Let's talk football games!

[YI]

So yeah...had a fantastic conversation about old football games tonight. Some absolute forgotten gems;

Ultimate Soccer Manager 2/USM 98...the absolute fucking daddy, sod your Champ Man's or Football Manager's...USM was fucking gold. I still have the 98/99 update disk lying around amongst a bunch of CD's on my desk, I can't find the actual 98 disk though, or I'd install it.

The Sega Mastersystem had some fucking gems on it. "Champions Of Europe", which was fucking impossible and had a rabbit dance about whenever you managed to score. "Tecmo World Cup '93" was probably the best, I remember it having the best graphics (only game that wasn't top down)...but my favourite was "Super Kick-Off"...where basically you could just lob the ball all the way up the pitch (one man kicking and running onto the ball when it came back down) and score, fantastic. And not football, but "Speedball" was a proper fucking hench game too.

The first FIFA game I ever had was "FIFA International" on the PC, it was a weird isometric view and I remember the only team I was actually able to beat was Qatar.

I also remember a Champions League game on the PC, which when you scored showed a little cut scene/video of a real life goal celebration. I actually remember finding the disk for this about 2/3 years ago and try to install it, but it was a DOS game so wouldn't install.

Anyone remember "Three Lions" on the Playstation? With the dodgy as fuck shooting system, where you had to direct a target in the goal? Mental.

Those ancient Acorn Computer systems. I remember a management game on their based solely around Leeds United, and I do believe was purely called "Leeds United". I still remember the really ugly main screen with the clunky buttons and everything. You started in the bottom division and it was around the time when Leeds had some absolute heroes in their team; David Batty, Lee Chapman, John Lukic, Tony Dorigo, Gordon Strachan etc. Your first game was always against Aldershot as well. It was bloody difficult.

"Libero Grande"...sod all these "Be A Hero" or whatever the fuck the modes are called on PES and FIFA these days...Libero Grande was the original and best. It was a schoolboys wet dream, because basically everyone else on your team was proper shit and you were mint and skilled everyone and could make them do what you said.

Oh fuck an absolute gem from my mate following on the same trend, which I never had but I remember. "ISS2000" on the N64...it had a 'career mode', all well and good, you control your one man...but about 95% wasn't actually playing a game at all and instead it was you deciding whether to train or try and pull one of a number of women instead.

I seem to vaguely remember a game on the Playstation called "Player Manager", I can't remember anything about it besides the disk was red.

"The Mission"! Oh my god, based on those adverts that were on...any words I say can't do this justice, so I'll use a description I found;

The Mission’, offers gamers the opportunity to play as some of the greatest footballers in the world. The aim of the game is to rescue a 'Geo Merlin’' ball, which has been stolen by Ninjas who embody the forces of brutality and poor sportsmanship, to save the future of football in its purest form. Using a selected team of two footballers, the player must battle and puzzle his way through over 24 levels of action, dispensing with fire-spitting demons and innumerable Ninjas trained in the martial arts along the way. Contains a mix of elements from football, action and combat games.

...sweet mother of fucking god, that's glorious.

"International Superstar Soccer Pro"...Fenwick was a beast in the box for England.

Also I can't not mention the ultra fantastic "Fifa 97" backwards headers and the "standing in front of the goal keeper when he kicks the ball" trick.

Man, just thinking about the series that don't exist anymore. Actua Soccer, Adidas Power Soccer, Sensible World Of Soccer, This Is Football etc.

And of course, the enigma;

I actually have a copy of this game...I don't even have a working Playstation anymore, but fuck me, I've got this game.

There was honestly serious talk of starting a website as a shrine to fantastic footy games of old.

Edited March 28, 2010 by YI

[Toe]

I had World Cup 94.

That game was fun...but the one that I liked the most was...

[Colossus]

I loved FIFA 98, the one with Indoor Soccer. Amazing. Too bad the game is broken (literally, the CD is broken in half) but I spent hours in that game

[estebanmon]

I loved FIFA 98, the one with Indoor Soccer. Amazing. Too bad the game is broken (literally, the CD is broken in half) but I spent hours in that game

Wasn't 97 the one with indoor soccer? I remember only playing that and never bothering with the regular pitch. 98 will always be the best to me, I always had a blast playing the World Cup or editing teams or whatever.

[Colossus]

98 had the Indoor pitch for sure, I basically played with that pitch for 2 years. Maybe 97 had it as well...

Edited March 28, 2010 by Colossus

[New Damage]

'97 had indoor too. One of my main memories from that games is the commentary: "Pallister. Heads to. Pallister!"

[EddieG]

I actually saw one of my favorite games at cash converters yesterday, ISS98 for the N64.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

I owned Libero Grande and it was brilliant but also quite tricky. They've definitely simplified things for the FIFA/Pro Evo games.

Ultimate Soccer Manager was great cos of the stadium upgrades stuff and being able to build chip shops on the streets around it and stuff. Definitely a nice slant on things.

Sensible World of Soccer was by far the best footy game ever though and had pretty much every league in the world that you could play as the real team in with real players = Heart of Oak in the Malawi league anyone? I always played as Spartak Moscow for some reason.

Striker on the Amiga was a good footy game and Qatar were lovely and easy to beat. Actua Soccer was another game I had and looked quite good back in the day. Had a cheat so you could play as a team with the members of the Super Furry Animals.

I played some old Player Manager too where one of the players you managed was you. You were the best player in the team to start but as you got promoted you sucked and sucked more each season, good times.

Premier Manager was groovy too and I bought 1, 2 and 3. You had to start in the Cconference and in the first game Wycombe were the only team you should be really cos they were soooo good. That was grea tcos you chose the pitch hoarding sponsors.

I also have a few games I used to play from the Amstrad/Commodore/Spectrum era. One text based game where you were a player and started asa sub for the reserves of your chosen team and dhad to forge a career for yourself . Maybe 4 or 5 times during the game a situation would be described with three options and a % net to them of how likely you were to achieve it. - "The ball rolls across to you on the edge of the box. A) SHOOT (34%), B) Through ball into the box (56%), C) Play it wide (73$)." Then depending on your choice you'd score, assist, screw up or whatever and your career would go on from there.

Another game involved moving around a playing board by rolling a virtual dice and buying players, or having players injured depending on where you landed and then a match every time you got around the board. I always had players getting killed in car crashes. So sad.

[OGpistolpete]

FIFA 2001, anyone?

[9 to 5]

Another game involved moving around a playing board by rolling a virtual dice and buying players, or having players injured depending on where you landed and then a match every time you got around the board. I always had players getting killed in car crashes. So sad.

Dream Team the video game? >_>

[apsham]

Best fucking game ever.. and the only one I owned back in my SNES days. Looked like this;

And I still remember the "own goal" animation thingy that came up.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

The goalkeeper at the far end is a GIANT I tells ya!

[Liam]

Me and my mate spent a lot of time on the Mega Drive playing 'European Club Soccer'. It had a pretty large roster of random teams in it, and was a good laugh. I also loved USM2, the bung system, upgrading grounds, betting on games, good times.

EDIT: Haha, 'Thee Lions'. I really hated that to start off with, but actually grew to quite like it. Hard shooting system for sure.

Edited March 28, 2010 by Liam

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

Manchester United in Europe was a great game too. You could edit all the players in the squad to be you and your mates as you fought through to win the old European Cup. Glorious.

[Grounded Wingman]

My football game playing history is as follows:

Atari XE - Emlyn Hughes Soccer, which was awesome. There was also a built in game just called Soccer, which was ridiculously addictive but a turn was done in stages (I remember my brother telling me that the players turned like a London bus).

I had a few football games on my ZX Spectrum but the only one that I really loved was Footballer of the Year. You played as 1 player and didn't play a full game, you just got 1 to 4 chances (decided at random apparently) to score with 2 defenders coming at you and a keeper in the sticks. I also remember a game called Soccer Sixes - six a side and Steve Nicol was legendary.

My Atari ST was where I formed my love for Championship Manager (now Football Manager) including CM Italia. My brother was more of a Premier Manager fan because he liked sorting the sponsorship, ticket prices etc. I also remember being vilified because I preferred Kick Off 2 to Sensible Soccer, but Sensi was too easy to play. I remember making a bet with one of my friends that I could turn the TV screen off and still beat the computer. Final score was 8-3 to me. Player Manager was a spin off of Kick Off 2, where you performed a managerial role and could also play as either just yourself (player manager) or the whole team. Final Whistle was a super little add on to Kick Off 2 as well - bringing in European teams and competitions.

Console wise I remember Libero Grande, Euro 96 (where it was incredibly difficult to score) and Worldwide Soccer on the Sega Saturn, as well as your FIFA's and Pro Evo's.

[Liam]

Just remembered a classic. 'Viva Football', on the PS1....hard to find a lot of details about it, but IIRC, you could play old World Cups, from qualifying through to the cup itself. Plus, if you won a cup, you could continue on to the next cup, but skip qualifying due to you being cup holders.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

Kick Off was okay.

I remember Footballer of the Year. Good game.

Another good management game was...Hmm I'm gonna have to look this up....Ugh can't find it.

It was based around the World Cup. You started with qualifying and then went to the World Cup (which you could choose country-wise). You then chose days for training, press conferences, days off etc etc and it had cool screens showing you the press conferences (you could choose your responses) and the players doing the training you'd asked them to do.

The matches also had graphical highlights.

I had it on the Amiga. Therre was a league version too which wasn't as good apparantly.

[Scott McFly]

Football games!

SWOS was the king.

Football Glory - blatant knockoff but still entertaining (overhead kicks and attacking the ref? OK!)

Wasn't there an old ISS game they used to play on GamesMaster all the time where when you went to shoot you got a closeup of the goal and a crosshair to move? That looked so cool.

Premier Manager was the management king before the fucked it up and CM/FM took over. That weird pitch view from PM3 that you normally watched in fast speed is still awesome.

Ultimate Soccer Manager was great too. Something about setting the price of your hotdogs and pies was quite appealing.

Sure I played a Striker game back on the Amiga too, can't remember what one though. But basically if you went Brazil you were unbeatable.

And I had an old PC game called It's A Funny Old Game, which was basically a really shit management game that tried to be funny by having all the players names as rude variations (presumably for copyright reasons too) and allowed you to basically tell your players to do all sorts of dirty tricks. Setting the aggro meter up to full would ensure about 4 red cards every game. And all the team names were variations on their nicknames too, so it took some thinking to actually work out who was who. Yeah it was crap.

EDIT: And Hamster, good shout - Off The Ball: World Cup edition. That was absolutely one of my favourites too, I seem to remember the press conferences being particularly great.

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

That was the game. ON The Ball: World Cup Edition.

[Scott McFly]

On The Ball, Off The Ball, same thing.

But yeah those animations were exciting, the animations for the buildup were exactly the same every time, only at the very end was it a goal or a miss.