Soccer Atari 8-Bit game review [Matter of Import 093]
7The simply titled "Soccer" is a four player sports game for the Atari 8-bit computers. Subscribe to Blown Cartridges for more retro game review videos: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoDQj54Gd-w8RTdukMrQScQ?sub_confirmation=1
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The simply titled Soccer is a surprisingly robust sports game for the system. Up to four players can compete or cooperate along with difficult computer opponents. Each team consists of ten fielders and a goalkeeper, and a tap of the button gives a player control of the closest teammate to the ball. If they already have the ball, the joystick button kicks it in the direction they’re running.
Meanwhile the rest of the players on both teams just stand around unless the scene scrolls away from the midfield, in which case they’ll run to stay in frame.
Playing single player plays a bit like one-on-one - you and one of the computer opponents are the only ones in motion at a time, trying to maneuver the ball past each other towards the opposite goal. Since you run faster without the ball than with it, this means kicking it downfield and hoping to catch up before the opponent jumps into a closer defender to grab it. Given the small sizes of everything on-screen, this is a difficult task, and a difficult game. The computer opponent, even on its lowest difficulty setting, is unerring in its ability to spot the ball, get there, and keep moving, while swapping to the closest uncontrolled teammate can be tricky if you’re wrong about who is technically closest.
Officially, as I was playing alone, I give Soccer a C ranking. If I had three friends to play with me, I might bump it up to a B.
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