Ronaldo’s EA Sports FC rival is finally playable this week

But is it going to be good?

Cristiano Ronaldo wearing a Real Madrid jersey on the pitch.
Photo by Oleg Dubyna via Creative Commons licenses

While most soccer fans focus solely on EA Sports FC, a new competitor is here to spice up the market. And it’s coming this week.

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Those who follow sports in the gaming industry should be familiar with UFL. Announced in 2021, the game is set to rival EA Sports FC and is backed up by some big names in soccer. This includes arguably the biggest star of the 21st century, Cristiano Ronaldo. It launches in beta on June 7.

The beta will be available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. Unfortunately, it will only last until June 9. So, if you’re keen on seeing if UFL is a real contender to take down EA Sports FC, you need to hurry.

The teaser trailer for the beta focuses on Cristiano Ronaldo. But the former Manchester United and Real Madrid player isn’t the only ambassador of the game. Other players supporting UFL include Arsenal defender Oleksandr Zinchenko, Manchester City star Kevin de Bruyne, former Liverpool forward Roberto Firmino, and current Chelsea striker Romelu Lukaku.

The EA Sports FC rival is advertised as a game “for all.” UFL’s gameplay trailer from 2022 underlined how it’s free-to-play and fair-to-play. Developers have backed this statement on multiple occasions.

Cristiano Ronaldo in UFL's promotional poster.
Can Cristiano Ronaldo and UFL make a case on their own? We’ll find out soon enough. Image via Strikerz Inc

“This is one of our core principles, essential for everything we do. We believe that our players’ success should not depend on the number of in-game purchases or the value of donations they make, but on their gaming skills, experience, and mastery,” Strikerz Inc.’s CEO, Eugene Nashilov, told IGN in 2021.

UFL is built using Unreal Engine 5 and has been in development for eight years. But despite the beta being finally almost here, the gaming community isn’t excited about its launch. Fans on social media said, “It’s taken EA and Konami a lot of years to get to where they are at, and they are huge companies.” With that in mind, they fear UFL is bound to fail.

Author
Image of Mateusz Miter
Mateusz Miter
Freelance Writer at Dot Esports. Mateusz previously worked for numerous outlets and gaming-adjacent companies, including ESL. League of Legends or CS:GO? He loves them both. In fact, he wonders which game he loves more every day. He wanted to go pro years ago, but somewhere along the way decided journalism was the more sensible option—and he was right.