PES History: From Winning Eleven to eFootball PES 2021

When we say PES, what comes to mind are the days that began with CRT televisions in the PS1 era, when we played without understanding most of what was written. From the games we played in Japanese in the Wining Eleven series to the era of playing against online opponents, many new releases were added to the series.

In this article, we covered the journey from Wining Eleven through to the PES series, from the past to the present, and crowned the evolution from 1994 to today with a video.

When Did Wining Eleven Come Out?

Pro Evolution Soccer World Soccer: PES, as we know it, is a series of football games developed and published by Konami. Every year, the games used to be released in late September or early October under two different names. They were published as World Soccer: Winning Eleven in Japan and Asia, and as Pro Evolution Soccer in Europe, North America and Asia (Indonesia only).

As of December 2011, the Pro Evolution Soccer series had been localized in 19 languages and was already available in 62 countries. As of December 2012, it had managed to become one of the best-selling video game series by selling 81,650,000 copies worldwide.

The first game, of the Pro Evolution Soccer series, Goal Storm (also known in Japan as World Soccer Winning Eleven), was developed by Konami Computer Entertainment Tokyo Inc. and released in 1996.

The 1995 Winning Eleven was released for the PlayStation platform and could only be played with teams from the J1 League.

The Journey That Began with the ISS Pro Series Continued as PES

ISS Pro 97 was released on June 1, 1997, ISS Pro 98 on May 1, 1998, ISS Pro Evolution in May 1999, and ISS Pro Evolution on March 24, 2000. After the series became very popular, the name of the game was changed and it was released for PS2 as Pro Evolution Soccer. After the first PES game on March 15, 2001, the series continued with Pro Evolution Soccer 2 on September 19, 2002, Pro Evolution Soccer 3 on August 7, 2003, Pro Evolution Soccer 4 on August 5, 2004, Pro Evolution Soccer 5 on August 4, 2005 and Pro Evolution Soccer 6 on November 27, 2006, all released for PS2 and Xbox 360. With the launch of the PlayStation 3, the first game was Pro Evolution Soccer 2008, released on September 13, 2007. It continued with Pro Evolution Soccer 2009 on October 17, 2008, Pro Evolution Soccer 2010 on October 23, 2009, Pro Evolution Soccer 2011 on October 20, 2010, Pro Evolution Soccer 2012 on September 27, 2011, Pro Evolution Soccer 2013 on September 20, 2012 and Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 on September 20, 2013. With the launch of the PlayStation 4, the first game was Pro Evolution Soccer 2015 on November 11, 2014. Then it met players with the sequels Pro Evolution Soccer 2016 on September 15, 2015 and Pro Evolution Soccer 2017 on September 13, 2016.

PES Cover Art of the Last 4 Years

Pro Evolution Soccer 2018

Pro Evolution Soccer 2019

eFootball PES 2020

eFootball PES 2021

Why Did FIFA Overtake PES?

As someone who has played PES since I was old enough, I can easily say that PES 2013 was the last quality game this series produced. With its game dynamics and its online game system, making transfers, building your team and taking your own team out against your opponents was really exciting. The biggest breakthrough FIFA made at that time was introducing the Ultimate Team mode. Although Ultimate Team, which football fans are now in love with, was not so popular back then, it had begun to feel like it could take PES's place in the future.

One of the biggest mistakes PES owners made was losing many of the game's developers to FIFA during this period. Since the game released in 2014, as game quality, sense of realism and immersion declined, many PES fans, myself included, turned to FIFA. With no online mode of high immersion in the Ultimate Team style added to it, it was inevitable that it would fall far behind FIFA.