was one of many to ask about the inclusion of a 'dive' button too.
"Same thing. Having moved front the UK to Canada to make the game, and
hanging out with those guys and playing a lot of football, believing in fair play is
also something that I think is an important part of the game. We're not such big
fans of some of the more cheat-y things."
What is the one feature you've always wanted to put in the game but haven't been
able to? (via Chris Watkins)
"I have a humorous one: two ore three years ago, a buddy of mine on the team put
some animated birds in the pre-match Arena that used to fly through the sky. I
asked to get collision detection put on them so you could kick the ball and hit the
birds. We never managed that…"
Surely the power of the next gen consoles can make that a reality?
"Probably but it fell off my radar. I might go back and ask!"
Finally, if UK cover star Gareth Bale signs for Real Madrid , what will you do? (via
Christopher Copp)
"[Confident smile] We're all sorted."
So there's a contingency plan in place?
"[Another confident smile] We're all sorted."
And with David Rutter departs for interview number six while we retire to a secret
behind closed doors room to sample the Xbox One flavour of FIFA 14 [SPOILERS:
It's brilliant]. This Fergie at least is still very much at the top of his game.

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Too long....make dem release the game asap