Konami has just announced that the January transfer updates will be implemented into the game on March 6 for the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC versions of the game. As we told you when we were speaking about the update for FIFA, it will now mean that PES players will be able to call on the likes of Paul Scholes for Manchester United, and Papiss Demba Cisse for Newcastle.

At the moment, there’s no word on if the update will alter any player stats such as making Fernando Torres less effective in game in accordance with his form for Chelsea at the moment, or if the game will be making Robin Van Persie even better.

You’ll also be pleased to hear that the transfer updates are not the only thing that is coming to PES 2012 for free. The update will also include brand new kits for the Spanish, Japanese and German national teams, as well as eight new boot styles to choose over from Nike and Adidas. As one further treat, Konami has also said that the update will add the Adidas Finale Munich ball to the game, which is meant to be the ball that will be used for this year’s Champions League Final.

Are you still playing PES 2012 regularly? There’s a lot of talk now that FIFA 12 is superior in every way, which is a little bit disappointing since PES used to be the football game of choice a few years ago.

The latest installment to EA’s franchise really stepped up to the fight this time to prove at last that their football game is the superior one. Today it managed to officially secure a fifth consecutive week at the top in the UK games chart, making it seven weeks in total since it was first released back in September 2011. It was already the fastest-selling sports title ever, having surpassed the sales of its predecessor, FIFA 11 by 23%.

According to the report at The Independent, the game has now gone on to make more money than any other sporting game in history, despite already selling 3.2 million copies in its first week of release, which amounted to £117 million. It has even gone on to make more money than FIFA Road to the World Cup which was number one for an impressive 11 weeks in total after its release back in 1998.

Official figures are yet to be confirmed, although according to one of The Independent sources, FIFA 12 has sold approximately 5,047,093 so far, over a million more than FIFA 11 had at the same time last year. Meanwhile FIFA 12’s closest rival, PES 2012, from the series that was actually outselling FIFA 5 years ago, was outsold by them by 25 to 1 in its first week of sales and does not even make the UK games chart top 40 anymore. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim takes the number two spot with Just Dance 3 taking third.

Are you surprised to see FIFA 12 break the record? Which football game do you prefer?

Before we get started we must just make it clear that at the time of this post a launch date for the patch had not been confrimed, however EuroGamer suggest that it will arrive in December. After this the next major update will relate to all of the squad changes which will take place during the January 2012 transfer window.

OK, let’s get started with some improvements to general gameplay. Apparently once the update is installed all goalkeepers should be better than before, especially at saving long efforts, also if you utilize the Speed Star skill card you should expect some tweaks post update to make this more realistic. Something else worth knowing is that you will now be able to search for Quick Match opponents based on pass support settings. Konami has also promised less freezing/hanging whilst partaking in Become a Legend and Online modes or when selecting Game Plan combinations.

In terms of bug fixes there’s nothing too exciting, one bug which allowed a team to remain with 11 players after receiving a red card will be patched, also if you have ever checked the myPES application after winning/losing on penalties you will no longer see a draw, here’s some other changes:

- Occasionally meaningless numbers were appearing when accessing the Community menu from the Community Card list
- Formation data in the Formation settings on the Game Plan screen can only be saved from the P1 controller
- Game data can be saved/loaded for both sides if you exit the Data Management menu while your opponent is saving/loading the game data and then enter the Data Management menu again on the Game Plan screen

We like the sound of all of these changes which are coming to PES 2012, especially the fact that goalkeepers will concede less efforts from long range – what other changes would you like to see made?

For some of our readers this news is no surprise at all as during the build-up to the release of these two popular sports games, we held a poll to discover which out of the two our readers were going to buy. We had more than a thousand votes with whopping 63% of them in favor of buying FIFA 12. Only 35% of the votes were for PES 2012 and the remaining 2% said they wouldn’t get either game.

According to Gamerzines, while at the EA European Winter Showcase, which was held in London, the VP of EA, Keith Ramsdale admitting there were ‘big smiles’ at the company at the moment, especially as the game had received ‘record pre-orders and record sell-through’ despite only coming out a couple of weeks ago. Just five years ago it was a completely different story as PES was outselling FIFA in the UK. Ramsdale believes this shows how far the company has come, saying it’s ‘a sign of the momentum and the fan base and community behind FIFA.’

FIFA 12 launched in the UK September 30th and managed to shift 3.2 million copies after just a week of being on sale, blowing the competition away. Like-for-like this represented an outselling of 25-1 when comparing debut week sales to that of PES 2012, which went on sale last Friday. Are you surprised to hear this news? Which game did you buy?

There’s nothing better than free DLC so first of all – hats off to Konami for making this happen. The free DLC will be available for all three platforms of the game (PS3, Xbox 360 and PC) and will be available to download from your respective online marketplace on October 11th – i.e tomorrow!

The update will make good on any player transfers that haven’t been applied to PES 2012 yet, while you’ll also get the latest kits for your team and items such as football boots that real-life players use at the moment – Konami are going really realistic on us here then.

More interesting though, the update will apparently update 160 clubs with more realistic player statistics and abilities, as reported from GodisaGeek. As you can see with our title, we can’t help but mention that poor old Fernando Torres may be given a lower rating in the game, to reflect his shocking form for club team Chelsea as of late. The same could be said for out of favor Carlos Tevez who can’t seem to do anything right after his recent exploits for Manchester City after refusing to play.

It will be good to see just how realistic Konami are taking effects in real-life and converting them into PES 2012. Will Torres actually have lower stats and will Tevez be moved from a Manchester City starter to a place on the subs bench or further down in the reserves? The update will probably have the answer so let’s wait and see.

If you are playing PES 2012 at the moment, let us know your impressions of the game so far. Is Torres amazing on the game and should he be given a lower rating or is it too harsh you feel?

GameSpot’s review scores PES 2012 8 out of 10 and an extract from the review reads: “PES 12 may lack new modes, but substantial improvements to its AI, speed, and controls make it an exciting football game that’s a lot of fun to play”, like previous games the gameplay is pretty fluid, but the lack of team licenses, the fact that there is no new game modes and the annoying commentary hold it back. GameSpot were big fans of the game’s off-the-ball control and the smooth animations, but seemed to suggest that new game modes were needed next time around. You can see their full review here.

1UP really weren’t too fond of Konami’s 2012 title, they gave it a C+ in their review and you can see it in full here, 1UP’s Sterling McGarvey said that the game felt like it had been rushed, but also said that once you have mastered the off-the-ball system you will find it very rewarding and it adds an extra dimension of gameplay. In terms of animations a few players look realistic, like the way Ronaldo runs down the wing, but on the whole this aspect of the game is disappointing.

VideoGamer and StrategyInformer both score PES 2012 8/10, both sites say that PES 2012 is behind FIFA 12 in many ways, but enjoyable none-the-less, in terms of gameplay it is rewarding, but beyond that you are left wanting more. In terms online play both critics compliment the game, they say that it is lag-free most of the time and rewards people who do not quit matches when they are losing, but VideoGamer’s Chris Schilling points out that when your opponent quits your completion rate suffers – which is unfair, perhaps this will be resolved before the game’s proper release.

Over at MetaCritic 20 reviews have been averages out so far and this has resulted in the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game getting a metascore of 79 (out of 100) – however until more reputable critics publish their reviews this shouldn’t be taken too seriously, Konami will be hoping that this score of 79 bumps up to the early 90s as this is what score FIFA 12 has received.

Do you think PES 2012 has been written off too early?

The main news here though, is that Konami has just released a day one patch update to the game which will add 3D support for the game, as reported from Shack. As far as we know, there is no support for 3D on FIFA 12 at the moment, so this may prove to be one early advantage for PES as the two giant games go head to head.

Having said that, you probably didn’t know PES 2012 could support 3D, so it may become a reality that EA take the same route and add 3D via a patch update to the PS3 version of the game sometime after release. Aside from the PES 2012 3D patch update, players will also get access to a beta version of ‘myPES’, which is a brand new service for the franchise allowing players to exchange match data between console and social networking website Facebook.

The patch is available now for those who already have a copy of PES 2012 in the US, for everyone else, it will be coming next month when the full game releases in Europe on October 14th, this includes the Xbox 360 and PC versions of the game too.

Will 3D support win over your allegiance to PES 2012 or does the new gameplay features highlighted in the recent FIFA 12 demo suggest that the nail is almost in the coffin for PES 2012. A lot of you that were once die-hard PES fans have now switched over to FIFA so we’re guessing that 3D support on Konami’s game won’t bother hardcore fans too much.

Which game are you buying this year?

You do not have to be a gaming expert to know that EA has had the lion’s share of the football/soccer market in gaming, but Konami came back strong last year with Pro Evolution Soccer 2011. They did not make a few improvements to the game that it was replacing; instead they gave it a major overhaul. We do not expect the same to happen this year, but we can be certain that they will not allow EA to keep beating them when it comes to these kinds of games.

These demo versions are not the final products, but they do give us a good idea as to how each has evolved. Our readers have been looking at what features they love and hate with FIFA 12 and PES 2012, as well as where they still need to make some improvements, but we are sure that you will also have something to add as well.

One for our readers said that defending with the new 2012 FIFA game would take some getting used to, but once you have mastered it you will just love it. For so long EA has just concentrated with shooting and attacking with FIFA, so nice to see that they are now taking more of an interest into other positions.

There does seem to be an agreement that PES 2012 is still way behind FIFA 12, as the demo shows that it is just not a next-gen version. We just hope that Konami take this concern onboard and evolve its soccer game more than it has done, as the demo does not show much promise. However, that is just an opinion of a handful of our readers, so why not tell us what you think or vote in our poll below. Once you have answered that maybe you will tell us which of the two will you be buying once released?
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Earlier this week we found a post started at the beginning of 2011, which looks at the new faces in FIFA 12. The author asked for readers to help piece together images and sources for the players that will be new to competing in the next FIFA game. Feel free to take a look at them here; it’s an interesting read.

While we’re talking about the graphics and specifically faces, we wanted to find images and videos that compare FIFA 12 vs. PES 2012. We have hunted around and found some good videos, and not so great videos but will post them here to give you an idea on what to expect from the two football games. Feel free to add your comments and other sources you know.

In no particular order, please see the comparison videos below and also videos showing motion/images for both FIFA 12 and PES 2012. The first video is from some sort of EA PR event and while taken sideways, almost certainly shows that it’s a solid leak. There are also a couple of videos that show specific teams like faces from Barcelona players, these again seem to be taken from a similar event.

Other videos show the most important players, although be aware they may be from a demo version of PES 12/FIFA 12. You may also like to see a recent article we found that looks at some new PES 2012 screenshots, which the author claims puts FIFA 12 to shame. Lastly, the FIFA 12 Wayne Rooney hair transplant images are a must see for those that missed them in this article.

Have a watch of the FIFA and Pro Evolution Soccer videos below and let us know your thoughts.

If you go back ten years, when anyone was asked to think of a football game, only FIFA would have been thought of. It was the same for many years after until Konami’s Pro Evolution Soccer came along. FIFA was made to look like an arcade game compared to this new simulation style version so many gamers and football fans then preferred PES to give them a better gaming experience.

PES continued to enjoy success for the next couple of years with the gameplay being arguably ahead of FIFA’s, though they were still lacking in on the graphics side of things and most obviously club licenses. The real turning point in my opinion came in 2009, when EA stepped their game up. The gameplay became more realistic, meaning they now had the licenses, graphics and gaming experience advantage over PES. It had leap frogged Konami’s game which now struggles to compete.

From then on I have always preferred FIFA over PES and have not been disappointed yet. FIFA 11 was a great improvement from the previous title in the series; it had more teams and had also stepped up the gameplay again. Players were now able to jostle more realistically and complete 360 degree angles were achievable when in control of a player. After playing the PES 2012 demo I was left disappointed and glad that I am now a FIFA man. Let’s just hope the FIFA 12 demo doesn’t disappoint, either way I know which game I will be getting.

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