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The head of John Barnes, true enough.
But those shoulders? Clearly that week's pasty mascot...
"There's only one way to beat them: Get round the back"
As Barnsey so memorably (ahem) "sang" way back in the day, when even Adidas Power Soccer was a distant fever-induced dream, and X-Box 360 was beyond even my own drunken imaginations.
So then, John Barnes.
Arriving around the same time as Sensi, but crucially featuring a bizarre and barely usable mouse control system for player 2, which meant for those amongst us with only 1 joystick, but also 1 friend we finally had a 2 player footy game.
Of course, it was dreadful.
In order to keep the speed up, the visible playing area was around half the screen (and just in case you're imagining some kind of "Widescreen" effect you could live with, no. This was letterboxed at the top and sides leaving not so much a letterbox as a keyhole).
The goalkeepers could pluck the ball out of thin air, having propelled themselves thirty feet forwards and sideways whilst facing the wrong way.
So good were the keepers, in fact, that the only reliable way to score was to run in a circle on the edge of the box, until the furious goalie threw himself at your feet. Allowing you to slip it into the net.
Every time.
This resulted in tightly poised scorelines of around 98 - 97 in every match.
Also, when you scored, your player would embark on a victory lap of the surrounding athletics track (which had been made a red-card offence earlier that year). Also the then new back-pass rule was missing, and as another review has noted the actual real-life cup winners weren't included in the team-line up.
The only other memorable feature was the tackling. Which, when successful played an odd suction cup sound effect to indicate taking the ball.
Occasionally, (presumably due to the 4 channel sound chip - but what do I know) this effect would fail to play, meaning your noble foe would be running off with the ball, leaving you to shout: "Ref! Not even a sucky noise!".
Having said that, me and my best mate played it every night for about a year.
They were the days, eh?
It also gave you the option to "Control all players" or "Control John Barnes". I selected the latter, and I'm still controlling him to this day. So next time you see him on Match of The Day looking slightly bewildered, you'll know why...
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Fine, but with a tiny visible area that makes you feel as though you're viewing the action from an adjoining room, or possibly playing by mail.
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Hysterical. From "thunder" that sounds like a snipers' bullet ringing out through the stadium, to the sampled chants, to players calling out for the ball. Badly.
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Running rings round the goalie, "Not even a sucky noise", and famously round my way - Lothar Matthäus getting rooted to the halfway line for the entirety of the second half.
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| A couple of years ago, I'd have given this 10 without a doubt. But my friend and I returned to it, while drunk last year. Which was rather akin to visiting a beloved relative, only to discover a bony skeleton, slumped in their once-favourite chair. |
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Get Amiga Forever with pre-installed Workbench, games, applications, and much more.
It also contains the original Amiga ROM-files, 100% legally!
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