Konami, the Japanese software house that owns eFootball, has just closed an exclusive agreement with the Inter football team. THEThe contract will prohibit any competitor, including EA Sports, from using the name and brand of the Milanese club starting July 24, 2024.
The news comes in official form from a press release of the team, which wrote on its website: “Starting from the new 2022/23 sporting season, the logo of eFootball – the popular football-themed videogame series by KONAMI – will appear on the back of the training kit of the men’s, women’s and youth teams first team, as well as on the pre-match kit worn by the players in the warm-up of all national competitions ”.
Inter will be exclusive to eFootball: how will EA regulate itself?
The agreement will then require EA Sports to come up with an alternative name to represent the team. Electronic Arts is in fact preparing for the launch of EA Sports FC, the new football video game that will replace the popular FIFA franchise in 2024.
As video game fans will know, this isn’t the first time EA has had to “get creative” with teams it doesn’t own the rights to. In recent years, for example, Juventus was renamed Piemonte Calcio. This is because the Turin-based company was also Konami exclusive for several years. Moreover, the same eFootball contract with Juventus has expired in these days, and the bianconeri have made official a return to FIFA 23in what will be EA’s latest FIFA.
We also remind you that FIFA 22 is currently playable for free for Xbox Game Pass owners. Likewise eFootball is available in free-to-play for all platforms. Inter will make their official debut on the KONAMI title with the release of the 2.0.0 update.