Last year, Italy battled France in the 2006 FIFA World Cup with Italy prevailing in the end with a penalty kick for a final score of 5-3. While this match surely implanted itself into the minds ofmillions of soccer/football fans around the world, an equally as big battle (read: understatement) is happening in the video game front.
Every year, Electronic Arts’ FIFA series and Konami’s Pro Evolution Soccer series (or known as Winning Eleven in the U.S. and Japan) go head-to-head for gaming market dominance. So what could be better than some trash talk from EA to spice things up?
Dan Holman, Marketing Manager for EA, spoke with UK magazine MCV and flexed its soccer muscles at Konami, "I’m happy to say that we’re comfortably on top in the whole FIFA vs Pro Evolution Soccer battle. Our market share has kept on increasing over the past three years, and more and more core gamers are being converted to FIFA all the time."
Holman also stated that EA’s latest released FIFA game, FIFA 07, sold over 1.7 million copies while Konami’s latest released PES game, PES 6 (or Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer 2007), "is lagging behind on just over a million."
Yikes, while it’s great to toot your own horn about your own games, no one really likes a boaster. As a side note, Konami gets an award for the most overly confused international translated game title.
FIFA 08 will be hitting U.S. stores in September while PES 7 (or Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer 2008) will be hitting European stores in October, but carries a TBA date for the U.S.
[Via ComputerAndVideoGames]
