''FIFA Football 2002'', commonly known as ''FIFA 2002'' and known in North America as ''FIFA Soccer 2002: Major League Soccer'', is a football

simulation A simulation is the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time. Simulations require the use of models; the model represents the key characteristics or behaviors of the selected system or process, whereas the s ...

video game released in 2001, produced by

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 ...

and released by

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 ...

. FIFA 2002 is the ninth game in the '' FIFA'' series. Power bars for passes were introduced, and dribbling reduced in order to attain a higher challenge level. The power bar can also be customised to suit the gamer's preference. The game also includes club emblems for many more European clubs as well as for major Dutch clubs such as PSV,

AFC Ajax Amsterdamsche Football Club Ajax (), also known as AFC Ajax, Ajax Amsterdam, or simply Ajax, is a Dutch professional football club based in Amsterdam, that plays in the , the top tier in Dutch football. Historically, Ajax (named after the l ...

and

Feyenoord Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Dutch professional football club (association football), football club in Rotterdam, which plays in the Eredivisie, the top tier in Dutch football. Founded as Wilhelmina in 1908, the club changed to various names bef ...

, although there was no Dutch league of any kind (they were under the "Rest of World" header). This game also features, for the first time, the Swiss Super League, at the cost of excluding the Greek League. A card reward system licensed from Panini was also introduced where, after winning a particular competition, a star player card is unlocked. There is also a bonus game with the nations that had automatically qualified for the 2002 World Cup (France, Japan and South Korea), in which the player tries to improve the FIFA ranking of their chosen team by participating in international friendlies. Many of the international teams in the game are not licensed (some of them down to the players' names like the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

), as well as smaller countries such as

Barbados Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the Caribbean region of the Americas, and the most easterly of the Caribbean Islands. It occupies an area of and has a population of about 287,000 (2019 estimate) ...

, who were only given numbers as player names. To date, this was the last ''FIFA'' edition (not counting the World Cup versions) to feature the Japanese national team, since Japan Football Association would go on to concede exclusive rights to

Konami , is a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machines, slot machines, and arcade cabinets. Konami has casino ...

's ''

Pro Evolution Soccer ''eFootball'', formerly known as ''Pro Evolution Soccer'' (''PES'') internationally and in Japan and North America, is a series of association football simulation video games developed and published by Konami since 1995. The series consists ...

'' series. Also, this was the final ''FIFA'' edition to feature the

Israel Premier League The Israeli Premier League ( he, ליגת העל, ''Ligat Ha`Al'', ), is a professional association football league which operates as the highest division of the Israeli Football League – the state's league of Israel. The league is contested b ...

and its teams.

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

and Arsenal star

Thierry Henry Thierry Daniel Henry (born 17 August 1977) is a French professional football coach, pundit, and former player who is an assistant coach for the Belgium national team. Considered one of the best strikers of all time and one of the best player ...

is featured as the cover star. ''FIFA Football 2002'' the last ''FIFA'' for 10 years to only have one person as the cover star, before

Lionel Messi Lionel Andrés Messi (; born 24 June 1987), also known as Leo Messi, is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a forward for club Paris Saint-Germain and captains the Argentina national team. Widely regarded as one of the ...

appeared alone on '' FIFA 13''.

Reception

Gary Whitta Gary Leslie Whitta (born 21 July 1972) is an English screenwriter, author, game designer, and video game journalist. He was editor-in-chief of both the UK and US editions of ''PC Gamer'' magazine and contributor to gaming magazine ''ACE''. Whit ...

reviewed the PlayStation 2 version of the game for '' Next Generation'', rating it four stars out of five, and stated that "With improved tactics and graphics, ''FIFA 2002'' once again cements itself at the top of the virtual soccer universe." The game was met with positive 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 82% and 77 out of 100 for the PC version; 81% and 81 out of 100 for the GameCube version; 79% and 81 out of 100 for the PlayStation version; and 79% and 82 out of 100 for the PlayStation 2 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 it a score of 34 out of 40 for the GameCube version, and 32 out of 40 for the PS2 version. ''GameSpot'' named ''FIFA Football 2002'' a runner-up in its annual award category for the best traditional sports

console game A console game is a type of video game consisting of images and often sounds generated by a video game console, which are displayed on a television or similar audio-video system, and that can be manipulated by a player. This manipulation usually ...

, which went to ''

NBA 2K2 ''NBA 2K2'' is a 2001 sports video game developed by Visual Concepts and published by Sega for Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, Xbox and GameCube. ''NBA 2K2'' featured more street courts such as Mosswood, Fonde Rec Center, Venice Beach, etc. The cover ...

''.

Notes

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fifa Football 2002 2001 video games Electronic Arts games EA Sports games Association football video games Cancelled Game Boy Advance games 2 GameCube games PlayStation (console) games PlayStation 2 games Video games developed in Canada Video games scored by BT (musician) Windows games Video games set in 2001 Video games set in 2002 La Liga licensed video games D.I.C.E. Award for Sports Game of the Year winners