REVIEWS COURTESY OF ZXSR

Football Frenzy
by Charles A. Sharp
Alternative Software Ltd
1987
Crash Issue 50, Mar 1988   page(s) 80

Alternative Software
£1.99

The trials and tribulations of football management could test the resolve and skills of even the most hardened First Division pro. But in Football Frenzy you are the manager of small Grimesditch Rangers, and getting your club to the Cup Final is just the beginning of an awesome task.

It's three days before the big match, but to get your team and players there you have to pay some very large bills. And if they're not met fairly promptly your club could find itself without electricity, the water supply dribbling to a trickle, the players left without any clean kit, and no club literature printed.

Football Frenzy has a fairly large vocabulary, including such subtle commands as GESTICULATE, KISS, GROPE, UNDRESS and LAY instructions holding entertainment potential - once used, though, they lead nowhere.

Really it requires lots of sharp thinking, and plenty of restraint when it comes to spending the club's money. But after the visual appeal has worn off, Football Frenzy is revealed as a very repetitive strategy (not really adventure) game.


Overall39%
Transcript by Chris Bourne

Your Sinclair Issue 54, Jun 1990   page(s) 54

THE COMPLETE AND UTTER YS GUIDE TO SOCCER ON THE SPECCY

Footie games, eh? Where'd we be without 'em? There've been hundreds of the blooming things, with more on the way each month, and they always (always! always!) sell like hot cakes (even the ones that are crap). So with the World Cup lining itself up on the horizon, let's join the slightly less-than-enthusiastic JONATHAN DAVIES, as we lead you by the hand into the past, present and future world of the Spectrum soccer game.

Oh dear. How can I start? Um, quite a few phrases spring to mind. Like "They're all the same!" and "No, please, not another one!" and, erm, "Let me out of here!" The problem, you see, is that for every MicroProse Soccer or Matchday 2 there are six or seven World Cup Carnivals (US Gold's tragic 1986 attempt at a footie sim) to wade through. And I should know - I've just waded through them all. Quite frankly I wouldn't care if the colour green never darkened my Speccy again. I'm sick as a parrot. So let's just forget all about them, eh?

What? No. You like them? Cripes. (Better get going on this giant mega-feature thingie then, hadn't you? Ed) Er, yes. Right. Football.

Well, there are certainly lots of games. And no, they're not all the same. There are in fact a few basic types, and within each of these categories dwell a hundred and one subtle variations. Um, what fun...

IT'S A GAME OF TWO HALVES

That's right, one half management, the other half actually booting the ball around a bit. To kick off with we have the straightforward arcade simulation. This you should all be familiar with - a big green pitch (seen from above, or sometimes from the side), the roar of the crowd (well, the 'beep' of the crowd), lots of little men running around kicking the ball, and you up in the air somewhere above it all, doing your best to keep one or two of them (plus the ball) under control. What you don't have to worry about though is what any of the blokes are called, how much they're worth, or any other boring managerial-type stuff. Good examples of this kind of game are Matchday 2 and Kick Off.

The second main sub-division, the management game, is a totally different kettle of fish. No footie here at all (as such), apart from the results of various games flashing up on your screen every so often to tell you how you're doing. It's business acumen we're worried about here, with all sorts of weird and wonderful information popping up to confuse you - what your men are called, how tall they are, how skilful they can be and all sorts. A good example of this variety of game is, surprise, surprise, Football Manager.

The third, and crappiest, type of footie game is the pools prediction program. Now you may get really excited by the prospect of these (I don't know) but I find them so brain-blendingly boring that this is the only mention they'll get here, so enjoy it while you can. (Sorry and all that.)

Actually there's a fourth subdivision I've just remembered too - those games that provide you with an often quite bizarre mixture of action game and management, usually consisting of lots of lists of numbers with slightly dodgy bolt-on arcade bits thrown in. Some of them work quite well, but there's always the odd game that's simply too weird for words - like Roy Of The Rovers for example, part arcade adventure of all things and with a badly drawn Roy searching for his kidnapped team!

This one's a bit weird - it was released by Alternative ages ago, and its a footie adventure game. Ber-limey. Having rescued it from the depths of the YS archives and dusted it down a bit I gave it a go. And, lo and behold, it's exactly like every other adventure I've ever played, but with the addition of that all-important footie element. What fun. Being a bit crap at both football games and adventures, you can probably guess what a pig's ear I made of it. Did I get past the first two rooms? (No.) It's got some quite nice piccies though, and I noticed that the vocabulary includes GROPE, KISS, UNDRESS, SOBER UP and HANG, although none of these seemed to have any results with my secretary (Ms Jones).

It's okay I suppose and, dare I say it, quite flash. Not really in the spirit of the traditional footie game though.


REVIEW BY: Jonathan Davies

Blurb: RATINGS Being the tricky things they are, footie games don't quite fit into the usual way we rate our games, so for the purposes of this feature here's a one-off system we've devised that hopefully takes into account all their little (and dearly loved) idiosyncrasies. Playerbility: Having forked out your dosh and loaded it up, will you be over the moon or sick as a parrot? In other words, is it any cop... or is it utter crap? At The End Of The Day: ...will you still be playing it? Or will it have joined the potato peelings, used tea bags and missives from Readers Digest in the dustbin? Kit: Aesthetic appeal, really. Lists of numbers are all very well, but are they decently presented? And if it's an arcade jobbie, are the graphics any good? Especially high marks go to those games with two or more colours used on the players, or a choice of team outfits. Atmosphere: Is it just like being in the stands at your local ground (apart from getting a bottle smashed across your cranium every ten minutes that is)? Or might you just as well be standing in a queue by the fish counter at Waitrose counting the dandruff on the back of the person in front of you? Here's where to find out!

Blurb: THE FIRST FOOTIE GAME IN HISTORY A bit of a tie (almost), but by checking out all my back issues of YS, getting hold of various release dates, dismissing the really early stuff that's virtually unrecognisable as Speccy games as we know them today, and consulting with all the experts I could find, it has to be... Football Manager from Addictive! That's right, it's the one with mugshots of that cheery bearded bloke all over it (Kevin Toms actually. Ed). Originating in the days of long shorts and over-the-knee footie boots, it sold squillions of copies, mainly because it was released on everything from the ZX81 to the Teefal HY9000 De Luxe Deep Fat Fryer. We didn't stand a chance really. It was, of course, the first of those dreadful 'management' jobbies, in which you spend the whole time staring at lists of things. Written in 100% Basic, it featured some chronic 'action scenes' and a unique 'customising' feature. (In other words, you could break into the program and do all sorts of despicable things to it.) The punters loved it. As for the first action game, that's a bit harder. It was probably Artic's World Cup Football, the first of the little-people-running-around variety. Unfortunately though it was, to be honest, utterly, utterly terrible. The graphics especially were complete rubbish. It was so bad, in fact, that US Gold decided to use it as the basis for its renowned World Cup Carnival game. (Hurrah!) Far better is Matchday, which appeared soon after - the first proper, enjoyable footie action game.

Blurb: ALMOST EVERY SOCCER GAME EVER RELEASED (DEPRESSING ISN'T IT?) Bobby Charlton's Soccer - Dacc Brian Clough's Football Fortunes - CDS Bryan Robson's Superleague - Paul Lamond Emlyn Hughes' Soccer - Audiogenic European Five-A-Side Football - Silverbird FA Cup Football - Virgin Fighting Soccer - Activision Footballer of the Year - Gremlin Footballer of the Year II - Gremlin Football Director - D&H Football Director II - D&H Football Fever - Tanglewood Football Manager - Addictive Games Football Manager II - Addictive Games Four Soccer Sims - CodeMasters Football Frenzy - Alternative Gary Lineker's Superstar Soccer - Gremlin Gary Lineker's Hotshot - Gremlin Gary Lineker's Superskills - Gremlin Gazza's Super Soccer - Empire International Manager - D&H International Match Day 128 - Ocean Kenny Dalglish Soccer - Manager Cognito Kick Off - Anco League Challenge - Atlantis Manchester United - Krisalis Match Day - Ocean Match Day II - Ocean Mexico '86 - Qual-soft Microprose Soccer - Microprose Peter Beardsley's International Football - Granslam Peter Shilton's Handball Maradona - Grandslam Player Manager - Anco Premier II - E&J Professional Soccer - CRL Roy Of The Rovers - Gremlin Saint And Greavsie - Grandslam Soccer Boss - Alternative Soccer 7 - Cult Soccer Star - Cult Street Cred Football - Players Street Gang Football - CodeMasters Super Soccer - Imagine The Double - Johnson Scanatron Tracksuit Manager - Goliath Games Two Player Super League - D&H World Cup Carnival - US Gold World Cup Soccer - Artic World Cup Soccer '90 - Virgin

Blurb: SO YOU WANNA WRITE A FOOTIE GAME? Here are a few features you may wish to incorporate when devising your own 'tuff turf' footie extravaganza... A celeb, preferably glistening and grinning, with his signature scrawled across the box. Important-looking statistics, and screenloads of them. These should not only be wholly incomprehensible but, so as to thwart even the most dedicated of punters, boast no underlying logic whatsoever. Minimal player interaction. Keep him waiting for hours just to 'PRESS ANY KEY'. A big green box with lots of footballers on it. They all have one. Tacky adverts round the pitch carrying plugs for your other games. Disastrous artwork all over the place. Muscles where you never knew they existed. Free poster and badge that you wouldn't particularly want to stick anywhere (see artwork). A 'STOP THE TAPE' message halfway through loading. Meanwhile, you've dozed off and the tape runs on to the end.

Blurb: NAMING YOUR FOOTIE GAME This is the trickiest part of writing any footie game. Although coming up with a name is fairly easy, the chances are that it's already been used seven times before. To assist with this problem we've designed the YS Footie Game Naming System™. Simply pick one word from each column and put them all together to come up with a convincing title. Gary Robson's Advanced Football Game Brian The Hamster's Ten-a-Side Soccer Simulator Kevin Lineker's Super Footie Director Plus Wayne Of The Rovers' Boring Tracksuit Manager '90 Darren Monkhouse's Quite Good Pickled Onion Challenge Bernadette Toms' Strip Ninja Footie Quiz

Blurb: A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE ON THINGS The Overhead View This features in MicroProse Soccer, Kick Off and most of the Codies games, among others. It has the advantage that you don't actually get to see the players faces (only their bald patches) and generally avoids some of the confusion you get in side views when too many players get all tangled in together and you can't quite tell what's going on. You often get a nice 3D view of the ball too, as it flies up into the air and then plummets back down to earth again. And on the minus side? Well, timing headers can get very, very tricky, but more importantly it doesn't always 'feel' quite right somehow. After all, when you watch a game of soccer, you never see it from above, do you? The Side View A bit common, you get this viewpoint all over the place, but generally it's the most reliable method. It gives a good 'as seen on telly' angle, although things have to be quite well animated for it to work (not always the case) and you do tend to get horrible sprite 'scrums' at key moments. A Bit Of Both Views Only spotted occasionally, in things like Gazza's Super Soccer, this technique can get very confusing indeed. You get a side view when the ball's in the middle of the pitch, but when you get near to either goal the whole thing flips round to give a sort of overhead/into-the-goalmouth sort of perspective. All very well, but it gives you a godawful headache after a while.

Blurb: AND STILL TO COME This is of course World Cup Year. And what happens in World Cup Year? Yes, hundreds and hundreds of new Speccy soccer games suddenly appear, that's what. There are going to be oodles of them - but how are you going to be able to tell them apart? What you need is a handy-dandy reference sheet to keep score on, isn't it? And - by Jingo! - what have we got here but the very thing! Simply keep reading YS, fill in the scores of all the new games in the spaces provided as we print them and 'Bob's your uncle' (as they say)! Now all you need do is take this copy of the mag down the shop with you whenever you intend to buy a footie game. You won't regret it! (Oh, and by the way, we've not included any budget games here - there'll be plenty of those around too. Check out Matchday or the Codies' World Cup offering for starters.) WORLD CUP '90 SCORE CARD Game: Adidas World Championship Football Company/Release Date: Ocean - May/June Notes: Programmed by Smart Egg Software, this one has to have a good chance around World Cup time. Score: 85% Game: England - The Official Football Game Company/Release Date: Grandslam - May/June Notes: Grandslam has secured the official England licence, meaning it can use the images of all the individual players (say John Barnes, or Bryan Robson). It's also planning a feature which modifies the team's performance if one of these is injured and can't play. Blimey! Score: Never released Game: European Superleague Company/Release Date: CDS - June Notes: Another management game to add to the list. Score: 80% Game: Football Manager World Cup Edition Company/Release Date: Addictive - any day now Notes: Apparently even better than Football Manager 2. It comes with its own World Cup wall chart and a competition with 'prizes' like getting your picture up alongside Kevin Toms on the packaging of the yet-to-come Football Manager 3!! Blimey! Score: 82% Game: Italy 1990 Company/Release Date: US Gold - April Notes: We await US Gold's entry with bated breath. The one thing we're certain of is that it won't be a replay of World Cup Carnival (surely?). Score: 81% Game: Golden Boot Company/Release Date: Ocean - to be announced Notes: We don't know much about this (including a firm release date) but it's a wacky football game programmed by Ocean France (responsible for Beach Volley, which looks less and less likely to ever appear on the Speccy). Score: Never released Game: Kenny Dalglish Soccer Match Company/Release Date: Impressions - April Notes: A pretty straight, eight-way scrolling side-view footie game with a Kenny Dalglish licence attached. Again, a full review next issue. Score: 46% Game: Kenny Dalglish Soccer Player Company/Release Date: Impressions - end of next year Notes: More in the Footballer Of the Year mould (though more arcadey than that apparently), this new Kenny game follows the fortunes of an individual player trying to make it into a team and then on and upwards from there. Score: Never released Game: Kick Off 2 Company/Release Date: Anco - May Notes: Hopefully a souped-up, less scrappily presented version of the original Spectrum game (on compilation now, though it was only released a few months ago). Score: 80% Game: Liverpool - The Official Football Game Company/Release Date: Grandslam - April Notes: The first of the two 'official' Liverpool games, this one gets to use the images of the various players... Score: Never released. Game: Liverpool FC Company/Release Date: Ocean - September Notes: ... while this one uses the official team badge and colours. Score: Never released. Game: Manchester United Company/Release Date: Krisalis - any day now Notes: Another game sponsored by a team as opposed to an individual player, we'll have a full review next issue. Score: 74% Game: Player Manager Company/Release Date: Anco - July Notes: Like a sort of cross between Kick Off and a management game, this was a massive hit on the 16-bit machines recently and deservedly so. Will it do the same on the Speccy? Score: Never reviewed in YS Game: Subbuteo Company/Release Date: Goliath - May/June Notes: Based not on football itself so much as the popular 'flick-to-kick' table-top game. Will we see giant fingers reach down onto the pitch? You'll have to wait and see! (Again.) Score: 81% Game: Super League Manager Company/Release Date: Audiogenic - May Notes: Audiogenic's first Emlyn Hughes game got a critical drubbing from Marcus (and then went on to sell by the lorry-load of course). How will this management offering fare? Score: Never released. Game: Superleague Soccer Company/Release Date: Impressions - out now Notes: A pretty basic management game by all accounts. Again we'll be having a look at it next month. Score: 52% Game: Vinnie Jones Company/Release Date: Again Again - September Notes: Too late for the World Cup, this will in fact sell on the 'merits' of soccer hard-man Vinnie himself. We can hardly wait. Score: Never released. Game: World Cup Italia '90 Company/Release Date: Virgin - May Notes: And last, but by no means least, it's Virgin's game, the only one officially sponsored by the World Cup tournament itself. Hurrah! Score: 79%

Kit63%
Atmosphere77%
Playerbility48%
At The End Of The Day45%
Overall50%
Transcript by Chris Bourne

Sinclair User Issue 73, Apr 1988   page(s) 51

Label: Alternative Software
Price: £1.99
Memory: 48K/128K
Joystick: None
Reviewer: Tamara Howard

Any adventure that has the temerity to tell you on the inlay card that it's Wednesday and you've just had three Shredded Wheat for breakfast has just got to be kidding.

Football Frenzy, the adventure game that has less taste than most, involves your efforts to get your team Grimsditch Rangers to the Cup Final. Judging by the state of the team on the packaging, you're in with a tough job (but you've had the shredded wheat after all). It's the standard set up, changes of location treat you to thoroughly interesting line drawings of your office, your secretary's office and some really rather fascinating tunnels.

If you're an avid football fan, you might just enjoy the game, battling through seemingly impossible odds to get to that all important match.

The vocabulary's small, the locations decidedly footballish (Ok, in this instance, I guess that's a point in its favour) and why does your office carpet have to be magenta? And why is your secretary called Yellow Pages?


REVIEW BY: Tamara Howard

Overall5/10
Summary: Decidedly budget adventure about a mythical football team and a lot of ridiculous problems. I wish I'd had the shredded wheat instead.

Transcript by Chris Bourne

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