EA confirms it isn’t secretly “fixing” FIFA matches

Enlarge / EA has convinced a set of class-action lawyers that there isn't a secret algorithm affecting the results for FIFA Ultimate Team squads like this one. (credit: Electronic Arts)

A group of California players has dropped a class-action lawsuit accusing Electronic Arts of secretly using a "Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment" (DDA) to covertly affect the outcome of FIFA: Ultimate Team matches. The group did so after EA proved that the controversial, patented system is not in use in the game.

We first covered EA's Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment system back in early 2018, after a late-2017 academic paper laid out the basic framework. That research found that automatically adjusting a match-three puzzle game's difficulty based on the player's demonstrated skill level led to a 9 percent "improvement in player engagement," (i.e., players wanted to play a bit more). On the other hand, it had a "neutral impact on monetization" (i.e., it didn't lead to players spending more money). EA filed for a patent on the same basic idea in 2016, and the patent was granted in 2018.

Some FIFA players have long suspected that patented technology was at work in at least some of their "Ultimate Team" games. To hear these players tell it, the game secretly uses a hidden, scripted "momentum" system to adjust the results of specific shots or touches based on the current state of the game. It's all part of an effort to manipulate players to spend more money on better Ultimate Team player cards, as outlined by that DDA patent. Or so the theory goes.

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