While EA Sports isn’t completely on board with the Nintendo Switch just yet, it is happy to continue kicking around its soccer franchise on it.
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Speaking with Dream Team, Andrei Lazarescu, who serves as supervising producer for FIFA World Cup mode, confirmed that FIFA 19 will make its way to the Nintendo Switch alongside other consoles this fall. What’s more, the team is working to make it a much more improved game than FIFA 18 was.
He did note that the engine wouldn’t be using Frostbite, EA’s signature technology for action and sports games. At least, not yet. “I’m not closing the door on that possibility,” he explained. “However, we didn’t want to create a dumbed-down version of the Frostbite engine.”
The game’s new “custom engine” promises better visuals and performance overall, in both handheld and TV mode. “The intent was never to have a one-off custom engine that we’re never going to touch again,” he said. “It was to have that as a baseline and then build from there.”
Though a full list of updates for the game wasn’t made available yet, Lazarescu did note some improvements, like how fans in the crowd will now sport face paint and hats. Other touches will make the game “seem better than what you’ve been used to in the core version.”
He added, “We’ll see more of that in the next few years,” indicating that EA would probably continue making FIFA games for the Switch. Now if we could just get other sports franchises to stop by, like Madden NFL and EA Sports NHL…
For now, fans can enjoy the FIFA World Cup update that became available for all versions of the game, adding the popular worldwide tournament for thousands upon thousands of fans to enjoy. It’s a free update, so you should be able to download it now if you haven’t already.
There’s no release date for FIFA 19 just yet but we should be hearing something in just over a week’s time during the EA Play event. More than likely it’ll roll around sometime in late September, giving Madden NFL 19 a little room to dominate with its August 10 release.
