Champs League dev opens up

Those of you who had their interest piqued by the Xbox 360's "Ultimate Team" mode in UEFA Champions League 2006-2007 might want to check out a developer diary elsewhere on Eurogamer today.

There you will find associate producer Chris Coates explaining how the mode - built around the concept of virtual trading cards - works, and how the team came up with and developed the idea in the first place.

"After exploring a number of ideas we hit on the idea of capitalising on some key motivations for football fans - the desire to build your own fantasy team and the huge sense of community on making those choices," Coates explains.

"Essentially we were trying to build the first ever football action game with online features beyond simply competing against other online and foster a unique gaming community."

UEFA Champions League 2006-2007 is due out on Xbox 360, along with PS2, PSP, PC and mobile phones, from 23rd March, and obviously lets you pick a team, qualify for the money-spinning tournament and then play your way through to the final.

Look out for more coverage of the game, including a full review, in the run-up to its release

via eurogamer