Mes: enero 2022

Pro Evolution Soccer is a football (soccer) video game with legions of fans around the world. PES games are produced for all major consoles including PS3, XBOX 360, Wii and PC and are distributed across all five continents making it a global powerhouse.

Pro Evolution Soccer games have now been around since 1996 when the uniquely titled Goal Storm started the Konami franchise. Along with the FIFA series from Electronic Arts (EA) the two games have gone head to head and dominated the football video game scene throughout this entire time. PES games have always focused on the playability and likeness to real football, whereas FIFA has predominantly been about being ‘official’, sacrificing game play for licensing and an arcade style of play.

The franchise has undergone several name changes in Europe and North America, at the moment the games are called PES followed by the next year to release year, so this year’s latest installment released this October, will be called PES 2013.

The initial name of Goal Storm was kept for just one year, before being changed to ISS Pro in 1997. Then it changed to ISS Pro 98 followed by ISS Pro Evolution in May 1999, making this the first time that ‘Evolution’ had appeared in the title. At this point in the history of the game, updates weren’t released at regular intervals and the first time I was introduced to the game was in 2001, with the arrival of ISS Pro Evolution 2.

Unlike in Europe and North America, in Japan – home of Konami, Pro Evo has retained the moniker ‘Winning Eleven’ since inception, with the prefix of ‘World Soccer’ being added after the first few years.

What made Pro Evo stand apart from other football games was the way the game played. The view of the action was side on and the ball could be kicked in any direction, unlike the FIFA games in which any directional shot would always fly towards goal, making the game seem staged.

Previous games which stayed true to football, such as Sensible Soccer, had top down views, which meant you played by either running up or down the television/monitor screen. Graphics were limited back in the 1990’s, but FIFA and Pro Evo started to change all of this – taking their respective games in different directions game play wise.

From the onset Pro Evolution Soccer never had naming rights for the players or teams, so early on in the franchise an editing option was created in the game. This allowed savvy gamers to edit the players and teams, replacing fake names with real ones. I remember spending hours recreating football strips and renaming all the players, until PES fan forums started a trend towards option files and max drives.

These saved option files were created by groups of fans and then uploaded via the internet to forum pages and download sites, so that all fans could quickly save and rename all the players in the game. Now they had better looking players, kits and real names, but it still didn’t compare to the official licenses of FIFA, but it didn’t have to, players simply wanted a resemblance, as it’s always been the game play that brings back fans year on year to Pro Evo.

This game play was honed over the following years as ISS Pro Evolution 2 became Pro Evolution Soccer in 2001. Game play was being tweaked all the time with AI (artificial intelligence) making the game smarter and the game speeds changed regularly, sometimes speeding up and then slowing down for the next release, as Konami tried to find the balance. Tackling became more of an art, instead of just button smashing and training modes were introduced to allow players to practice before doing things in real games.

Discussion on PES forums alluded to FIFA getting literally shirty with Konami on licensing issues, by forcing Konami to make the fake team names even more obscure (Manchester United were no longer ‘Man Red’, they were now ‘Aragon!’). This provided new challenges for the edit masters and fans always hoped that Konami would battle for the licenses for the next game – to date this still hasn’t happened taking into account PES 2013.

In Pro Evolution Soccer 2 commentators Peter Brackley (voice of Football Italia on Channel 4) and Trevor Brooking were introduced to add a new dimension in the realism stakes. Hearing somebody famous talk about your team during play sounded exciting in principle, but limitations in the technology meant that this could quickly become boring, monotone and often, irrelevant.

By comparison, music was introduced to the menu screen, with Queen belting out ‘We Will Rock you’ and ‘We Are The Champions’ amongst other artists and tracks. Music in the menus was a welcome addition as you could very often spend long periods of time negotiating these pages, especially if you were editing. This has been a feature Konami has maintained and improved over the years, right up until the present, often using small, unheard or unknown groups and giving them a platform to reach people through with their music.

In Part Two of PES games we’ll look at the continuing battle with FIFA, the movement to online and high definition gaming and how PES hopes to regain its football video game crown with PES 2013.

It’s the question everyone is asking not only in Portugal but throughout the world by football fans, now that CR7 and his teammates were sent packing after their defeat at the hands of Iberian rivals Spain in the round of 16 match on Tuesday in Cape Town.

With so much hype surrounding this dream Iberian derby, which featured FIFA’s second- and third-ranked sides in the world, Portugal ended their adventure without any bang as Carlos Queiroz and his squad were clearly beaten by a superior Spanish squad.

Spain won the game 1-0 with a goal by the inevitable David Villa at 63 minutes, which after some careful observation is clearly off-side, though not by much. Towards the end of the game, Portugal’s right back Ricardo Costa was unjustly red carded for apparently elbowing a Spanish defender.

Cristiano Ronaldo the Portugal captain and the world’s highest-paid footballer had probably his worst game ever. He appeared slow and tardier than most of his colleagues, failing miserably to get through Spain’s defense or even warm up his game on a chilly Cape winter’s night.

Ronaldo, who has lately been criticized for not being a good Portugal captain, drifted with indifference and frustration through most of the game, even if it can be rightly pointed out that that he got no help from a sluggish Portugal midfield with a serious lack of passing ability and creativity, which sorely misses players of the caliber of Luís Figo, Rui Costa and Deco when he was in form.

CR7 who mesmerized Manchester United and most recently Real Madrid with his magnificent skills, making him one of the most exciting players in the world of football, slipped back into his annoying habit of shooting from all angles and long distances at every opportunity instead of trying to link with his team-mates up front.

The only time we were able to see the true Cristiano was when he unleashed a typical powerful 30 meter free kick that caused some trouble for Spain goalkeeper Iker Casillas in the first half. Apart from that he only touched the ball on 11 occasions in the second half.

South Africa has a large Portuguese community of about half a million, so the «Selecção das Quinas» had lots of support from tens of thousands of Portuguese fans in a full Cape Town Stadium. Even the non-Portuguese fans that came specifically so see their idol Cristiano Ronaldo, left the stadium highly disappointed with the performance of a player that was transferred for a staggering $132 million last summer when Spanish club Real Madrid acquired him from Manchester United.

Portuguese and foreign newspapers like the LA Times were very critical of Ronaldo’s performance against Spain saying that he strolled through the 90 minutes, probably didn’t need a shower, and couldn’t possibly have raised a sweat, given his invisibility and lack of effort.

Even the encounter of the Portuguese star with Nelson Mandela last week was not forgotten by the Los Angeles newspaper, saying that even the 91 year old Nelson Mandela would have moved more than Ronaldo who is 25, did.

More than likely Carlos Queiroz, who is extremely unpopular in Portugal, will be fired, since his tenure as coach was hardly successful. Cristiano Ronaldo is not the indicated player to be captain of the Portugal squad as he did nothing to lift his nation’s game and keep fighting to the end in the old-fashioned way.

C Ronaldo was also the only player not to sing the National Anthem of Portugal. As captain of the team, this action made him look very unpatriotic to his country and to the thousands of Portuguese fans inside the stadium and all over the world, who had so many expectations of him and of Portugal.

The former footballer of 42 years old, Coach Jose Angel Ziganda, was dismissed by the Osasuna team of the Spanish League this past October 13th due to the results the team has been having at the beginning of this season.

The team is relegated to the 16th position of the 20 teams in the league, with only 4 points on the first six games of the season. The team had 4 tied games with Villarreal, Mallorca, Deportivo and Numancia, and had 2 losses against Valencia and Racing. With these results and the close the team ended to relegation last season, the franchise of Osasuna decided that it was time for coach Ziganda to leave the club.

The news of his release took Jose Ziganda and his assistant coach Andoni Goikoetxea by surprise, but they do accept that the results were not the best for the club. The fact that surprise them the most was that Ziganda became the first coach in 11 and half years to be fired by the club, because in the past, the franchise did not seemed to be focusing on the results. But now the expectations of the franchise are higher as they want to get out of the last positions of the table and be a more remarkable team in the league.

Ziganda expressed that he is leaving the club a little heartrending because he wanted more time to improve the team results and get the best performances of every player, but he accepts that he didn’t managed to win and that the team needed points. »We are very sad but we have to accept it, the reasons are obvious, we have not managed to win and the team needed a change. We wanted more time, because I think that the team has been capable of winning all the games, but the club want results,» expressed Coach Ziganda.

Jose Angel Ziganda was in charge of Osasuna for two seasons, replacing the Mexican coach Jose Aguirre. In his first season 2006-07, Ziganda took the team to the 14th place of the league and leaded them into the 2007 semifinals of the UEFA Cup, which they lost against Sevilla 2-1. However, for the 2007-08 season, Ziganda left Osasuna at the 17th place and very close to relegation. Although the club directives meant to keep him for another year, giving him the chance to turn things around, but the results obtained so far were not different.

The club has acknowledged the press that Coach Jose Antonio Camacho will replace Ziganda; he already signed a contract with Osasuna until June 2009. Camacho was the coach of the Spanish national team between 1998 and 2002, guiding the team to the quarter-finals of both Euro 2000 and World Cup2002. He also coached the teams Espanyol, Rayo Vallecano, SL Benfica and was in charge of Real Madrid for two brief spells; 22 days in 1998 and four months in 2004. More recently, in 2008, Camacho was coaching Benfica again, but after some issues with the club, he decided to leave them. Now his expectations are placed on Osasuna, since he wants to take them out of the last positions of the table and convert them in a successful club in La Liga.

In soccer, arbitrage opportunities are almost endless thanks to the global coverage of every major league in the world.

OddsExchange, an odds comparison site is very useful in finding arb opportunities, not only for soccer but other sports as well. There are so many bookmakers that offer soccer results and that is a very good thing for us. It ensures many opportunities to pick up easy profits.

It is important to note that in UK, many of the bookies will compile similar odds so you would not find many such opportunities between 2 UK bookies in an English football game.

However, there are different odds to be found with European bookmakers which will lead to arbitrage opportunities for you. In your journey to hunt down arb opportunities you should open accounts with as many online bookies across the world as possible.

One of the best soccer tips is to start looking at lower leagues first and work your way up instead of the other way around. Remember there are very few experts on lower league football so more price differences are likely to exist here and so more arbitrage opportunities can be found.

If possible, get news before the bookies. Remember that with soccer you will find that news can change odds dramatically. The good news is that some bookies are much less responsive than others in changing odds and this will result in arbitrage opportunities being created.

Arbitrage opportunities can be found in other soccer markets such as corners and total goals but these are harder to find and your main hunt should be focused on the results after 90 minutes area. In other words, keep it simple, anything beyond 90 minutes might just confuse you.

An important tip that applies to any sport is that you should always secure the best price first, usually the one that is out of line with what other bookies are offering, because this price may not last.