EA Sports FC 26 Reportedly Making a Much-Needed Change to Ultimate Team

Ultimate Team remains the most popular game mode for EA Sports FC 26, as it has been for the last several iterations of the game. Generally speaking, it doesn’t change much year over year. Every time a new game is released, the same card-collecting, online head-to-head mode that everyone loves.

However, it’s far from perfect, and there have been complaints every single time. EA Sports has largely not addressed them, but when FC 26 finally comes out, one of the most-needed changes is finally going to be implemented for this iteration and presumably those that come after.

EA Sports FC 26 to Add Penalty for Leaving FUT Matches

Previously, there was no reason to stay in an Ultimate Team match for FC if you didn’t want to. Didn’t like the matchup? Just leave and try again. If you’re getting outclassed, just leave and find a more appropriate opponent. That won’t be the case in FC 26, apparently.

According to FGZ on X, a football gaming news account, EA has implemented a penalty for doing that over and over again. Should you leave multiple games in a row, there will be a cooldown before you can try and match with someone again. The report stated 15 minutes as an example, although that may or may not be the time EA goes with.

It is also unclear presently how many matches “multiple” is referring to. That could be anywhere up from two, but it could also mean five or more. Players will likely find out quickly when the game launches on September 26, how many it actually means.

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This is designed to ensure players always get into games and that those games last as long as they’re supposed to be. It’s not as enjoyable to get into games and not be able to finish them on account of an opponent quitting. It’s perhaps even worse to get into a game and not even get started before the other player abandons ship entirely. This will prevent that, or at least it will give players a penalty for committing that infraction.

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And if you’re on the other side of things as a player who’s getting demolished by someone, don’t quit and try again with a different player. You may end up penalized, but losing that match should help the skill-based matchmaking properly place you next time, so for multiple reasons, it’s worth seeing it through.

The game is not yet out, but this change, as well as a few other rumored tweaks, suggest that EA is actually listening to players on some things. FC 26 is just the latest in a long line of yearly releases (formerly the FIFA series), though, so just how different it is remains to be seen.

Ultimate Team allows players to open packs and collect cards to build a lineup all of their own, rather than playing as the set teams or as their own player in Career Mode. For this reason and more, it’s rather popular, so any change that betters this mode is overall a really positive addition to the series.