It's difficult to remember a world in which FIFA didn't dominate the football gaming market.
Annual releases sell millions of copies no matter the critical response,
in a sign that the series has truly captured the market.
It wasn't always like this, though.
Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer was king
until EA took steps to revolutionise FIFA with a roadmap
that would quickly cement its position not only in the gaming world,
but in wider sports culture, too.
The period between FIFA 10 and FIFA 13 produced four of the franchise's most critically acclaimed games,
per Metacritic, but it was work done earlier that let these titles excel.
One game, in particular, was a vital step on the road to taking PES down,
and it's one many players will have overlooked or even forgotten about.
Some 12 years after its release,
we can now look back and see how the UEFA Euro 2008 game
was a pivotal moment in the FIFA franchise's history.
It would set up its future critical and commercial success
while thrusting PES into its most difficult era and out of the consciousness of many players.
In September 2017, FIFA creative director Matt Prior told B/R Football:
"Here in North America, if you say FIFA, the majority of people will think of us
rather than the actual governing body.
A lot of people over here have gotten into football
because of us and our game. The rapid growth in popularity of
football in North America is in part down to us."
It's a bold statement, but FIFA's evolution from being just another football game to owning
the marketplace is in part down to the developer's willingness to take risks at the right time.
Pro Evo's quality and popularity
dipped as the '00s progressed, providing a window of opportunity
that let FIFA sneak in to cement itself as the dominant force,
but it would only do so by using PES' gameplay as inspiration.
—"For me, UEFA Euro 2008 was when I got the first inkling that FIFA
would mount a serious challenge to PES where gameplay was concerned.
I think it's fair to say that EA's previous standalone tournament games had a less-than-stellar reputation,
but Euro 2008 literally felt different for me.
It seemed as if the EA team was taking its cues less from super-realistic animation cycles
(although those still lingered and still do), but more about what made PES great:
less about look and more about feel.
So snappier shooting, faster passing, less focus on 'realism'—
getting everything absolutely, totally right—and more on authenticity.
PES didn't have to be totally realistic,
because in the moment, when you were playing, the response times and the flow of that play
dictated the sense of immersion without sacrificing the animation transition speed.
So this is a very long-winded way of saying that
PES' animations are clipped, which is why it looks robotic in
a lot of the trailers or gameplay footage you see when you're not playing it.
However, when you are playing it, your brain fills in those little gaps.
This is what made PES so immediate, some would say arcadey,
but there's a reason PES has a command called Super-Cancel, which
wouldn't be out of place in a fighting game, because that's what it's about.
Euro 2008 felt like it was going more in that direction.
The licensing war and presentation stuff had been well won,
but it seemed as if the FIFA team had realised that drama
and not perfectly mocap drag-backs was the actual key to success.
And they were right."
—Euro 2008 release was the perfect opportunity
to try something new with minimal risk.
It came midseason, so there was less pressure
for the game to excel commercially, and if the implemented changes failed,
there was no huge commitment on EA's side to stick with them.
The game also built on the foundation of FIFA 07,
which was noted by critics
as a step in the right direction after a string of underwhelming releases. IGN's Alex Simmons said
that FIFA 07 "closed the gap on PES5 more than we could possibly have imagined."
But this progress needed to keep gaining momentum if FIFA was to continue its ascent.
EA supervising director Aaron McHardy reinforced this point with a quote to B/R Football in 2017:
"I think we recognised early that we needed to focus on gameplay
and focus on depth in gameplay
and how we make every game feel different, and that every game feels responsive and fun."
This was a change of tack for EA, which had received disappointing reviews
for its last tournament game before Euro 2008,
which was the Road to World Cup 2006 shambles that failed to capitalise
on the new hardware of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
Euro 2008 flipped this on its head and put PES on notice.
—"I believed it back then in April 2008,
and have absolutely no doubt now,
that UEFA Euro 2008 was the positive turning point for EA Sports' FIFA series.
Speaking as an ardent PES player,
it was also the first step that helped the company emphatically barge past Konami's franchise,
which was seen as the football connoisseur's game of choice.
FIFA 08 before it made some decent gameplay changes,
but it's almost like EA Sports used UEFA Euro 2008
as a guinea pig to go even further, without the shackles or pressure
of a proper numbered game attached to it.
It had no right to play this well.
I say that as someone who had been playing the muddled atrocity that was PES 2008
and grew up putting hundreds of hours into all the PS2 classics, especially PES5.
It was a total role reversal. Konami rested on their laurels,
something that clearly showed in PES 2008 and a few years after."
—FIFA's rival was struggling
and would take years to begin rebuilding its reputation again.
PES' plummet coincided with FIFA's strongest era ever,
one that nailed gameplay and brought in genre-defining modes such as Ultimate Team
while also re-upping on its complete dominance of licenses
and replicating the feel of real-world football.
—"Arguably, until PES 2013,
the games Konami brought to the table showed promise early on,
but ultimately delivered rigid, lethargic and on-rails experiences.
That's even before you went online to be greeted with a laggy, broken mess.
On the other hand, EA Sports used the fantastic foundations laid by UEFA Euro 2008
and went from strength to strength, leaving Konami's series behind.
The focus clearly shifted to gameplay, resulting in the incredible FIFA 09."
—Although the step forward with Euro 2008 was huge,
it would mean nothing if EA didn't continue to build.
Improved gameplay was just the beginning of a juggernaut that would soon take over.
It wasn't just improvements made on the pitch that made an impact, though;
the company also stepped up its marketing in a significant way,
and there was a conscious effort to show critics the long-term plan ahead.
—"So in the aftermath of Road to the World Cup 06, which was on Xbox 360—I gave that 2/10
because it was just a disaster—
EA were really keen to show that they were genuinely trying to improve the series
and close the gap to Konami.
When I was at Eurogamer, they took us out to Vancouver to see FIFA 08 in development,
and they gave us so much time to talk about this, like, huge design document they
had and their roadmap for the next few years.
And I just remember it being very convincing
and impressive. Essentially their pitch, though they didn't
phrase it this way, was that they needed to build FIFA
up over several years in order to deliver a game that could defeat PES.
So they started with the base technology
and basic moves which led to the reasonable, I guess,
but quite anaemic FIFA 07. Then in subsequent years they
were going to layer on more gameplay systems
and refinements to fill out the rest of the simulation.
It was actually really an eye-opening trip for me in that it really torpedoed
a lot of my naive assumptions about corporate
EA and their cynical approach. Whatever the EA that existed around
these guys was like, they were fanatical about football,
and they were trying to create a game series, within the restrictions that the EA model
placed upon them, that would make people who love football happy."
—EA began to promote every new detail, including gameplay tweaks and modes,
often using buzzwords and eye-catching marketing terms to consumers
whose attention was now firmly on them.
Konami failed to do the same in this time of transition.
Players lost interest while EA penetrated television, online and the sport itself
in a way that made FIFA the only choice for many.
They continued to improve on the pitch and introduced Ultimate Team in FIFA 09,
but they really went all-in with the marketing side of things.
They got on the social media
and community train early on, amplifying their messages via official channels
and through growing community voices, such as KSI.
This combined with Konami not adapting to the changing market,
propelled FIFA far into the distance in terms of game quality and sales."
—FIFA has gone on a long journey since the Euro 2008 game.
Despite years of clear dominance, PES has managed to claw
its way back into the conversation over the last few years, especially critically.
EA Sports’ series is currently in a difficult spot, with aspects such as Ultimate Team,
Career Mode and general gameplay receiving lots of criticism.
But the franchise remains a commercial powerhouse after a stretch of undeniable supremacy.
Without Euro 2008 taking a huge step forward at the time it did,
FIFA may have struggled to achieve so much.
—"With all the licenses, stadiums, lots of modes and functional online; EA Sports had a winner.
A big winner. The rest, as they say, is history."