Pro Evolution Soccer

The series consists of eighteen main installments and several spin-offs, including the mobile game Pro Evolution Soccer Club Manager.

Fans of the series often make "option files" and "patches" which modify all player names into those of their real life counterparts, as well as including transfers from the latest transfer window and, occasionally, altered stats of more obscure players whose in-game attributes do not precisely replicate their real life skills.

More experienced gamers often use "patches", editing the actual game code and modifying the graphical content to include accurate kits for unlicensed teams, new stadiums, and footballs from Nike, Inc., Puma, Umbro and Mitre, as well as more Adidas balls.

Konami have become less tolerant of this kind of fan editing in recent years, and now encrypt the data pertaining to kits and player statistics in each new release.

Developed by Konami Tokyo, ISS Pro introduced a new 3D engine capable of better graphics and more sophisticated gameplay than its rival.

It spawned the Pro Evolution Soccer (PES) series, which became known for having "faster-paced tactical play" and more varied emergent gameplay, while FIFA was known for having more licenses.

[6] In the late 2000s and onwards, EA and Konami began borrowing gameplay elements from one another's respective titles, and eventually (due to poor impressions of PES 2008, and higher-than-expected impressions of FIFA 08), FIFA managed to pull ahead by a significant margin in the early 2010s and emerged as the world's most successful sports video game franchise.

The following three games in the series were also produced by Konami Computer Entertainment Tokyo and they were released under the name of ISS Pro for the European market and Winning Eleven for the rest of the world.

The licensing was much the same, but infamously all Dutch players were called "Oranges" (e.g. goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar was renamed "Oranges025", Johan Cruyff was "Oranges082", etc.

), and instead used very ambiguous names (e.g. Manchester United were now Aragon, Liverpool became Europort, and West Ham became Lake District).

The gameplay was changed to accompany this, with more fast-paced action than that of PES 2, a much better physics engine, additions such as the advantage rule improved passing and long-ball functions, while as per usual, more licences (with the infamous Dutch "Oranges" removed, replaced with pseudonyms such as "Froibaad" in the place of Patrick Kluivert), more club teams and the Master League is now split into regional divisions, with competitions equivalent to the Champions League with matchball Adidas Finale 03 without UCL watermark, the UEFA Cup and as Umbro was no longer revived, the company has been replaced by Adidas and Adidas Fevernova as Official Match in Winning Eleven 7 Japan version.

As a result, clubs in, for example, the English League, an unlicensed league, have ambiguous names like "West London Blue" and "Man Red" for Chelsea and Manchester United respectively, and their home grounds Stamford Bridge and Old Trafford are respectively named "Blue Bridge" and "Trad Brick Stadium".

The game also includes an "International Cup" and four regional Cups: Tagline: "Bring it On" Pro Evolution Soccer 5 (known as World Soccer: Winning Eleven 9 in North America and Japan) the fifth installment in the series, was released in October 2005 and featured John Terry and Thierry Henry on the cover and alongside Didier Drogba on the main menu.

Pro Evolution Soccer 6 (World Soccer: Winning Eleven 10 in Japan and Winning Eleven: Pro Evolution Soccer 2007 in the United States) is the sixth installment in the series and was officially released in the UK on 27 October 2006 and 28 April 2006 exclusively PlayStation 2 released in Japan, upgraded from stuck kits without licensed league in Season 2005-2006 but used kits licensed from previously World Soccer Winning Eleven 8 Japanese version to new kits 3 licensed league from season 2004–2005 to season 2005-2006 included real font and numberic football players, for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, Xbox 360 and PC platforms and on 9 February 2007 for the Nintendo DS.

Pro Evolution Soccer 6 was issued with more tricks and an overall more attacking mentality, but whether it does make it easier to take on defenders and get forward is debatable.

The French Ligue 1 is now included as fully licensed league first time from Pro Evolution Soccer 6, as well as the Spain LaLiga, Italian Lega Calcio Serie A and Dutch Eredivisie, plus several other individual clubs.

Also, the recent extensions to Old Trafford are not included, but included only J-League Winning Eleven 10 + Europe League 06'-07' with real name Manchester United stadium Old Trafford, while Serbia and Montenegro are still present despite the dissolution of the country in May 2006, this being due to the disestablished state competing at the 2006 World Cup.

While in some respects keeping the same structure of its predecessor, PES 2009 makes a large number of improvements, starting from the graphics, now better suited for HD image technologies.

This game has sponsored Lazio once in real life (during a match against Inter Milan), but the team's in-game kit does not feature the PES 2009 sponsorship.

For the first time in the series' history (excluding the regional versions which included the J & K-Leagues 1 and 2), the game featured unlicensed secondary leagues.

Also in April 2016, the special edition of PES 2016 called UEFA Euro 2016 which features Real Madrid and Wales player Gareth Bale on the cover, updated start from Data Pack 3.00 released in March 2016 with official background UEFA EURO 2016 France with official HUD in during live game, in title game and Cup mode or Exhibition mode when you selected this real competition name.

Tagline: "Control Reality" Pro Evolution Soccer 2017 (officially abbreviated as PES 2017, also known in Japan as Winning Eleven 2017) is the 16th installment in the series.

The cover of the game features Barcelona players, including Neymar, Lionel Messi, Luis Suárez, Ivan Rakitić and Gerard Piqué.

On 26 July 2016, Konami Digital Entertainment officially announced a premium partnership with Barcelona allowing "extensive" access to the Camp Nou, which will be exclusive to the game for three years.

[14] Tagline: "Where Legends are Made" Pro Evolution Soccer 2018 (officially abbreviated as PES 2018, also known in Japan as Winning Eleven 2018) is the 17th installment in the game series.

Tagline: "The Power of Football" Pro Evolution Soccer 2019 (officially abbreviated as PES 2019, also known in Japan as Winning Eleven 2019) is the 18th installment in the game series.

According to NetEase Games, they stated his comments "hurt the feelings of Chinese fans and violated the sport's spirit of love and peace.

[citation needed] On 15 July 2020, it was announced that eFootball PES 2021 Season Update would be released in celebration of the series' 25th anniversary.

Lionel Messi (Barcelona) is the cover star of the standard edition, alongside PES ambassadors Cristiano Ronaldo (Juventus), Alphonso Davies (Bayern Munich), and Marcus Rashford (Manchester United), each representing one of the game's partner clubs.

eFootball was met with overwhelmingly negative reception from critics and players alike because of the game's poor technical and graphical quality, and its lack of teams and features.