The next-gen Pro Evolution Soccer game could be a massive departure for the soccer simulator, as rumours swirl that the series may be poised to go “properly free-to-play”. Konami has, for the last few years, released PES Lite as a free alternative to the main game, which focuses on the franchise’s Ultimate Team mode, MyClub. The implication here is PES 2022 will go beyond that.
Word comes courtesy of a VGC podcast, in which editor Andy Robinson alluded to the Japanese publisher “really changing it up” with this year’s title. He didn’t elaborate any further – and didn’t specify a source, just noted that it’s what he’s heard – but it would certainly represent a seismic shift for the series, and sports games in general.
In an unprecedented move, PES took a year off with eFootball PES 2021: Season Update, effectively releasing a roster refresh while it focused on transitioning to the Unreal Engine behind-the-scenes. A move to free-to-play could be a concern for franchise faithfuls, who’ve grown to love Master League and the series’ other primary single player modes. How will these be monetised if the rumour is true?
FIFA obviously dominates the football game space, and PES has been forced to scrap for a handful of official licenses. But many feel the gameplay is superior in Konami’s effort, with more accurate ball physics and realistic artificial intelligence. Recently it released a rough beta to test the new game’s online netcode, but a full reveal is scheduled later this month.
[source youtu.be, via gfinityesports.com]
Comments 19
So if they go for a free 2 play only multiplayer game, they will answer to “how can we do something worse than MGS survive?”.
They will lose the whole fan bae and community.
Why they don’t go for a COD solution with paid single player and free multiplayer? Why they don’t go for a yearly fee like season update for single player only?
Meh, still too expensive - fifa everytime
The last time I tried to play PES it was worse than FIFA Ultimate Team. Players you buy quickly become useless and you had to continually play as a rubbish team to earn enough of whatever currency it was to fix them. In the end you just never wanted to use good players. At least in FIFA you only had to drop a player occasionally to get the fitness back up, or use an easy to get from playing fitness card (not that I support EA in this, but they had a better system for non payers who didn’t care about getting big name players)
It then went free, so imagine got even worse. Which doesn’t inspire me with confidence here.
RIP PES
Surprised FIFA hasn't went down this route yet tbf
I actually thought a yearly update "for a fee" was a good idea.
No need to start over UT, no pastic waste and shelve space freed from pre-owned FIFA boxes.
All EA's sports games are just last years game with updated teams.
But I suspect EA wouldn't make as much money.
I don't think this will happen. They've literally spent two years building a new game on a new engine. No way they can afford to do it as F2P already. Maybe in the years to come it could happen, not that anyone actually wants it to. You can kiss goodbye to any improvements or updates in the single player modes if that's the case.
This could be a good thing for football gaming! To many years go by with football games being essentially the same thing with just updated teams and kits. If this works then perhaps that model will change and if it doesn't work then maybe it will force change in other ways. FIFA and PES both need to up there game in numerous ways. EA has so much money yet their servers have been horrific for years now! PES on the other hand need to work on their presentation and game modes as this is where they fall flat every year.
@HMazzy111 the trouble is, if it's free to play, I don't see why they would bother spending money on improving presentation and game modes, as the game will mostly be funded by MyClub like FIFA is with FUT. Bad news for those who only like playing offline I think.
Football games just need a base version then have yearly updates to save many things.
I installed new football game, played for around 10 mimutes and uninstalled. Not sure if that suppose to be next gen graphics there already, but it looked bad. Also gameplay wasn't as good as previous PES and I just couldn't bare with it.
@Bamila 10 minutes?! You lasted 5 minutes longer than I did. I thought it was such an odd thing for them to do, especially in terms of PES 22 and people getting hyped for the new engine etc. It really brought me crashing back down to earth as I was hoping for a PES renaissance.
I olay PES20 regularly with a mate. It's fun but I wouldnt necessarily say its better than FIFA. We had to look up a lot of the mechanics because it wasnt explained and often doesnt even makena lot of sense.
But my main gripe is the defending mechanic which boils down to pressing and holding X, and to make it more difficult the referee is super strict which just isnt fun. Sliding tackles are allmost impossible to do without a foul, and imo executing a good sliding tackle in FIFA is half the fun of the game,
@Deljo fifa reskins fifa 14 every year
Fifa became too samey: me doing same moves and ball going into the same places. As someone who played football (soccer) competitively for 30+ years, PES has a level of variety, pace and realism that I can appreciate.
Since PES 2-6 the series went downhill. The Renaissance was pes 17-18, it wasn't quite as good but really shone through the passing and fluid strategy changes. 19 was a misstep and now free to play. Wow konami you really are a bunch of Muppets.
@Illy333 unfortunately I cant agree with that as 14 was probably my favourite gameplay wise. They tend to tweak the gameplay each year and as someone who buys each year the difference can be very noticeable. The big thing for me will always be presentation and licences and fifa just cant be beat in that regard
@Deljo Well you shouldn't be happy EA will be the only one with a full experience. This could go two ways EA does not even have to try anymore or free to play will go big and you will be stuck in a mobile experience on your platform of choice.
@Flaming_Kaiser valid point and I have to agree....
@Deljo As long as 2K does not get their grubby claws on a soccer license if they do all is lost.🤣
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