FIFA is dead; long live FIFA. EA’s football simulation behemoth has returned for one last hurrah after a nasty public divorce with its licensor, calling itself ‘The World’s Game’ ahead of a painful name change to EA Sports FC, coming next year. But the tagline transcends its bittersweet pomp because, for all intents and purposes, FIFA 23 fittingly does feel like the same game the world has been playing for the past few years, with its reliable end-to-end gameplay and familiar frustrations.

Even at the end of an era, FIFA 23 marks another year of careful attrition from EA, as several tactical and aesthetic revisions supplement its sturdy gameplay blueprint. Yet it’s also an entry that feels both propped up and consumed by its Ragnarok status, begrudgingly pulling down a ruby-red final curtain as the football game genre descends into a maelstrom of chaos.