EA Sports Gamepad for iPhone

FIFA Soccer 12 for iPad players who long to test their skills against their friends will want to download the free EA Sports Gamepad app from Electronic Arts. Once you master the modest challenge of setting up the app, it’s easy to turn your iPhone or iPod touch into a virtual gamepad for controlling EA’s iPad-based soccer game.

The app itself doesn’t offer much in the way of instruction, but you can find some helpful pointers on the EA Sports Gamepad App Store page. There, you’ll learn you need to turn off Wi-Fi on both the iPad running FIFA Soccer 12 and on the iOS device you’re hoping to turn into a controller. You’ll also need to turn on Bluetooth on both devices.

I had my best luck pairing up the two devices following this approach: I launched FIFA Soccer 12 on my iPad, and selected the Quick Match mode. From there, I picked the teams and then moved to the Select Sides screen. That’s when I launched the Gamepad app and tapped on Seek Game. My iPad appeared on the ensuing list; tapping it pairs the devices.

From there, your iPhone functions as a game controller, with the d-pad and virtual buttons appearing on your iOS device and controlling the action on your iPad. Many of the advanced swipes work as well via the Gamepad app as they do on the FIFA Soccer 12 screen. For instance, double-tapping the screen allows your player to juke and feint around the opposition; that works perfectly well on the Gamepad. Other controllers don’t make the transition as easily. On penalty kicks, for example, the usual swiping controls didn’t make my goalkeeper move to block shots.

You can pair two devices to an iPad running FIFA Soccer 12, allowing you and an opponent to play each other with the Gamepad app loaded on both devices. It’s a decent—and free—method for adding multiplayer capability to EA’s soccer offering for the iPad.

[Philip Michaels is the editor of Macworld.com.]