Super Soccer review - Super Nintendo

Have you ever fancied becoming the manager of one of the world's greatest soccer teams? Does the idea of taking to the pitch yourself and scoring that winning goal fill you with unbridled, pulse-racing excitement? If the answer to both of these questions is in the affirmative, this game could be the one for you.

Super Soccer revolves around the escapades of the professional football teams which represent sixteen countries of the world. Each team is vying for top position in the renowned Human International Cup, sponsored by the game's creator's, Human Inc.

The game uses the Super NES spin 'n' scroll custom graphics chips to create a brilliant third person perspective scrolling pitch. You always take control of the nearest player to the ball and use your soccer skills to outwit the opposition and score goals. Control of the spherical item is simple, since the superglue-sponsored ball sticks to the players' feet as they make a run.

Do your goal-scoring skills rank alongside those of the legendary Gary Lineker or have you all the shambling qualities of the school spaz? You'll find out for sure when you play Super Soccer.

What the Mean Machines staff thought

On the surface, Super Soccer looks absolutely incredible. The highly realistic smooth-scrolling 3D pitch and beautifully drawn and animated players make this the best-looking sports game I've ever seen - better even than John Madden's! Sadly though, this ultra-high quality doesn't continue onto the gameplay. Super Soccer simply doesn't play a good game of football. The passing and shooting controls might sound good, but in reality they're very limited and simply aren't practical. Consequently putting together moves is a completely hit-or-miss affair - you just punt the ball into space and hope that a member of your team is there to pick it up. The only real way to play is to simply do solo runs rather than to play as a team, which isn't really football. Another very weak aspect of the gameplay is that against most teams you can pass the ball back to your goalie, take him on a solo run up the wing, avoid the two players which try to tackle you, run at the goal and, once you've sussed the right angle to shoot, blast the ball into the back of the net time and time again, which is stupid. More rigorous playtesting, a decent selection of moves, better controls and proper computer player logic could have made this the greatest soccer game yet seen. Sadly it falls short of its considerable potential and the end result is a fun, but ultimately limited football game that's great to impress your mates with but just doesn't offer enough soccer thrills to make it a priority purchase.

Super Soccer certainly defies the laws of tradition in its presentation. The viewpoint is quite original and this coupled with the fine graphics makes Super Soccer right tasty visually. Sadly, this isn't true for the gameplay. For starters, when you're playing downfield (towards the screen), hardly any of your forward players are displayed on-screen which makes passing a little difficult, especially as there's no radar. Secondly, Super Soccer is lacking in realism. Most of the time it seems as if the ball is one of those plastic 99p ones such are its fly-away qualities. In an average match, the ball may only touch the ground three or four times, the rest of the while it is suspended in a state of one volley after another. Also, the supposed multitude of possible moves are pretty much useless. The passes are always intercepted, so the only way to make any sort of progress is to just welly the ball forward every time you get it and hope for the best. All in all, Super Soccer is a potentially fantastic release spoilt by careless playtesting and minor design faults.