The subject I intend to address here is particularly interesting. If you are 80 years old and, like me, have lived through different generations of video games, you will probably find something familiar in this reflection. Perhaps this is precisely the perfect place to discuss it.
First, however, we need to give our reflection a creative title: — We Were Responsible for the Monsters We Created.
Do you remember when Facebook first came out around 2005? Back, then it was called the social networking. There was no social media because there was no media involved. Before ads, revenue, and influencers, it was simply a place to share, hang out, and enjoy the company of others.
This is what video gaming used to be like, and this is when sports video games plateaued - not just soccer, but football, basketball, baseball and even hockey all peaked around 2005. They were excellent single player games that could also be played multiplayer, in person or online.
We the consumers aren’t to blame for microtransactions. Participation in something good does not cause corruption. That comes from persistent and willful intent to place profits above all else. As kids in the 80s and 90s, we were just playing kickass games. Now as middle aged adults, we recognize that there are some absolutely terrible human beings in positions of extreme power, wealth and influence. They only care about money, and if they didn’t, they would quickly be replaced by someone that does.
It would take a lot to undo this. As a consumer, you can vote with your money and your clicks. Keep playing the classics. If you are a person in a position of wealth and influence, develop your own game - you have basically no competition (for a game that actually simulates soccer). The social media sword can also cut EA and Konami - if a game is clearly and demonstrably better, it could catch fire.
Do you remember when Facebook first came out around 2005? Back, then it was called the social networking. There was no social media because there was no media involved. Before ads, revenue, and influencers, it was simply a place to share, hang out, and enjoy the company of others.
This is what video gaming used to be like, and this is when sports video games plateaued - not just soccer, but football, basketball, baseball and even hockey all peaked around 2005. They were excellent single player games that could also be played multiplayer, in person or online.
We the consumers aren’t to blame for microtransactions. Participation in something good does not cause corruption. That comes from persistent and willful intent to place profits above all else. As kids in the 80s and 90s, we were just playing kickass games. Now as middle aged adults, we recognize that there are some absolutely terrible human beings in positions of extreme power, wealth and influence. They only care about money, and if they didn’t, they would quickly be replaced by someone that does.
It would take a lot to undo this. As a consumer, you can vote with your money and your clicks. Keep playing the classics. If you are a person in a position of wealth and influence, develop your own game - you have basically no competition (for a game that actually simulates soccer). The social media sword can also cut EA and Konami - if a game is clearly and demonstrably better, it could catch fire.
I disagree. I think the consumer is to blame for micro transactions, just as we're to blame for online subscriptions. When a companies started to implement micro transactions, you have a choice whether to use them or not. It's clear a lot of people use them and that's why they continue to exist. If everyone who plays video games just completely stopped using them then they'd eventually cease to exist and the company would find another way of extracting the maximum amount of money from the consumer. Same goes for online subscriptions which is now common place and people expect to I pay for an online subscription. Remember there was a time when playing online was free. They test the waters and see if something is profitable by the amount of users. Personally, I've never bought an online subscription or paid for a micro transaction but enough people do so it will continue to happen.
The subject I intend to address here is particularly interesting. If you are 80 years old and, like me, have lived through different generations of video games, you will probably find something familiar in this reflection. Perhaps this is precisely the perfect place to discuss it.
First, however, we need to give our reflection a creative title: — We Were Responsible for the Monsters We Created.
Do you remember what the 1990s were like? The SNES generation, the PlayStation, and later the PlayStation 2? Young people would get together and spend hours competing against one another. There was rivalry, ego, trash talk, and, naturally, the occasional fight was also part of that universe.
It was perfectly normal to find someone playing Winning Eleven with the Brazilian national team — my country — and putting Roberto Carlos up front in a 4-3-3 formation simply because he was fast and had a powerful shot. If the game allowed it, why not?
Many people also played Master League, signed the best players available, and then used those teams to play matches against their friends. Memory Card files, edited teams, and all kinds of content created by the community were shared among players.
But, honestly, there came a point when I simply could not stand watching the same Real Madrid vs. Real Madrid matches anymore.
The pleasure of simply experiencing the game, using weak or average teams, discovering unknown players and understanding their individual characteristics — in other words, appreciating the art itself and the philosophy of virtual football — often seemed completely secondary.
There was always a “super team” or a particular combination of players that became an obsession.
And I believe this behavioral phenomenon occurred, to a greater or lesser extent, all over the world.
The objective went beyond mere entertainment. The implicit message seemed to be:
I WANT TO BE THE BEST.
I WANT TO BEAT YOU.
I WANT TO HUMILIATE YOU.
I WANT TO BE THE CHAMPION AND EARN RESPECT IN MY COMMUNITY — AND, IF POSSIBLE, THROUGHOUT THE ENTIRE MILKY WAY.
And yes, I did not merely experience all of this. I paid close attention to the looks, gestures, expressions, and words of those young people — many of whom were my close friends and family members.
If you showed up at a Goal Storm 97 tournament using the Netherlands national team, that would make me furious. Because the Netherlands belonged to me.
And to think that, in 1997, I was only 16 years old. It is remarkable to realize, with the perspective that time provides, just how absurdly competitive we could be — and, let’s be honest, how incredibly foolish we could also be.
The Moral of the Story
Time passed. Decades went by.
Today, we are witnessing the consolidation of online football games, where, essentially, we find many of the same behavioral profiles from that era: players constantly competing against one another, seeking to outperform their opponents and now chasing special cards, rare players, rankings, and increasingly sophisticated rewards.
The difference is that the market recognized the enormous economic potential of this behavior.
Publishers realized that this very human need to compete, to win, to have the best team, and to demonstrate superiority could be transformed into an extremely profitable business model.
And gradually, the focus stopped being exclusively on the quality of the game, the simulation of the sport, and the experience of simply playing football.
There was now a much greater emphasis on keeping the player engaged, making them come back, making them compete, and, above all, making them spend.
And that is, in a sense, how we arrived at the model we have today.
We helped create the cultural environment that made this system possible.
The “monsters” of loot boxes did not appear out of nowhere. They were fed by decades of competitive behavior, by the need to win, by the relentless pursuit of the best team, and by the desire to possess something that others did not have.
The industry simply observed this behavior, understood its potential, and turned it into a product.
And perhaps this is the most uncomfortable part of the reflection: Did we create the monsters we criticize today?
I do not believe there is a simple answer.
The responsibility certainly does not lie exclusively with the player, nor exclusively with the publishers. There is a much more complex relationship between human behavior, competitive culture, technology, and monetization models.
But one thing seems evident to me: The monster did not appear yesterday. We simply helped teach it how to grow.
The great chaos—because sweet dreams are made of illusion.
All versions of these games—Winning Eleven 4, PES 5, PES 6, PES 2008, PES 2013, every single one you consider beautiful and wonderful—belong to an offline vision of competing against the CPU, where you control and create a unique universe. Because all those competitive versions turn into garbage that will just make you furious.
What is your opinion on this?
Check out below my last experience playing Pro Evolution Soccer 2020 and 2021 online. These are some screenshots I took at the time.
In friendly matches, I tried to use a wide variety of teams — especially weaker and mid-level ones — with the intention of exploring the game's content, appreciating its possibilities, and, above all, creating a different and positive experience.
However, over time, I realized that, to a large extent, it was all rather pointless.
Take a look, for example, at the teams some of my opponents were using, with tactical formations that sometimes featured four forwards. Even so, those formations were neutralized, mainly because I maintained a high level of possession and was able to control the pace of the matches.
That was when I started to reflect:
What am I doing with my life? What should I really expect from the online environment?
Constant competition? Toxic behavior? Players willing to do whatever it takes to win, even if it means completely abandoning the fun of the game?
And that is exactly what happened.
After that period, I simply stopped getting involved in online matches.
Not because I stopped enjoying football or video games, but because I realized that, for me, that environment was no longer providing the experience I was looking for.
My impression was that most people were interested in nothing more than competing, competing, and competing, resorting to cheats, exploits, bugs, abusive mechanics, and stacked squads in order to gain an advantage.
And when winning becomes more important than the experience of actually playing, perhaps it is time to stop and ask ourselves:
Are we still playing to have fun, or are we simply trying to prove something to one another?
Whenever I chose Torino, I wished people would use Lazio, Udinese, or Parma.
But no. It was always Barcelona or Real Madrid. For God's sake, it was just a friendly match!
I'd like to ask a question out of curiosity. This is a topic that used to spark intense debates during tournaments among friends at the old LAN houses here in Brazil. Back then, in the mid-2000s, internet access was still quite limited, and there wasn't much information available.
Because of that, I've always wondered: what do Winning Eleven and Pro Evolution Soccer fans around the world think about this?
So here's my question: What do you prefer to play?
Patches/Mods: They offer impressive visual improvements, such as full licensing, new kits, stadiums, menus, and many other enhancements. However, they often end up changing the game's original identity by modifying leagues, player ratings (overall), squads, gameplay, and many other aspects.
100% Original Game with only an Option File: This preserves the original experience, limiting changes to corrected player names, kits, badges, logos, and team names without altering the game's core structure.
The central point of this discussion is determining how much of the authentic experience envisioned by the developers is actually being preserved. Many editing teams create patches that go far beyond fixing licenses, fundamentally transforming the game. Some of these projects even become extremely popular and are indirectly commercialized.
I remember that whenever my friends and I organized tournaments—especially the more competitive ones—patches were often not allowed. The reasoning was simple: to ensure everyone played the exact same version of the game, preserving the original experience and preventing any modifications that could affect competitive balance.
After thinking deeply about this topic over the years, I've developed what could honestly be described as an obsession with this choice.
Yes, I like patches and mods. I can't deny that I admire the talent, creativity, and incredible work of the modding community. However, I no longer feel comfortable when the game's original structure is drastically altered.
Take Winning Eleven 10 as an example. The game was designed to represent the 2005–06 season. That's why it's perfectly natural to see players like Shunsuke Nakamura playing for both the Japanese national team and Celtic. The entire game—its squads, player ratings, atmosphere, balance, and overall design—was built around that specific period.
With that in mind, I don't see much logic in controlling players like Lamine Yamal within that same game, considering that he hadn't even been born at the time. That kind of time inconsistency breaks the historical identity of the game.
In my opinion, today's football stars make much more sense in modern titles like eFootball or EA Sports FC 27, which were specifically created to represent contemporary football. The classic Winning Eleven/PES games, on the other hand, derive much of their value from preserving a particular era of football history, allowing players to relive that period as authentically as possible.
Just about the best thing I've read on the internet for years lol. I 100% agree with all you have written here pal. I'm 55 and 6 of us used to gather every Friday night from 1995 until 2007 without fail. Once the online community began all seemed to get together less and less. 3 star team nights through to 5 star team nights were the regular order up until PES 4 where we created our own teams from the huge pool with a swap option every week to change up to 3 players. Always competitive and boozy but always so much fun and laughter. I often lament on these halcyon days and wonder why we can't have them again? The reason is no one is really interested in football anymore! Not just games but the actual sport in which we existed constantly before the advent of the damn smartphone. I myself, over the last 12 months have bashed away at most Pes and Fifa titles on the PS4 looking for the best one to play a career on for some longevity and have settled on Pes 17. I have the resources to have a great gaming PC and get in to the modding side of things but am acutely aware that time is perhaps not on my side to delve so deep. I no longer play anything online these days and can see why companies freeze my generation of gamers (Who bought their games pre-internet to start with) in favour of the cash cows of younger gamers. It is unfortunately a very sad state of affairs and doubt we will ever see any football game, or other sports title ever created again for the purpose of making a great sim just because you can. This is the reason I stay around this site as at least there are people who play just for the joy still like myself......
This has gone way off-topic from Retro PES I feel, so I'm going to try and tie it back in. The early days of gaming, the 50s/60s until the early 90s, it was a niche hobby. Usually confined to 'nerds', they played games, copied tapes and found their introvert way to pass the time. The "PlayStation era", which includes the N64 &, eventually, Xbox, brought gaming to the forefront as a hobby anyone could do. It gained popularity. But it was still largely about making games for the love of it, to make what people would want to play. And it succeeded. Gaming grew in popularity. From the 80s until the 2010s, gaming slowly grew as the most profitable media source for companies. Online comes along. It allows patches for games to fix things. I personally believe this made some developers lazy, as while nobody 'wants' to release a bad game, there's less incentive to "make it great" when you a toss out a patch in a couples weeks. From that, DLC. Extra content for your games. And people bought it. Companies began to make extra on top of the game itself. And so it's evolved into today's market where the goal of the company is the give someone roughly playable, to keep people's attention, but also distract them with new things, which keep them playing more.
And so the market has outgrown us who got into it maybe a couple or few decades ago. Hence the love of retro PES and old games "from the golden age of gaming". And that's maybe why we have eFootball and not continued PES versions. Konami looked at the market and just followed what would keep them in profit. Mobile for them was far beyond the custom they got on console. So they focuses on that seam. They felt they couldn't compete with EA, so chose a different path, even if in the same genre.
Some might dislike how it is. But it's just progress of the hobby. Next might be play as you go. You pay $1 and you get 1 hour of game time. You pay $5, you get 5 hours. Who knows?
But as long as old games survive, we should always have something to play, and while not perfect, old PES are some of the best
WEndetta's patches for japanese Winning Eleven's games, at the time were simply the bests, but it was an Italian group, so various jap WE were traslated only in Italian by them. I don't think you can try an english version online today.
Each WEndetta patch should be translated in English today, so the world can appreciate better their attentions to details.
I'd like to ask a question out of curiosity. This is a topic that used to spark intense debates during tournaments among friends at the old LAN houses here in Brazil. Back then, in the mid-2000s, internet access was still quite limited, and there wasn't much information available.
Because of that, I've always wondered: what do Winning Eleven and Pro Evolution Soccer fans around the world think about this?
So here's my question: What do you prefer to play?
Patches/Mods: They offer impressive visual improvements, such as full licensing, new kits, stadiums, menus, and many other enhancements. However, they often end up changing the game's original identity by modifying leagues, player ratings (overall), squads, gameplay, and many other aspects.
100% Original Game with only an Option File: This preserves the original experience, limiting changes to corrected player names, kits, badges, logos, and team names without altering the game's core structure.
The central point of this discussion is determining how much of the authentic experience envisioned by the developers is actually being preserved. Many editing teams create patches that go far beyond fixing licenses, fundamentally transforming the game. Some of these projects even become extremely popular and are indirectly commercialized.
I remember that whenever my friends and I organized tournaments—especially the more competitive ones—patches were often not allowed. The reasoning was simple: to ensure everyone played the exact same version of the game, preserving the original experience and preventing any modifications that could affect competitive balance.
After thinking deeply about this topic over the years, I've developed what could honestly be described as an obsession with this choice.
Yes, I like patches and mods. I can't deny that I admire the talent, creativity, and incredible work of the modding community. However, I no longer feel comfortable when the game's original structure is drastically altered.
Take Winning Eleven 10 as an example. The game was designed to represent the 2005–06 season. That's why it's perfectly natural to see players like Shunsuke Nakamura playing for both the Japanese national team and Celtic. The entire game—its squads, player ratings, atmosphere, balance, and overall design—was built around that specific period.
With that in mind, I don't see much logic in controlling players like Lamine Yamal within that same game, considering that he hadn't even been born at the time. That kind of time inconsistency breaks the historical identity of the game.
In my opinion, today's football stars make much more sense in modern titles like eFootball or EA Sports FC 27, which were specifically created to represent contemporary football. The classic Winning Eleven/PES games, on the other hand, derive much of their value from preserving a particular era of football history, allowing players to relive that period as authentically as possible.
100% Original Game with only an Option File: This preserves the original experience, limiting changes to corrected player names, kits, badges, logos, and team names without altering the game's core structure.
And if you look at all the OF's I did (and still do), this is the philosophy I always follow. You can check my signature for some examples.
Initially it was to be fair during our offline tournaments. It'd be silly someone trains at home and during the tournament would experience different stats, team compositions, ...
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