''2002 FIFA World Cup'', sometimes known as ''FIFA World Cup 2002'', is the second

EA Sports EA Sports is a division of Electronic Arts that develops and publishes sports video games. Formerly a marketing gimmick of Electronic Arts, in which they tried to imitate real-life sports networks by calling themselves the "EA Sports Network ...

official

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...

video game and tie-in to the

2002 FIFA World Cup The 2002 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Korea Japan 2002, was the 17th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial football world championship for men's national teams organized by FIFA. It was held from 31 May to 30 June 2002 at sites in South Korea an ...

, released for GameCube, Microsoft Windows, PlayStation, PlayStation 2 and

Xbox Xbox is a video gaming brand created and owned by Microsoft. The brand consists of five video game consoles, as well as applications (games), streaming services, an online service by the name of Xbox network, and the development arm by the ...

. It was developed by

EA Canada EA Vancouver (formerly known as EA Burnaby, then EA Canada) is a Canadian video game developer located in Burnaby, British Columbia. The development studio opened as Distinctive Software in January 1983, and is also Electronic Arts's largest and ...

and Creations, with

Intelligent Games Intelligent Games Ltd was a British video game developer based in London. The company was established in 1988 as The Intelligent Games Co. by Matthew Stibbe, who was studying at Pembroke College in Oxford. Following his graduation and the re ...

assisting the development of the PC and sixth-generation console versions, with additional assistance from Tose Software for the GameCube version. The game was published by EA Sports in North America and Europe and published by

Electronic Arts Victor was a joint-venture between Electronic Arts and Victor Entertainment. They made sports games for the Family Computer, Super Famicom, and the Mega Drive. This brand name is unknown outside Japan and the emulation community (since the brand only a ...

in Japan. The GameCube version was a

launch title This list includes terms used in video games and the video game industry, as well as slang used by players. 0–9 A ...

for the system in Europe.

Overview

A stepping stone between the game engines of ''

FIFA Football 2002 ''FIFA Football 2002'', commonly known as ''FIFA 2002'' and known in North America as ''FIFA Soccer 2002: Major League Soccer'', is a football simulation video game released in 2001, produced by Electronic Arts and released by EA Sports. FIFA 20 ...

'' and '' FIFA Football 2003'', the game still incorporates the power bar for shots and crosses but with a steeper

learning curve A learning curve is a graphical representation of the relationship between how proficient people are at a task and the amount of experience they have. Proficiency (measured on the vertical axis) usually increases with increased experience (the ...

and customisation of the chances of being penalised by the match referee. Some kits are licensed, along with the player likeness and the stadia of the

. Unlike the previous games in the FIFA series, the game had an original soundtrack performed by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, although " Anthem" by

Vangelis Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou ( el, Ευάγγελος Οδυσσέας Παπαθανασίου ; 29 March 1943 – 17 May 2022), known professionally as Vangelis ( ; el, Βαγγέλης, links=no ), was a Greek composer and arranger of ...

is used as one of the match entrance fanfares.

Teams

The game features each of the 32 teams that qualified for the

, along with nine other national teams that did not qualify: Australia,

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders ...

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

and Switzerland.

Reception

''2002 FIFA World Cup'' was met with positive to average reception. GameRankings and

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

gave it a score of 79% and 80 out of 100 for the PC version; 76.58% and 73 out of 100 for the PlayStation 2 version; 76.05% and 79 out of 100 for the Xbox version; 73.59% and 78 out of 100 for the GameCube version; and 68.75% and 77 out of 100 for the PlayStation version. In Japan, ''

Famitsu formerly ''Famicom Tsūshin'', is a line of Japanese video game magazines published by Kadokawa Game Linkage (previously known as Gzbrain), a subsidiary of Kadokawa. ''Famitsu'' is published in both weekly and monthly formats as well as in the f ...

'' gave the GameCube, PS2, and Xbox versions each a score of 30 out of 40. The PlayStation 2 version of ''2002 FIFA World Cup'' received a "Gold" sales award from the

Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association The Association for UK Interactive Entertainment (Ukie) is a non-profit trade association for the video game industry in the United Kingdom (UK). Ukie was originally founded as the European Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA), and the ...

(ELSPA), indicating sales of at least 200,000 copies in the United Kingdom. The game was an immediate hit in Italy, with sales of 90,000 units across all platforms within one day of release. The game sold 3.5 million copies by October 2002.

Lawsuit

Bayern Munich and German international goalkeeper

Oliver Kahn Oliver Rolf Kahn (; born 15 June 1969) is a German football executive and former professional player who played as a goalkeeper. He started his career in the Karlsruher SC Junior team in 1975. Twelve years later, Kahn made his debut match in t ...

successfully sued

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...

for their inclusion of him in the game without his prior consent despite EA reaching an agreement with FIFPro, the body that represents all FIFA players. As a result, EA was banned from selling copies of the game in Germany and was forced to financially compensate Kahn.Oliver Kahn wins case against EA
''- uib.no'' 29 April 2003

References

External links