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Head of EA Sports: "People told us just to copy PES"

R

rvy

Banned
Andrew Wilson explains how FIFA went from the underdog to top of the sports gaming league

Seeing the FIFA franchise dominate the charts it's easy to forget that just a few years ago it was the underdog in the soccer game market. But, says EA Sports president Andrew Wilson, the team refused to take the easy option.

"The easiest thing that could have been done and certainly what a lot of people were telling us was 'Pro Evolution Soccer is a great game, just copy them and then you'll win on marketing! It's a sure fire way to win.' That just wasn't that interesting to us."
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"I can remember at that time when I got offered the job I asked some friend of mine 'should I take this job?' Because FIFA wasn't liked outside the company, and wasn't liked inside the company. Because we weren't, as a company, building a great game."
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He mentioned sitting with the FIFA team at 2am, looking at a broken build of the game and wondering if the series would ever be successful. The defining moments came when they set an ambitious goal for the future and an extensive recruitment overhaul of EA Canada, the FIFA studio at the time, that led to an international team with 19 nationalities.

"We were like the UN of game development teams, but we were all unified around a passion for football. And I think that was the first step."
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"We were like the UN of game development teams, but we were all unified around a passion for football. And I think that was the first step."
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"We had this dream of wouldn't it be amazing if by the time we got to the 2010 World Cup, we could have 11 on 11 online play with 22 real humans around the globe? Wouldn't that be amazing?"

"And I remember the first time we stood up and gave that presentation the company thought we had rocks in our head."
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Cool tidbits here and there.
 
F

faridmon

Member
FIFA is not as good as the PS2 era of PES but have improved to stand on its own foot. I Guess when you have aim, any kind of aim such as copying a superior game, it does give you the push you need to improve.
 
C

charsace

Member
faridmon said:
FIFA is not as good as the PS2 era of PES but have improved to stand on its own foot. I Guess when you have aim, any kind of aim such as copying a superior game, it does give you the push you need to improve.
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Its better than an Soccer game by far.
 
Haunted

Haunted

Member
It's good that they took a lot from PES' core gameplay and controls.

Their other additions have been hit and miss, but it's clear that they've continued to improve while PES has simply stagnated over the last couple years.

I like the bit about them being a truly international team coming together for the love of the game. That's good, that's footy for me.


edit: they should get some more Italians on the team so we can get some diving mechanics in there again.
 
J

jonno394

Member
The turnaround EA have done with the FIFA series has been immense, but at the same time, Konami really failed to transition from PS2 to PS3/360.

PES 5 was and probably still is my favourite football game though, but every FIFA game for the past 3 years has been quality and taken up hundreds of hours of my time
 
A

AlexBasch

Member
Heck, Konami inner studios even ruined the PS2 games in the latter versions, to this day I still can play a match on WE8 (with Owen and Becks on Madrid, fuck yeah) and have a shitload of fun but the PES2010-1 PS2 version is just a trainwreck compared to it.

I have been a long supporter of FIFA since 01, so it's good to see them on the top. I'd still like them to fix several things about the game modes and glitches, but other than that, it's really cool that they admitted doing things wrong and actually fixing them.

Also, FIFA 02 was so broken that you could score way too many goals in short amount of time, God those old FIFA games were ridiculous. Its really great how much they have improved since the inception of this Generational cycle.
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Fuck Totti and his midfield, homing missile goals. @_@
 
F

faridmon

Member
KieferCrimson said:
Heck, Konami inner studios even ruined the PS2 games in the latter versions, to this day I still can play a match on WE8 (with Owen and Becks on Madrid, fuck yeah) and have a shitload of fun but the PES2010-1 PS2 version is just a trainwreck compared to it.

I have been a long supporter of FIFA since 01, so it's good to see them on the top. I'd still like them to fix several things about the game modes and glitches, but other than that, it's really cool that they admitted doing things wrong and actually fixing them.
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PES have gone horrible since they introduced the yearly naming convention. PES 3 is still my favorite.

Also, FIFA 02 was so broken that you could score way too many goals in short amount of time, God those old FIFA games were ridiculous. Its really great how much they have improved since the inception of this Generational cycle.
 
T

The_Darkest_Red

Member
The new FIFA games are some of my favorite sports games ever, and 09 in particular consumed an insane amount of my free time over the span of a year or two.
 
Auto_aim1

Auto_aim1

MeisaMcCaffrey
rvy said:
FIFA prior to 08 is pretty bad. And I'm being nice.
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EA has handled this franchise really well. I can't even imagine how big this is in Europe and PAL territories. And I do agree that FIFA 08 was the turning point for this franchise.
 
R

rvy

Banned
Meisadragon said:
EA has handled this franchise really well. I can't even imagine how big this is in Europe and PAL territories. And I do agree that FIFA 08 was the turning point for this franchise.
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Not as big as you think. It's huge in the UK, but that's about it. Italy is still PES country. I think France is too. There's only one sad, lonely German playing PES in Germany though, AFAIK. He's a Bayern fan.
 
S

Shiloa

Member
I remember once FIFA lost out to PES, EA did at least try to be inventive and catch up. Was it 05 when they added the off the ball mechanic? It was a neat idea but didn't work quite well enough. Since then they clawed back slowly while PES stagnated. By FIFA 09 they'd taken over completely and it was far more fluid. Still lots of issues on both games for me, but I enjoy them anyway.
 
Haunted

Haunted

Member
rvy said:
Not as big as you think. It's huge in the UK, but that's about it. Italy is still PES country. I think France is too. There's only one sad, lonely German playing PES in Germany though, AFAIK. He's a Bayern fan.
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rofl
 
S

Shining Sunshine

Banned
rvy said:
Not as big as you think. It's huge in the UK, but that's about it. Italy is still PES country. I think France is too. There's only one sad, lonely German playing PES in Germany though, AFAIK. He's a Bayern fan.
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It's big everywhere, and I bet FIFA is beating Call of Duty in profitability because of FUT.
 
X

Xater

Member
rvy said:
Not as big as you think. It's huge in the UK, but that's about it. Italy is still PES country. I think France is too. There's only one sad, lonely German playing PES in Germany though, AFAIK. He's a Bayern fan.
Click to expand...

I don't know about Italy but I am pretty sure FIFA is outselling PES in France as well. In Germany that is not even a question. Wasn't it last year when like 5 versions of the game were in the top 10?

And yeah the change to this generation has not been kind to PES. FIFA at this point is clearly the superior game. I think. I hope Konami can turn it around. It's always better to have competition.
 
R

rvy

Banned
Xater said:
I don't know about Italy but I am pretty sure FIFA is outselling PES in France as well. In Germany that is not even a question. Wasn't it last year when like 5 versions of the game were in the top 10?

And yeah the change to this generation has not been kind to PES. FIFA at this point is clearly the superior game. I think. I hope Konami can turn it around. It's always better to have competition.
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IIRC, PES always outsells FIFA in Spain, Italy and Portugal. Thought it did in France too, the last couple of years must have changed things over there.
 
A

AlexBasch

Member
Latin America is/was a huge market for PES. Editing those Option Files and creating lots of patches to include the Argentinian/Mexican (prior to FIFA 2005) Leagues or Copa Libertadores speak for themselves. :p
 
G

GQman2121

Banned
Let's not act like the FIFA License itself doesn't drive a number of sales every year. They're both good games that any fan of the sport can learn to enjoy in some way.

I will say that PES has a lot of very Eastern minded design choices in its UI and inability to skip replays. That shit needs to go......
 
J

jooey

The Motorcycle That Wouldn't Slow Down
it's hilariously obvious who in here only read the title. (luckily only a few?!)
 
G

Guri

Member
Shiloa said:
I remember once FIFA lost out to PES, EA did at least try to be inventive and catch up. Was it 05 when they added the off the ball mechanic? It was a neat idea but didn't work quite well enough. Since then they clawed back slowly while PES stagnated. By FIFA 09 they'd taken over completely and it was far more fluid. Still lots of issues on both games for me, but I enjoy them anyway.
Click to expand...

I remember off the ball. It was on FIFA 2004.
 
S

Sol..

I am Wayne Brady.
B_Rik_Schitthaus said:
Sadly, the same is true for PES.


Those PS2 ones where amazing.
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To me, FIFA has evolved the genre far too much to even make the best of the old PES games tolerable.

It's like that for most sports games for me even madden with what little changes they've made.
 
M

Menelaus

Banned
There were some flashes of brilliance in 12, but for the most part, I felt like I paid 60 bucks to be a beta tester. 11, for all its shortcomings, was the much more polished product.

Tactical defending needs to be sorted; it's not fun.

The new collision physics are great, but make it impossible for the AI refs to make correct calls.

The quick thrown in system is great in theory, but almost never triggers.

Hard to deny that FIFA is driving the genre forward, however. PES has completely stagnated, and is just not a fun game period.
 
B

Blablurn

Member
rvy said:
Not as big as you think. It's huge in the UK, but that's about it. Italy is still PES country. I think France is too. There's only one sad, lonely German playing PES in Germany though, AFAIK. He's a Bayern fan.
Click to expand...

lol

the pes series pulled a torres in the last years. it was on top of the world... and then they sold out and lost all their confidence.

SEABASS NEEDS TO LEAVE!!!

yeah, i said it.
 
R

rvy

Banned
NateDrake said:
How about you start making some improvements to Madden.
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No competition, the consumer is forced into buying it or not getting a football fix. I doubt EA is going to improve it just because they want to make a good game. Madden is the new FIFA at EA Sports. Shit is horrible.

Blablurn said:
lol

the pes series pulled a torres in the last years. it was on top of the world... and then they sold out and lost all their confidence.

SEABASS NEEDS TO LEAVE!!!

yeah, i said it.
Click to expand...

He has spoken. Pretty soon spwolf will jump off the bandwagon as well.
 
P

PaulLFC

Member
Nothing will top PES 4 and 5 for me, although FIFA is a great game. I buy both of them every year (well, up to now anyway) - PES on the PC for the patches. I would have bought Euro 2012 as well had EA actually put any effort into it whatsoever instead of making it a lazy cash grab.
 
R

rvy

Banned
I'm still waiting for someone to top WE9LE for me, but no luck so far. Hopefully at some point they can.
Only WE8LE is better.
 
S

SephCast

Brotherhood of Shipley's
And this is what EA needs to do with NBA. Do all the things NBA 2k does right, and then beat them at the things they do wrong.
 
S

Socreges

Banned
No one ever saw FIFA as an "underdog". They were the giant that sold lazy products each year, while the "underdog" continually bested them. They finally invested more, took a lot from PES/WE, and ended up with the superior product. Meanwhile Konami/Seabass have done a pretty poor job recently.

"The easiest thing that could have been done and certainly what a lot of people were telling us was 'Pro Evolution Soccer is a great game, just copy them and then you'll win on marketing! It's a sure fire way to win.' That just wasn't that interesting to us."
Click to expand...
Yet... that's largely what they did.

And yes, PS2-era PES/WE were amazing.
 
R

rvy

Banned
Socreges said:
No one ever saw FIFA as an "underdog". They were the giant that sold lazy products each year, while the "underdog" continually bested them. They finally invested more, took a lot from PES/WE, and ended up with the superior product. Meanwhile Konami/Seabass have done a pretty poor job recently.

Yet... that's largely what they did.

And yes, PS2-era PES/WE were amazing.
Click to expand...

Quality-wise they were. Surprisingly, PES only started selling as much as FIFA when PES 6 was released, which is pretty sad in retrospect.
 
R

rvy

Banned
LeleSocho said:
Not really, nowadays even people without "gaming culture" know that FIFA is way better than PES there are really few people that still choose the Konami one.
EA really made a good job on this.
Click to expand...

My data is all fucked up, lmao. Poor Seabass, you really done goofed.
 
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