As if EA wasn’t going through enough this month, what with Madden 23‘s botched launch upsetting even pro athletes, it seems a certain segment of FIFA 23 players have gained access to the soccer simulator one whole month before its September 30 release date. Talk about a score.
Players who preordered the game’s Ultimate Edition were already slated to get access to FIFA 23 three days before its official release, letting them play the game on September 27 instead of September 30. However, according to IGN and Eurogamer, a mistake of some sort allowed Ultimate Edition buyers to accidentally hit the soccer sim’s fields one whole month early, letting them check out the entire game and every team’s roster way ahead of FIFA 23‘s official launch. These lucky, early players have shared a huge number of deets with the public, from the FIFA Ultimate Team mode’s stats to the new gear footballers wear and much more.
It’s unclear just how this leak happened, but VGC suggests it was a portion of the playerbase that had access to the recent beta test and were playing it on Xbox consoles. Updating their beta-test versions somehow gave them full access to all of FIFA 23‘s final modes. Some were even livestreaming the game on Twitch, like user mexico07dan1, before their channels were quickly scrubbed and terminated. EA is also reportedly just banning anyone caught playing FIFA 23 early. Still, these sorta consequences haven’t stopped the series’ dedicated fans from posting their findings.
In fact, Reddit, Twitter, and YouTube are inundated with leaked details. There’s Cristiano Ronaldo’s 81 rating, a downgrade from the 91 he was assigned in FIFA 22. Some folks have demonstrated the FIFA Ultimate Team mode’s UI in copious videos. Hell, even parts of the game’s soundtrack were made public. If you care about spoilers, be careful out there right now.
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Kotaku has reached out to EA for comment.
There’s no word on how EA will handle this leak. While the publisher is allegedly banning players, it’s unclear if their progress would be wiped alongside the swift takedown. Despite this, it seems some players are still checking out FIFA 23 offline before it drops. The fearlessness is unmatched.