Champions League (video game)

The UEFA Champions League video game license has been used by four different companies, with a surprising irregularity, given the competitions' fan-base and popularity. Debuted in 1996, the series has only had five games published so far, and after being in the hands of Krisalis Software, Silicon Dreams Studio and EA Sports, the license now lies in the hands of Konami.

Krisalis Software had a strong history of football video games in the past, and inclusively released European Club Soccer, a game that simulated the old knockout format in 1992. With the official branding, Krisalis worked on a 3D engine, fitted with the Tacti-grid and gameplay in the line of their older games. It had all 16 teams present in the 1996/1997 Champions League with the actual groups, plus national teams. Only one title was produced, distributed by Philips Media.

With Silicon Dreams Studio, who also developed the World League Soccer series, Champions League had four titles, 98–99, Season 1999–2000, Season 2000–2001 and 2001–2002 released, aimed mostly at the PlayStation, but PC releases existed for the games. It replaced the national teams with finalists of all competitions since 1960, also including scenarios (in 98–99, with fake settings, in 1999–2000, based on the previous finals, including the 1999 final last minutes). The first two games were published by Eidos Interactive, whilst the last two were published by Take-Two Interactive.

In November 2002, Electronic Arts announced the licensing deal and further development of the game, which was published before the second round on the 2004–05 competition started. It uses the same FIFA engine, and was now the fourth licensed football title EA has in its catalogue.

...
Wikipedia