The power of the FIFA video game franchise

The FIFA video game series has been around since the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis console generation of the early 1990s, and the franchise is one of the most important titles in the video game industry.

Using YouGov GameIndex data, we tabulated the top five most popular video game franchises in eight international markets including China, Vietnam, Brazil, South Korea, Germany, the United States, France and the United Kingdom. Of the eight top-five lists, FIFA appears in all but two, and it’s the most popular franchise in Brazil, where 16% of the national population has played the game in the last year, as well as in Germany where 7% of the population has picked up controller and tried their hand.

YouGov GameIndex provides a view of what consumers think of the top gaming brands. The comprehensive tool for measuring brand health performance allows users to continuously track video game publishers and franchises across 16 key metrics.

For this analysis, we’re using Current Customer metric, which is based on the question: “Have you played a version of any of the following video games in the last 30 days?” Scores reflect the average of daily results from the last year.

The soccer/football simulation title is tied with the massively popular League of Legend franchise, although multiple iterations account for three of the top-five most popular titles in China and two in Vietnam.

FIFA is the only sports title on our lists and appears more frequently than some heavy-hitting gaming franchises. Pokémon appears in the top-five list in five markets, including the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Brazil, and Vietnam. Minecraft – arguably one of the biggest gaming phenomena of the decade – appears on four of our eight top-five lists.

FIFA also remains more popular than the grandfather of modern video games, Mario, which also appears four times. It’s worth noting this is the only title that is exclusive to a single platform, which makes its repeated appearance in our analysis even more impressive. Interestingly, though, its popularity is limited to only the north-western countries we examine for this piece – the UK, France, US and Germany. The franchise doesn’t enjoy as much traction in other major gaming markets.

Other internationally popular titles include Call of Duty (which appears three times), Grand Theft Auto (twice) and Garena Free Fire (twice).

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Methodology: YouGov BrandIndex collects data on thousands of brands every day. The Current Customer score is based on the question: “Have you played a version of any of the following video games in the last 30 days?” and delivered as a percentage. Scores are based on an average daily sample size of 219 – 21,524 adults between August 10, 2020 – August 9, 2021.