With the release of FIFA 16 fast approaching, a lot of the talk has been about the introduction of women to the game. But just how do they compare to the men?
Forbes spoke to Nick Channon, Senior Producer on FIFA, and he explains several aspects of the new feature.
We’ve been working on it for three years now. The biggest challenge was how to scale the body. Now we are looking at shoulders and hips it’s allowed us to create much more variety in body types so we can create great representation of female bodies. Also this means we now have more variety in the men’s game too.
We needed to simulate hair. If you look at the men’s game there aren’t many pony tails, if you look at the women’s game half the players on the pitch have pony tails.
He started out talking about the visual aspect of the game, more than the football side itself, which is fair enough. You couldn’t just plonk some boobs on the front of their male setup and hope that the existing ponytails are going to pass as acceptable.
But what about the players ability? Will their stats and skillsets be equal to the mens?
Well… No. Not quite.
You can still have a 90 rated female but she’s not going to play like a 90 rated man. It was key to us to make this authentic to how the women’s game is played.
So basically, the women players have their own independent stats.
A 90 rated woman isn’t as good as a 90 rated man, but she is one of the best players on the women’s side of the game. I find it difficult to disagree with this. I know saying that might annoy a few people, but realistically, they are two separate things. Until the game is played co-ed, there is no definite answer as to whether women and men are on equal pegging.
Of course, some women players are much better than some of the men. But their stats will reflect that, so I don’t personally see it as a problem right now. If you put a rated 90 female, up against a rated 90 male in real life, would they be as good as each other? It’s unlikely. So if you were to integrate the stats, the best women players would be on a lower score, despite being the best in the world in their own field.
I’m sure some people may think otherwise, though. Where do you stand with it?
