The rivalry between EA and Konami seems to intensify year on
year with both companies offering something different from the other which
appeals to fans of each franchise. Even though FIFA is largely the most popular and most played of the two, the latest installation of Konami's PES has seen the most traction in years. Many tried and true Fifa players have made the switch to Konami's take on football simulation and have enjoyed it’s slower and more
realistic gameplay and ball physics it provides. This is a credit to Konami who has been developing and fine-tuning the gameplay on PES for some time now.
The surge in the demand for PES by previous Fifa plays isn’t
all Konami's doing, EA has played a major part in that. From micro-transaction
to severs going down at the most inappropriate times among other issues has left the
fan base of the popular franchise frustrated. It so bad to the extent that pro
Fifa players were forced to play a match of rock paper scissors to determine
the winner of their match because they could not invite themselves to a match
in a licensed EA qualifier due to servers being down.
These issues have also affected the view count of the video game. For
the first time ever, PES had more twitch viewers count than Fifa due to streamers trying and actually liking PES, causing them to stay with the game. A simple search on youtube, for instance, will bring up quite a number of content creators playing the master league mode
which is Konami's alternative to FIFA's career mode.
MyClub is Konami's answer to FIFA's money-making machine
which is Ultimate Team (FUT). But unlike in FIFA that you need to spend a lot of money
opening packs to get good players, in myClub, you can do that by just playing
the game.
It's fair to say Konami has had a good year so far, but what can they
do in order to keep closing the gap between them and EA?
Menus
For starters, Konami needs to step up the off-field experience
that they provide in Pro Evolution Soccer. PES menus have gotten better but are still not
good enough and its time Konami realizes that the things that go on off the field are just as important as the gameplay.
MyClub
Konami also needs to lean fully into myClub in order
to make it even more entertaining than it is at the moment. Even though the
mode very fun as it is, it suffers from a lack of events when compared to EA’s
ultimate team. The co-op mode in eFootball PES 2020 is a good step in the right direction but Konami
needs to do more on that front.
Licenses
This is probably the major reason why EA's FIFA is so far
ahead in terms of popularity as they have the vast major of the licenses allowing
them to have official kits, scoreboards, stadiums, and more. This also allows
them to organise official tournaments with these registered teams which surely
raises its appeal. If you are on PC or PS4, then this isn’t a big problem because
it can be fixed with a patch in less than ten minutes and your game will look no
different from Fifa in terms of official kit, team logo, etc. Konami has made the right moves in
getting some licensing deals but we want to see more of that in PES 2021.
With a few game clips showing as the capabilities of next-Gen hardware on the PS5 and Xbox Series X, Konami can put PES in the perfect position by taking full advantage of what these platforms have to offer, therefore marking the start of PES' resurgence. Imagine seeing Messi rendered by the fox engine on PES on the PS5, I know I want to.
To add, Konami's slogan which is "the pitch is ours" is undoubtedly true but the franchise still needs a bit more if it is to leapfrog
FIFA for the most popular football video game--and Konami, please fix free-kicks.