EA Sports officially announced its first soccer game, titled FIFA World Soccer Championship, for the Sony PlayStation2. This comprehensive soccer simulation will incorporate 47 FIFA member teams, the top sixteen of the worlds under-23 national squads, and club teams from official leagues in England, Germany, Spain, and Italy. Created by the same development and production teams that were involved with the previous efforts in the series, the game will be released in May 2000 for the Japanese PlayStation2.

　　The games have been designed to specifically take advantage of the technological capabilities of the PlayStation2. EA says that FIFA World Soccer Championship will feature highly detailed facial animations, intuitive and realistic Artificial Intelligence (AI), advanced motion blending, high-resolution player models, field-level camera angles, and dynamic player and stadium lighting. Players will run in and out of the shadows as they move up the field, showing changes to their physical structure as a result of emotional reactions to events during play.

　　FIFA WCS will also incorporate five game modes including exhibition, World Cup, U-23 World Championship, league, and training. In the game's training mode, players can work on penalty, corner, free kicks, and throw-ins, or take part in a full practice match before taking to the pitch. Adding more realism, the game includes motion-captured data from famous Japanese soccer legend Hidetoshi Nakata.

　　"FIFA Soccer World Championship is a perfect marriage of stunning graphics, silky smooth animation, and refined gameplay in an emotionally evocative environment," said FIFA Soccer executive producer, Marc Aubanel. "We are thrilled to bring the legendary FIFA Soccer Series to the PlayStation2 console and set the standard for sports-gaming excellence on this exciting new platform."

　　The European and North American markets will also receive versions of the FIFA series for the PlayStation2 this fall. The North American game, titled FIFA 2001 Major League Soccer, will naturally include the MLS license and feature teams and players from the US soccer league. The European version will be known simply as FIFA 2001. According to an EA representative, FIFA games released in all three territories will be developed using similar engines but will have different teams and features.

　　EA Sports plans to display FIFA World Soccer Championship at the Electronics Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles next month. GameSpot will bring you complete details on the game as part of our comprehensive coverage of the event.