Team Café
For many Ronaldo fans, who are also FIFA
gaming fans, this is finally their year. EA Sports has revealed that Cristiano
Ronaldo will be their global cover star for FIFA 18, which will be released on
September 29. The Real Madrid star is already the early favourite for this
year’s Ballon d’Or, and has landed one individual honour for 2017 already,
having been named the face of arguably the world’s most popular football game
for the first time in his career.
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The ‘17 edition of the game broke gaming
records as the best-selling console title in the world for the year, and EA
believes that ’18 will go even further, with its producers having gone to
Madrid, where they spent an entire day with Ronaldo, to track his exact
movements, so they could bring the world’s best player to life. Ronaldo went on
to take part in a motion-capture session at EA studios in Madrid, to create his
most accurate in-game likeness ever.
Ronaldo’s presence at the centre of FIFA
18 will further up the ante in the rivalry that he shares with Lionel Messi,
given that the Argentine featured on the cover of FIFA from editions 13-16.
However, after the latter’s contract with the gaming franchise ran out, he was
replaced by Marco Reus of Borussia Dortmund, and now the next cover will
feature Ronaldo, who, along with Neymar, wasn’t a favourable option earlier,
given that both players had contracts with rivals Konami, who make Pro
Evolution Soccer. FIFA fans can already pre-order the ‘Ronaldo Edition’ of the
new game, which has a host of extra features.
Café catches up with FIFA gaming fans in
Goa, asking how big it is to finally have Ronaldo on the FIFA cover, and what
they feel about it taking so long to finally get him on one:
Despite being a terrific footballer in
his prime, Cristiano Ronaldo did not make it to the covers of FIFA on the PS4.
Messi was chosen for FIFA 13, 14, 15 and 16 on the FIFA PS4 cover, so it must
be really a big moment for Ronaldo, when he finally got chosen for the FIFA 18
PS4 cover. It probably took so much time to get him on the FIFA 18 PS4 cover
because of the decline in Ronaldo’s fans and increase in Messi’s.
Shawn Pacheco
I’m not Ronaldo’s biggest fan, but there
is no doubt he is one of the greatest players of all time. In recent years,
we’ve had some great past legends like Beckham and Henry, as well as modern
superstars like Rooney and Messi, who have graced the covers of the FIFA
series. It seems only fitting that Ronaldo gets to be the cover star after
winning the Champions League, La Liga, Club World Cup and the Euro
Championship, as well as numerous individual honours in a span of one year.
Akio Fernandes
Having Ronaldo on the cover of FIFA is
huge! It’s been a long time coming. He has been just amazing in the last two
seasons and actually just strived for more and more. It wouldn’t have been this
long to get him on the cover of FIFA, as Messi just dominated the scenes for
quite some time and Ronaldo was bound to his contract with PES. FIFA 18 is
going to be a bomb, Ronaldo on the cover is just magical.
Duncan Marlon Rodrigues
Messi was the mainstay poster boy for
four consecutive years after being replaced by fan favourite Marco Reus last
year; and now finally Cristiano Ronaldo! After the phenomenal season he had
this year, he completely deserves it. After being the cover star on the PES
series a few years ago, Ronaldo ever representing FIFA seemed unlikely. I
frankly feel that the past FIFA titles with Messi particularly being on the
cover were majorly because he outperformed Ronaldo; but this year is
Cristiano’s, his performances have proven that.
Ayman Aga
