"Soccer" - NES/Famicom

----- Introduction -----

Time to squeeze out one more warm, steamy review for the day. You don't even know how many I've written today. You'll never know.

This is also the last NES title we're going to see for awhile. There's about 7 Famicom games that didn't release in the west coming up here, though most of them are ports.

And boy aren't we happy, because it's a doggone sports game. This one's Soccer. It was developed by Intelligent Systems, who's better known for developing Fire Emblem, but as we know them right now, they handled the ports for Mario Bros. and Donkey Kong 3, and they also developed Wild Gunman and Duck Hunt.

Koji Kondo also composed for this game, which is pretty exciting. Not knowing who he is now would be pretty surprising for an avid game fan, but back then, in 1985, Kondo wasn't any more special than the other people we've been seeing doing soundtracks. That'll change later in our Famicom tour, but not yet.

Let's look at this Soccer game, shall we?

The lit up letter goes from left to right, it's not just the C. That would be weird.

----- Playthrough -----

My natural inclination towards sports video games is to... buy the carts for 50 cents at a yard sale and save them in-case I need a shell to encase a cool repro of a translation of a JRPG that didn't come out here, or something like that-- but I decided to put aside my difference with the genre for a moment and try not to give short shrift to Nintendo's Soccer.

At first, thinking as I did with Tennis that the only way I'd stand a chance and enjoy the game was on easy, I put everything down to the lowest difficulty, and shortest match.

I also picked Japan as my team, because I'm an insufferable weeaboo.

However, about 2 minutes into that match I was creaming the CPU 6-0, and I wasn't having very much fun. So I fingered my close friend the reset button (we have brunch on Saturdays) and set the skill level up to 3.

I'm not going to explain how soccer works-- but you should know it involves kicking the ball in the other person's goal. The game controls here are simple enough. A kicks the ball towards the opponent's goal, always. B is contextual, but it either switches the player you control (on defense), or it passes the ball between players (on offense).

You also use it to throw the ball in when someone knocks it out of bounds like a moron.

It didn't take long for the CPU to score on me, brutally kicking the ball against my goalie while I tried to pick it up, until it went through-- and it also didn't take long for me to think I had made a terrible mistake by putting the difficulty up.

By halftime, it was still 0-1, and watching the cheerleaders run out and run up and down the field, jumping around like deranged monkeys, only served as a reminder that I was running out of time to make my precious comeback.

Cease your mocking dance, large handed pink women!

So, in the back half of the game, with the chips down, I knew I had to make my move. We pushed the ball ferociously, and when all seemed lost-- BAM.

Straight down the middle, in-between a defensive player and the goalie. They never knew what hit 'em.

YOU THOUGHT!

For once my team was doing the emasculating instead of receiving it. Despite their pink shirts and pink socks with frills, they had showed the enemy team what it was to be real men. How to never give up in the face of adversity. Also, how to dress with style.

The enemy team couldn't cope with this backlash, and despite their attempts to muster all of their 3/5 talents, were unable to stop the steam-rolling that was coming their way.

You've earned the right to stand awkwardly and dejectedly in our presence while we celebrate, enemy team. 

So anyway, I won.

----- Review -----

Innovation:

Does the game show anything not yet seen on this system/ever before?

Well, there hasn't been a soccer game yet.

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Spitting Rage:

Does the game make you want to tear your own organs out of your body?

No, because I'm awesome at Soccer, and undefeated. The only thing that can be a bit frustrating is it's really hard to predict who is going to walk away with the ball when you mash two players together. It seems kind of random.

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Intuitive Design: 

How easy is it to intuitively understand the game?

I understood it without reading any manual or anything, and I barely have two sports-related brain cells to rub together so I think you can probably swing it, too.

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Satisfying Gameplay: 

How rewarding does playing the game feel?

It is actually pretty satisfying when you get off a good shot in this game. It was also satisfying crushing that enemy AI.

HOO, HOO, HOO, HOO!

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Game Depth: 

How deep/long is the game?

There's really just the one mode and no career or anything, so if you're in it for a long-haul sports experience you're probably going to be pretty disappointed.

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Sound Design: 

How's the sound?

Koji Kondo's music adds quite a lot to this game, to be honest. I'm not sure that I would have been nearly as interested in continuing to play it without the sweet tunes.

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Graphics:

How's it look?

The players have cute little sprites, and everything is pretty easily visible. I like the isometric goal sprite, it looks good. It's all fine. I wouldn't say it'll blow you away though. It's just a soccer game.

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Personal Chord: 

Does the game have that undefinable "something" for me?

Actually, a little. I really liked the music! I don't think I'll ever play this again, though.

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Should You Play: 

Is there a reason to even bother with this one?

If you're just looking for a sports game? No, I mean, just go play the new FIFA or something, why are you even reading a blog about NES games? The only two reasons I'd know of that you'd want to play this is that you're doing one of these three things:

• Playing every games on the NES/made by Nintendo
• Playing every soccer game ever made for some reason
• Sitting at your friend's house with nothing to do and he happens to have an NES and this game for some reason

So if that's how it is for you, then sure, play it. Otherwise, listen to the music on Youtube and check out my favorite games list (it may be sparse for now, but I'm trying to be selective or it'll be humongous).

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