International Superstar Soccer Deluxe

"The most realistic 2D soccer game by Konami. Absolutely perfect."

This is the Japanese version of Konami's International Superstar Soccer Deluxe...only this one has twice as more teams than its US counterpart and tons of Japanese voices! This is also THE best 2D soccer game I've ever played in my life!

Gameplay: 10

Believe it or not, the teams in this game are somewhat UNbalanced, which is a *good* thing for soccer games, since if all teams have the same offense and defense levels, then where's the fun? This game can't allow Korea's team kicking Italy team's butt because (you guessed it) Italy's team is MUCH stronger than Korea's team, almost as much as Brazil's.

You can only control one of the eleven characters in the team. While controlling, you can pass, shoot the ball, kick it to the sky, do some fancy dances, etc. Also, there's a "tiredness" system that when that character run a lot in a game, he'll evantually lose stamina.

You can also set which type of formation you want and if none of them suits your need, you can create your own. There are also formation strategies too, like putting all units on offense or putting all units on defense. The choice is yours.

The features in this game are simply way cool. Single match, tournament, International championship, World championship, Practice, time attack, and scenario, and the most important of all, Penalty Kick! This alone increases the replay value big chunk.

Graphics: 10

Beautiful. Simply beautiful. The fields look real, the characters look real. Even the dog referee (unlock by using secret code) looks real! Nothing's really wrong with the animations either. In fact, there's a _lot_ of animations going on here. There are even winning posts! ...Well, sort of. After you get a goal, you'll get a special victory post from the character who shot it. The coolest one is probably the character flips and shake his body --- Contra style. Better yet, there are even some "idle cinemas" which will activate when a character shot 3 goals in a row, or shot an " I saved the day" goal. With all these, Konami manage to run it at the super smooth 60fps. Pretty amazing.

Sound: 10

The voice acting is a very cool feature in a SNES game. There are lots of them (over 100), and some voices require you to do certain action, like passing the ball to your partner and then pass it back, and repeat the process. You can hear them very clearly, though. The Gooooooaaaallllll!!! thing is also here, although much shorter than that special Spanish commentator, who is the creator of this thing. The kicks and headbutts sound like as they're kicking in real life. Also, the crowds do add a LOT of realism in this game. Don't underestimate these little people.

Control: 10

Very responsive. Customization is here, too. With just these two, I have nothing more to say with the controls. Oh, 4 player support, too, but you need the multi-link in order to do so.

Replay value: 10

This game has so much going on that you'll spend hours just trying to beat the World Championship. And that's just one of the many features! This game is soooo real that you can feel you're watching World Cup. This game has reaches the point of pure perfection. Definitely a must buy.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/99, Updated 11/01/99