At its press conference earlier this week, Microsoft made the announcement that Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer (known as winning Eleven to us) and EA's FIFA Soccer would both see a year's exclusivity on the Xbox 360, making its next-gen console "the platform" for soccer fans. This was seemingly a huge win for Microsoft, considering how popular Soccer is in the European and Asian territories.
Now, however, we're starting to hear a different story. Speaking with Winning Eleven producer/creator Shingo 'Seabass' Takatsuka earlier today, we learned that Microsoft made claims that were untrue. "The presentation was misleading," he told us. "We never said exclusive for one year on the next-gen platforms. We said this year. We were agreed that it was this year."
According to Takatsuka, Microsoft's claims have caused some issues for Konami (with Sony, no doubt), and he definitely wants to set the record straight. Winning Eleven is exclusive to the 360 for this year, but it's likely a case of necessesity (the PS3 game, which he confirmed is being worked on, isn't far enough along in development) rather than some major exclusivity deal with Microsoft. The PS3 version could ship as early as next spring, he admitted, though no timeframe has been set yet. The only thing certain is that it will absolutely not release before January 1, 2007.
(Takatsuka sets the record straight)
Interestingly, although EA has no official comment on the matter yet, sources indicate that FIFA may not have a year's exclusivity window for next-gen platforms either.
http://1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3153167
