Robbie Williams was apparently so keen to appear in 'FIFA 2000' that he would have done it for free.
After making a passing comment at the BRIT Awards in 1999 that he was off to play 'FIFA 99', the team wanted to find out if the 'Angels' hitmaker was serious before asking him to work with them.
Robbie ended up having his solo song 'It's Only Us' soundtracking the opening of the game and, as requested, he was mo-capped and turned into the player Cyber Rob.
Port Vale supporter Robbie also got his hometown team added to the game.
Tom Stone, former vice president of Electronic Arts‘ European marketing division, told Time Extension: “He comes out of the Brit Awards and the interviewer says, ‘What are you going to do now Robbie?’ And he said, ‘I’m going to go home and play my copy of FIFA 99.'
“So we heard this, we called his management, and said, ‘Was Robbie serious? Was he really playing?’ And they go, ‘He loves FIFA."
Not everyone was into the idea of a former boy band member joining 'FIFA'.
Marc Aubanel, senior producer of 'FIFA 2000', noted: “There were a lot of people who thought he was wrong for the game because they still saw him as Take That and his bad thing with the press."
However, his team saw it as a "branding opportunity".
Aubanel added: “Robbie didn’t care about the [money] at all. He’s like, ‘If you get me in a mocap suit and I can be mo-capped and put into the game, I’ll do it for free."
