Ocean
£9.99/£14.99

Adidas Championship Football is a knockout competition between 24 countries, and one of the best footy games around. It kicks off (ho, ho) with you choosing a one or two player game and a country to represent. Following a draw to determine who plays who, the computer randomly selects four teams for each of the six groups.

Each match is made up of two halves, with team formation, the length of match (2, 4, or 8 minutes), music on/off etc options to fiddle around with. Depending on the fall of a coin you play either up or down the pitch. The controlled player is marked, as in most (if not all) footy games, with an arrow, and when in possession of the ball a power meter controls the force with which the ball is kicked (hold down the fire button for more power).

Be careful when tackling an opponent, the ref is very fond of handing out the yellow and red cards. In one game I played three of the opposition's players were sent off (I wonder if some of them were Cameroon players in disguise). The pitch is viewed from above so all you see of the players is their heads, but character animation is good. If the World Cup hooha hasn't made you nauseous give this one a go.

MARK [80%]

It's not very often I get a football game I actually I I like. But this one did appeal to me. Adidas Championship Football is excellently presented. It's been ages since I've seen a game with so many animated logos and special screen effects: this kind of presentation injects a special quality. Ocean is definitely improving on this front. Presentation isn't everything of course, the game has to be playable to make it successful. Unfortunately when you get to the football it isn't that good. All the players look the same, the one you're controlling is supposed to have an arrow to show you where you are - the funny thing is all players on the computer team also have an arrow! The confusion this causes spoils things. I just couldn't get the hang of it and keep possession of the ball. The score at the end of one of my matches was England 1 Italy 10 (me playing En-ger-land)! Thankfully England didn't lose this badly in the real thing well done lads, you did us proud!). Adidas Championship Football is a well presented game that could have been a bit better on the football side. Well worth a look.
NICK [85%]

Ocean
£12.99 cass/£17.99 disk (128K only)
Reviewer: Matt Bielby

No, don't say it! This isn't 'just another footie game'! It is, in fact, a cause for celebration. You see, with crossed fingers and a bit of luck, it should be the last major soccer release we'll see for, ooh, ages and ages (I hope). Massive sighs of relief can be heard from everyone here in the YS office.

So. Adidas Championship Football. It is, of course, a World Cup game - a very late World Cup game, but a World Cup game nevertheless. Weirdly, and perhaps after a little chat with lawyers from official licence holders Virgin, it doesn't actually mention the words 'World Cup' at all, but goes on about an unnamed, Adidas sponsored 'knockout competition between 24 teams representing the best footballing nations in the world.' This slightly bizarre skirting of the issue hasn't actually damaged the game itself though - in fact it actually represents the real World Cup contest better than perhaps any of the current batch of games (with the possible exception, that is, of US Gold's Italy 1990).

The front end (as we say in the trade) is particularly impressive. First up you get the country names spinning around for random selection into World Cup groups (except of course it's not 'the World Cup' at all), quickly followed by an animated coin flick to decide whether you get to kick off or not. There are screens where you can save the current championship to tape, select the formation your boys are going to play in the upcoming game (not that it made too much difference to the outcome in my experience) and so on. Nifty graphical touches crop up in the actual footie bits too - windows showing the ref blowing his whistle, yellow cards, red cards and so on. Almost identical to the US Gold game is the animated sequence that crops up every time someone (usually the other side in my experience) scores - the word, erm, 'Goal!' bounces up and down frantically on a giant digitised scoreboard.

What isn't almost identical though is the gameplay. Instead of the usual side-ways on or forced perspective viewpoint everything is seen from directly over-head (like in MicroProse Soccer or Kick Off) with one team playing up and the other down the screen. Things scroll quite smoothly in all eight directions and everything is drawn in a 'nice' green monochrome - the little men coming in grey and, um, darker grey strips, though for all that they're actually quite easy to tell apart, the one you control being indicated by a little arrow pointer.

People who know the brilliant 16 bit game Kick Off will understand what I'm going to write next, but I'm afraid the rest of you will be a bit lost (sorry). You see, the version of Kick Off they released on the Spectrum was a bit of a mess really (especially visually) so there's still a whopping great hole in the market waiting for a true 8 bit replica to fill it. And - I'm happy to say - it looks like Adidas might be the game.

Y'see, while it might not be as fast or as smooth as the original, it plays in a very similar sort of a way. Things whip around the screen at quite a rate (though unfortunately it looks more like they're booting a big, wobbly balloon around than a football!) and you can change from defending frantically to making a goal-scoring break in a matter of seconds. Power meters show how hard you're kicking the ball (and a little arrow underneath helps to chip it or whatever) while tackles are fairly easy to execute too (keeping them clean is another matter of course). Unlike in Kick Off you even get (limited) control of your goalie during the game, and very necessary it is too - though switching to him quickly takes some getting used to.

This all makes for a fast and frantic game, and quite a hard one too - if you're not paying attention it takes no time for the computer controlled teams (if you're not playing in two player mode) to rack up an eight-nil (or whatever) lead.

Unfortunately though it has its faults, chief of which I found during my second or third match. From kick off you can simply dribble in a straight line up the screen into the enemy goal. You might get tackled a couple of times, but if you avoid the guy who stands directly in your way these'll all be from behind and thus bookable offences. With a bit of luck you'll be able to score without even kicking the ball (as such) once!

What else can I say about the game? Well, its 128K only (which we haven't seen for a while) and as such comes with a fairly hefty price tag, something not really justified by the packaging, which is nowhere near up to the standard of, say, Italy 1990 with its neat World Cup souvenir booklet. However (and it's a big 'however') initial batches do come with an extra cassette - a special 12" mix of New Order's World in Motion World Cup song, just the thing to get you in the footie mood.

So, to sum up. Well, apart from a tragic mistiming of the release so it fairly and squarely misses World Cup fever, Championship Football has a lot going for it. It's well presented, quite tricky, and (apart from a few annoying glitches) plays as well or better than most existing football games. Arguably the best of the current batch of soccer games, and well worth considering.

Label: Ocean
Price: £9.99
Reviewer: Jim Douglas

And this is the one! For my money, Adidas Championship Football is the best of this year offerings celebrating the Most important Event in The World.

All the elements are there, from the excitement of the draw, through the early rounds, right up to the huge finale. And every stage is handled with the flair and style you'd expect to see from an international-standard team like Ocean.

You can opt to play against a mate or battle through the entire set of computer-controlled countries on your own.

The selection process is pretty straightforward - friendly, but straightforward. It's on the pitch where Adidas stands head and shoulders above the competition.

The screen scrolls extremely smoothly and the players (some in plain shirts, some in checks) run around at an entirely respectable rate. The action is better paced than the other titles we've seen this month. In fact, it almost up to Kick Off 16 bit quality.

An arrow follows the player currently under control. The computer automatically switches your control to the player nearest the ball.

A gauge in each corner of the screen offers useful information about your player. The lower indicates his running ability (or state of fatigue). The lower this bar gets, the slower your man runs. This discourages over-use of star players and actually forces you to pass the ball. The top gauge indicates the style and strength of kick. The longer you hold the fire-button, the higher the gauge-reading and the harder the kick. Once the strength of the shot is determined, you can opt for a lob or a ground-level shot.

Once all these parameters are in place, the next time your player hits the ball, the ball will act in the specified manner. The only thing you now have to worry about is running toward the ball at the correct angle.

Getting to grips with the ball control took some time, I have to admit, but once I'd got the hang of it, there were no worries.

Goalkeepers are entirely under your control. Once an opposing attacker gets into the area with the ball, a simple left or right will make the keeper dive. So long as you're paying attention your (exceptionally tall) keeper should keep the onion bag largely free of balls. Obviously in games as important as these, tempers are bound to get a little strained and, now and again, people will end up on the floor. So it's a good job the Ref is on hand to dish out cards (Yellow and Fatal) to the offending ruffians. Such instances pop up in little bottom-right boxes.

The lower half of the screen is reserved for score-line information, remaining time on the clock (variable at your whim), who is currently "with" the ball and what position he plays.

There's also a commentary line which throws up the most toe-curling platitudes on top of the usual info of who's been booked, who won the throw in etc "The keeper was daydreaming" indeed.

It you're after endless screens full of stats and strategy, forget it. If, however, you want a realistic World Cup series of events and a thoroughly sound football arcade game: Adidas Championship Soccer is your man, er, men.