Konami
Fifa has struck an agreement with Konami to stage FifaE World Cup events featuring the Japanese video game publisher’s eFootball video game.
Two events will be held during the inaugural year of the partnership, with participants from 18 nations invited to participate in a console and a mobile tournament, the winners of which will both be crowned a FifaE world champion.
“We are incredibly excited to join forces with Konami,” said Romy Gai, chief business officer at Fifa. “This collaboration aligns perfectly with our mission to promote football globally and to provide a platform for players to showcase their skills. We truly believe in an inclusive ecosystem which allows different communities to be part of the FifaE competitions.”
The collaboration with Konami fills a void left by EA Sports, whose FIFA series was previously used to power the FifaE World Cup, first held in 2004 as the Fifa Interactive World Cup (FIWC).
However, since Fifa’s high-profile split with EA in 2022, world soccer’s governing body does not have an official soccer simulation to use for its flagship esports event. It had been linked with a licensing deal with 2K Sports for an officially licensed simulation, but developing a title capable of challenging EA Sports in terms of quality could take years.
With that in mind, Konami’s eFootball is the only comparable game on the market. eFootball is an evolution of the Pro Evolution Soccer (PES) series which had major critical and commercial success in the 1990s and 2000s.
Konami struggled to keep up with EA Sports’ financial muscle in the 2010s, falling behind in terms of gameplay and licensing, leading to a shift in focus to free-to-play (F2P) and esports in a bid to differentiate itself. However, the game has still trailed EA Sports FC in terms of feature set, player base and critical perception.
“At Konami, we have continued to take on challenges in the development of football simulation and esports,” said Koji Kobayashi, senior executive officer at Konami Digital Entertainment. “We are very pleased to be able to contribute to the promotion of eFootball in a new dimension through this collaboration with FifaE. We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Fifa for providing us with this opportunity.
“We can’t wait for the FifaE World Cup to begin. We look forward to sharing the enthusiasm, excitement, and joy of our players around the world through the FifaE World Cup.”
Since the split with EA Sports, Fifa has used its new freedoms to expand its esports portfolio, signing deals with Epic Games’ Rocket League and Sports Interactive’s Football Manager, both of which will be the subject of a FifaE World Cup championship.
Fifa’s split with EA Sports was a huge surprise given the former received significant revenues and marketing benefits for intellectual property (IP) that delivered very little. With gaming and esports an increasingly important channel for engaging younger fans and EA FC being so influential, the long-term impact of not being part of that ecosystem could be hugely damaging.
While deals with Rocket League and Football Manager, and the wider expansion of the FifaE brand, are shrewd moves, it would have been odd for Fifa not to have a soccer-based esports tournament for too long.
Unfortunately, EA Sports has virtually decimated the competition over the past decade and a half. The costs of development and licensing, coupled with the need to assemble critical mass for a sustainable online operation, are a huge undertaking and help explain why Konami moved away from trying to compete on like-for-like terms.
2K Games, which has vast revenues thanks to its ownership of Grand Theft Auto developer Rockstar and a strong track record in sports video game development, is one of the few companies capable of taking on the challenge, especially if it gains the Fifa licence, but it would be a multi-year project.
eFootball, despite its shortcomings, is therefore the only choice for now. Konami will be delighted at the legitimacy this partnership conveys on its project and the awareness it will drive for eFootball moving forward.
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