Ahead of the release of Konam’s Pro Evolution Soccer 2009 on October 17th, the series’ creator Shingo Takatsuka has claimed that improving the game’s online performance has been the top priority for the team this year.

Speaking to CVG, Seabass admitted: “I do acknowledge that last year we placed such emphasis on the controls that the online side was sacrificed. For instance if you didn't have a very good connection, that could really seriously affect your gameplay and it could turn out to be very horrible indeed.

“This year we looked at online as a top priority and we tested half way around the world, so that even for people who don't have good connections we wanted to pursue how we can make the game still playable. We found a solution as well as taking on more players, four this time, for multiplayer online.

“We're not going to stop, until we're fully satisfied with this online version of PES 2009, we want to go even further. So I promise you it will still continue to change and improve further as we go along.”