Sega Soccer Slam

"Fantasy Soccer Fans Rejoice"

Hands up all those people who get bored of your traditional sports sims because you either: A) can’t stand the slowwwwwww gameplay, or B) are sick of tired old games like FIFA that make you work too hard to simply execute the same attack pattern every time against a largely unintelligent AI. You may now put your hands down and read in quit awe as I tell you about easily the most underrated game of the, um, year, no, history of humankind.

CONCEPT: Imagine you took the sheer goal scoring frenzy of soccer (well, some soccer), added wanton violence, and topped it off with Matrix-esque special moves. Well imagine no longer friends, this is Sega Soccer Slam (SSS).

O.K. here’s the deal, smaller sized soccer pitch (you can run from goal-line to goal-line in about 8 secs), teams of four players (you control the three field players completely, plus a few certain goal-keeper functions like dives), five different teams, no rules (no offsides, handballs, fouls, out-of-bounds), that’s pretty much all there is to it.

There are a few different game modes: Quest – play the other four teams at your home stadium, maybe get selected in all-star game, then play the teams at their home ground, then semi’s then the final. In Quest mode each match you win earns you money to buy various items at the soccer shop, which gives you certain power-ups like increased hitting, speed, shooting etc. You can even buy SSS concept art, which have cheats written at the bottom.

The other modes, Tourney, Arcade, Challenge and Multiplayer are all good too, but pretty much the same (well not really). In these you can unlock the three extra teams for use in multiplayer. That’s it though; you will probably stick to Quest where you can unlock extra stadiums.

To the little things that make this game so good. You can save at any time during Quest, so don’t worry about having to do the long haul. The pitch, if you’re playing on grass, will turn brown in areas of heavy use if it’s sunny. Easy to unlock extras when playing on easy, but when you switch to Expert the game changes dramatically, the AI comes up with awesome plays that are extremely well thought out, very simple and effective, and ARE humanly possible with very tight strategy. The game speed and camera angles are adjustable. The game makes good use of the Xbox’s rumble facility, with vibrations matching what they should, from tiny vibration when passing, to wild spasm during Killer Kicks (see below). The commentator does well with the traditional English rants about tea and the Queen and other stuff; it is actually quite funny and has a good variety of dialogue and tone. The goalie can be weakened by pummelling him with high-powered shots, i.e. he loses his armour and is more likely to let goals in (this works really well because on Pro you MUST weaken the goalie to get a good score up). Lastly shooting is not your standard FIFA fare where the computer will decide where the ball will go based on a few variables, in SSS you aim reasonably specifically with the analogue stick (your shots go based on the direction of the stick at the time which is stating the very obvious, but aaargh, you can shoot low near, far, mid height, top corners, all based on aiming while you press shoot – I hope you get what I mean cause sometimes you have to shoot to the top opposite corner, or keep it low to score). I should also mention that on Easy you get a lot of help with you’re shooting, but on Pro you really have to aim your shots properly or you’ll hit the post, or not place it where you want to – it’s fairly easy though, it just makes the game a lot better. A good idea is to use the first time shots (if you’re not familiar with that it’s when you get the ball passed to you and you shoot without taking a touch to control the ball). The first time shots are an awesome inclusion and can be used for spectacular volleys and headers, as well as one-two passing.

The special moves are unbelievable – fill up a power meter by dodging players, punching them, using one-two’s, and combo’s of the above, and you can execute a special move in which ball carrier lobs the ball high (way, way, high) into the air, and a second player moves over the targeted landing zone for the ball’s trajectory, jumps, and then goes into super slow motion “Killer Kick”. When you’re doing a Killer Kick, you get a little red target to aim your shot into the net. Trust me, it’s awesome.

Controlling the game is dead easy. I won’t go through it all, but on offence there’s shoot (which you hold down for a harder shot), pass (hold down for a lob pass) and protect (this makes you spin quickly so the other team can’t punch you when you’ve got the ball – you have to time it though), and deke (your player does a little jump with the ball so as to avoid slide tackles). On defence there’s change player (to the closest to the ball), tackle (a slide tackle), and punch. I should mention that on Pro you really have to time deke and protect, for example if you protect you will avoid punches but not slide tackles, and if you deke you will avoid slide tackles but not punches – which makes sense really. Anyway both work really well, look cool, and fill up the power bar way quick if you string a combo together like deke, deke, protect etc.

Multiplayer rocks, there’s just no other way to describe it. 4 player compatible so don’t worry. It’s also good because you don’t have to worry about four-player split screen. Because the pitch is relatively small the action never lets up. Be wary of ball hogging glory-boys who will leave you open and take on the whole team, or shoot from half-way when the goalie’s on full power. Best way to solve that problem is to have everyone at arms length so you demonstrate the effects of computer game violence in real life.

So to the wash up…

Gameplay: 10 You can experiment with what you like to do, but I personally love Pro difficulty on high speed, absolute mayhem, damn, DAMN hard, but stacks of fun.

Graphics: 9 Fan-damn-tastic. Player models are fluid and well drawn. Stadiums are well done, ditto weather effects. There’s supposed to be over 1,000 motion captured moves, I’ll just take Sega’s word for it.

Controls: 10 So ridiculously easy to learn (there is an included training mode), but difficult to truly master. Not much to learn at all really.

Sound: 8 No complaints. Each player has their own theme. It really does compliment the light-heartedness of the game, and rarely gets repetitive.

Replay: 9 You will not get bored of it any time soon as long as you don’t stick to the easier difficulties. Unlockable extras, plus some really good cheats like big head mode and some other really good ones. Multiplayer makes me forget about Mario Kart on Super NES, most probably because you don’t need a giant or separate TV to fully enjoy it. It’s non stop action.

FINAL WORD: I’m sick of boring old FIFA, so this game was a Godsend. If you want a game that you can just pick up and play without trudging through layers of menus, the SSS is it. You can get straight into it, and I guarantee you’ll be laughing a lot during this game. It handles like a Ferrari and looks as good too. Buy it.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 12/03/02, Updated 12/03/02