EA Sports FC 27 review: come for The Grounds, stay for Career

Date:
Sun, 18 Oct 2026 07:00:00 +0000

Description:
EA Sports FC 27 brings surprisingly big changes to EAs long-running football franchise, but not all of them land successfully.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Ill say one thing for EA Sports FC 27 : its not the same game as EA Sports FC 26 .

That reads like a compliment and in some respects, it is but where previous entries in EAs long-running football simulator series shipped with minor improvements and equally minor frustrations, FC 27 takes bigger swings that flip between successful, insignificant, and occasionally experience-worsening in their execution. Review info Platform reviewed: PS5 Available on: PS5,
Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch 2, PC Release date: Early Access: September 18, 2026 | Full release: September 25, 2026 EA Sports FC 27 at Amazon for 58.99 I wish I could package that sentiment into a neat metaphor (a mixed bag is too hackneyed), but I cant so heres the Cliffs Notes version of my
review: Latest Videos From TechRadar Watch full video here:

EAs shiny new mode, The Grounds, is a hollow imitation of NBA 2K 's The City. Ultimate Team is objectively better than it was in FC 26 , but is still
geared towards card-collecting youngsters and time-rich YouTubers. Career
mode is the best its ever been, but is oddly prone to breakage by the same
new features that make it better. And the overall FC gameplay experience is more challenging than before, but more rewarding as a result.

Still with me? Ill run through each of those mini-verdicts as you read on,
but you get the idea: EA Sports FC 27 is immense fun in parts, dull in
others, and a generally quite confusing entry in a series that rarely changes so much from one year to the next. But hey, change is good... right? Around The Grounds (and out again) Yes, you can emote in The Grounds (Image credit: Future) This years big new addition to the FC franchise is The Grounds an open-world reimagining of the series Clubs mode in which you can compete with friends or randoms in both stadium- and street-based challenges.

I put open-world in quotation marks because The Grounds is not so much a free-roam experience as a third-person menu-hopping one. The idea of
exploring three cultural hubs of football sounds cool, but in reality, these hubs are little more than poorly rendered maps populated by lifeless NPCs (non-player characters), Riddler Trophy-style Drop Kick Targets, and PvP waiting areas. Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me
with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. Each of The Grounds' three districts are connected by a central hub (Image credit: Future) The game modes available within The Grounds are fun enough there are traditional 11v11 matches, FIFA Street -style cage matches, and more casual mini-games like the basketball-inspired Bucket Ball but the open-world
aspect of the experience adds little beyond longer wait times (because you
now have to travel from A to B on foot) and the ability to customize your
pros wardrobe with licensed clothing. At a price, of course. There was quite
a difference between the appearance of my virtual pro in the avatar creation menu (left) and The Grounds itself (right) (Image credit: Future) I wont lie: I did have a good time building my pro and was excited to get out into The Grounds virtual world. But once Id played a handful of matches and completed enough Alex Hunter-ordered errands to buy myself a cool headband (Kylian Mbapp, Paulo Dybala, and Chloe Kelly are the other mentors), the novelty of this new open-but-actually-closed game mode quickly wore off.

With enough friends in tow, I can imagine The Grounds being a lot of fun, and I dont criticize EA for trying something genuinely new with FC 27 . Im just not sure The Grounds actually is all that new its more like Clubs with an extremely elaborate menu system. Players for points An example of a Streamlined SBC (Image credit: Future) Opening Ultimate Team (FUT) for the first time in FC 27 feels like walking into a nightclub sober. Youre immediately hit with a barrage of menus, cards, and checklists, which is a frankly disorienting experience until you remember that this is exactly what FUT has been like for several years now.

Still, once you get over the customary nausea, there are some genuinely neat improvements to be found in this years edition of EAs most popular (and profitable) mode.

My favorite addition is Streamlined SBCs (Squad Building Challenges). These are essentially SBCs that swap the starting XI puzzle aspect for a cumulative target score each player in your club has a value, and you need to exchange enough players to reach that score. You dont need to worry about formations, positions, or chemistry; instead, Streamlined SBCs are purely a numbers game.

Traditional SBCs are still present and correct in FC 27 I personally enjoy the challenge of completing the weekly Marquee Matchups SBC but with Streamlined SBCs, EA has acknowledged that most players arent fussed about
the puzzling they require. Streamlined SBCs are for those who,
understandably, want to snag the SBC reward in as little time as possible.
But I appreciate that EA has kept both SBC types in the game. An example of a Gallery Set (Image credit: Future) The Gallery is a less meaningful but otherwise harmless addition to FUT. Its a sticker book-style card-collection feature that tracks every player whos ever passed through your club and encourages you to curate these players into graded sets. Doing so earns you trinkets and cosmetics (boring), but also Gallery Tokens (less boring), which can be spent on special Hall of FUT players like Loc Rmy, Adebayo Akinfenwa, and Marouane Fellaini.

Honestly, the Gallery interface is as dizzying to navigate as everything else in FUT, but at least there are tangible player rewards to be gained from taking the time to understand it. I just wish The Gallery were available in the FC 27 Web App, so I could kill time grading cards while on my evening commute, and not while playing FC 27 proper. Jockey down the line Auto-tackling is gone in EA Sports FC 27 (Image credit: Future) Its a little hard to give a comprehensive verdict on gameplay in FC 27 , since EA is tweaking the mechanics all the time, but broadly speaking, the biggest gameplay changes apply to defending and set pieces.

On the former, theres now less AI assistance, so computer-controlled players on your team (i.e., those you havent switched to yet) wont auto-tackle an opponent, meaning youve got to be quicker on your L1/LB draw and smarter with your tackle timing. Jockeying is faster for all players as a result, which also makes the Jockey PlayStyle less overpowered than it was in FC 27 .

As someone whos better at defending than attacking, Im all for these
defensive changes and the redesigned corner kicks system also puts more importance on defenders in this years game. You can now manually control player positioning in the box when taking a corner (Image credit: Future) Theres now a longer pause between the taking of a corner kick and the balls arrival in the box, and finally! you get manual control over player positioning within the box itself. This change means corners are now skill-based rather than luck-based, which is absolutely what they felt like before (even if EA would never say so).

I spend most of my time playing the Authentic gameplay preset in Career mode, which is a different kettle of fish entirely, but for those who play Competitive in FUT, Id say defending and corner kicks have seen the most noticeable tweaks in FC 27 .

Skilled dribblers now ride challenges more effectively, too, but this isnt such a significant gameplay tweak in my experience but then again, I havent played too many online matches in FUT, which is where youre likely to come up against the dribble-happy duo of Ousmane Dembl and Lamine Yamal. Ill pray for your controller. The Art of the Deal The redesigned transfer negotiation interface in EA Sports FC 27 (Image credit: EA) After fulfilling my testing-time obligations in The Grounds and Ultimate Team, I couldnt wait to dive into FC 27 s refreshed Career mode. And judging by the view counts on
EAs YouTube Deep Dives for the game (the Career Deep Dive has the most views by a margin of over 1 million ), theres a good chance that you, too, are more interested in FC 27 s slower-paced managerial simulator than any of its other modes.

The big changes this year apply to transfers. The awkward 3D negotiation scenes have been replaced with FIFA 13 -style 2D negotiations, primarily because theres a lot (and I mean a lot ) more negotiating to be done in FC 27 .

Previously, youd offer a sum of money for a player, and if the selling club accepted your price, youd then negotiate personal terms with the player in question. That was it. Two steps. You could pretty much buy any player for
any club if you had the funds to do so.

In FC 27, transfer negotiations are far more realistic for better and worse.

Now, if youve got your eyes on a player, you first have to send an inquiry to determine whether their current club is willing to sell them. The players themselves can also reject your advances if theyre simply not interested in joining your club regardless of the money you mightve been prepared to pay them and their club. If youre rejected, you wont be told the reasons why, but EA says player decision-making is based on tactical fit, club finances, form, historical rivalries, and long-term club philosophy. A small sample of my rejected player approaches (Image credit: Future) And trust me: you will get rejected a lot. Or at least I was while playing as Everton. I couldnt
convince 80% of my transfer targets to even come to the negotiating table,
and even when I did get close to signing a target, theyd invariably be stolen at the last minute by a bigger rival (Newcastle, for instance, accepted my offer for Harvey Barnes, but Barnes rejected me to join Chelsea on deadline day. Mercenary!). Best bit (Image credit: Future) Actually being able to
score from corners and free-kicks using carefully positioned target men, thanks to the revamped set-piece system. If you do get to the negotiation stage, there are some nice new ways to structure deals, including with transfer instalments, agent fees, and performance-based bonuses. But I was honestly surprised by how difficult it was to sign players generally.

You can make transfer negotiations easier theyre set to strict by default when you start a save but actually, after the initial difficulty shock, I came to enjoy the challenge. Sure, I didnt get most of my initial transfer targets, but that struggle made my eventual signings Patrik Schick, Lucas Bergvall, Dan Ballard, and Ral Asencio on loan feel more rewarding as a result. It also felt very Everton to be rejected or outbid so frequently.

One big negative, though, is that players are absolute prima donnas in FC 27 Career mode and their stinking attitudes can sometimes present a real headache.

Its entirely possible that large groups of players hand in transfer requests at the same time because, as per the new minutes system, a player with 41% or higher stamina expects to play. If they dont, they get annoyed and request a transfer. That (sort of) makes sense, but its particularly problematic if you like to simulate lots of matches, as the computer will only play high-stamina players (think 70% stamina and above).

Ive seen some streamers complain that the games liberal transfer request system has ground their Career saves to a halt, and even if you can appease your unruly squad, its not particularly enjoyable to feel like virtual
players are managing you, rather than the other way around.

Unexpected Events are back in FC 27 , too, and these random scenarios like Abrupt Retirement or Urgent Family Leave can similarly disrupt the flow of a season.

Im all for being tested as a manager, but Career mode feels particularly patience-testing this year its more rewarding in places, sure, but it would be nice to play five straight matches without an injury, a mutiny, or an unmissable family funeral. Dynamic Overall gives more weight to form, morale, and fitness (Image credit: Future) Dynamic Overall is a more positive
addition to Career mode in FC 27 . Its essentially a dynamic rating system that causes player ratings to fluctuate throughout the season instead of staying fixed. Form, morale, and fitness can all make a players rating go up or down, and transfer values are impacted by big changes in rating.

In my Everton save, Tyler Dibling played so well so consistently that his rating went from 74 to 83 in a matter of months that seems ridiculous on paper, but its actually representative of how player values change
drastically in real life. Good feature! Should you play EA Sports FC 27? Play it if...

You've always wanted a more challenging Career mode The redesigned transfer system has a huge impact on the realism and difficulty of Career mode in FC
27 .

You can't resist FUT's shiny player cards FC 27 makes it easier than ever to unlock special player cards in FUT via Streamlined SBCs, while The Gallery gives you a place to show off your collection. Don't play it if...

You want an open-world footballing experience Yes, The Grounds is 'open-world' to some extent, but it's more like an elaborate menu system than an enjoyable place to explore and engage with.

You want an arcade-style Career mode Career mode is more feature-packed than ever in FC 27. Its difficulty can be lowered, but it's no longer an arcade-style experience. Accessibility features (Image credit: Future) Like its predecessors, EA Sports FC 27 offers a comprehensive suite of accessibility options, including settings for subtitles, button remapping, color blindness, and increasing the size of the player indicator. It also features a dedicated High Contrast Mode for low-vision and cognitively disabled players.

All of these accessibility options can be found in a dedicated Accessibility Settings tab. The game has six difficulty levels Beginner, Amateur,
Semi-Pro, Professional, World Class, Legendary, and Ultimate and features support for 21 languages. How I reviewed EA Sports FC 27 I played EA Sports
FC 27 for a month, having received the game a few days ahead of its official Early Access release on September 18. During that time, I had access to all modes and features and was able to compete against real-world players who
also had early review access to the game.

I played on PS5 , using a standard DualSense controller, on a Samsung QN95A Neo QLED 4K TV . Ive played every EA Sports football title since FIFA 13 ,
and also reviewed FIFA 22 , FIFA 23 , EA Sports FC 24 , EA Sports FC 25 , and EA Sports FC 26 for TechRadar Gaming.

First reviewed: October 2025. PS4 Deals 1 deals available 64.89 View We
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