WHO REMEMBERS? The UK Nostalgia Podcast
Join "amateur" historians Andrew and Liam (thrice bronze medalists in 'The South Yorkshire Rememberers Chalice') as they travel back in time like Nicholas Lyndhurst in Goodnight Sweetheart and try to remember things from the past.
Do you remember Woolworths? Do you remember when Marathons changed their name to Snickers? Do you remember Del Boy falling through the bar? If so then come and remember with us. If not then stick around and we will probably remember it for you. You literally can't lose so why not hit the play button as hard as Paul Sykes hit that shark?
WHO REMEMBERS? The UK Nostalgia Podcast
Who Remembers........Retro Football Video Games?
Take a nostalgic journey through the evolving world of football video games with podcast hosts Andrew and Liam joined by special guest Mark Webster from the Tufty Club podcast. Together, they unpack the fascinating progression from primitive pixelated football simulations to the sophisticated games we know today.
The conversation kicks off with early Commodore 64 and Spectrum classics like Match Day 2 and Emlyn Hughes International Soccer, with Mark recounting his formative gaming experiences playing these often frustrating but strangely addictive titles. The hosts discuss the bizarre quirks that defined early football games – from chunky sprites and awkward controls to the infamous "glitch goals" that players would exploit to win matches.
As the discussion moves through the decades, we witness the transformation of the genre with landmark titles like Sensible World of Soccer on the Amiga revolutionizing what was possible in a football game. The group explores why some games succeeded where others failed, analyzing the delicate balance between playability, graphics, and authenticity that has always defined great football games.
There's plenty of laughter as the hosts recall oddities like Peter Shilton's Handball Maradona, ridiculous commentary lines that would repeat endlessly, and games where you could inexplicably swerve throw-ins or make the referee a dog. Behind the humor lies a thoughtful exploration of why, despite their obvious limitations, these games captured our imaginations and kept us playing for hours.
The episode finishes with each host selecting their desert island picks for the greatest football management game and football simulation of all time, reflecting on just how rare truly great football games have been despite the countless titles released over the decades. Whether you've been gaming since the 80s or are curious about the roots of today's FIFA and PES titles, this episode offers both nostalgia and insight in equal measure.
Hello and welcome to the podcast who Remembers? In this episode we are asking who remembers retro football video games.
Speaker 2:C5, Britain's first mass-produced electrical car.
Speaker 3:And something called the internet. Stop joking. Thanks, steve, but none of the locals got paddling. Yeah, that's for me. No bottleless kids. I can't speak. You can't win anything with kids. Pac-man One of the superstar video games in the business Do you think it threatens the world of the living?
Speaker 2:If we're weak, can't get fooled again.
Speaker 1:Remember when it's the lowest form of conversation. So, yeah, this week we are joined by a podcast royalty, I would say, certainly as far as we're concerned and about the rest of the world. But yeah, one half of the Tufty Club, mark Webster, who was an inspiration we mentioned when we did a recording with dead bat that they were an inspiration. But yeah, absolutely, they gave us the kick up the arse to have a go at this.
Speaker 3:I think the line the lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that if. But the line that I loved, by the way and I don't even know if we knew you guys at the time, but when you sort of said, you gave us a bit of a mention and said, if you tolerate this, living With Maylee will be next, as a sort of Manning Street Preachers reference, and I loved that because we weren't, you had no reason to mention us or promote us. But yeah, we are eternally grateful and you know, mates, these days, but we weren't at the time. So thanks, and these days, but we weren't at the time. So thanks, and yeah, mark webster, what are you going to talk about with us today?
Speaker 3:I'm going to talk about myself. Now. You've given me that ego boost, I think. But uh, no, thank you. Uh, what I'm going to talk about is what dead bat prescribed I'd talk about on the, on his subuto party. Basically it rules my life, basically runs my life. So I think he mentioned that. I'm going to talk about, um, retro football.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he said you're an expert in it. He signed you up for it, didn't he?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know why he did that. To be honest, I think he's stitching me up, but I mean, if you've ever listened to us, I can talk rubbish about anything really. So I'll give it a go.
Speaker 2:But before I forget because I've this to Liam and I don't know if you knew you have actually appeared on a video game TV show, aren't you? I can't remember what it was called.
Speaker 3:Did you just say I don't know if you know this, as if I don't?
Speaker 1:know no sorry, people can't see you didn't know it and Roy did.
Speaker 2:Obviously, we're filming this and you can see us both. I'm pointing at Liam, but I've just realised to you two, it just looks like I'm pointing at you both.
Speaker 3:Well, even worse, you are pointing towards me on the Zoom.
Speaker 2:I mean, this is very behind the scenes, you don't know about this, but yeah so, but you, Liam, didn't know that you'd been on a games TV show.
Speaker 1:It's understandable. I didn't know. I would hope Mark knows that he was on a TV show.
Speaker 3:I did know it's like one of those memories I've suppressed and now you're bringing it out and I'm going to have to have therapy. Yeah, I did, and you know what? We'll probably come on to that later.
Speaker 2:Ooh.
Speaker 3:Teaser.
Speaker 1:Was that football related? Then Was it a football reference?
Speaker 3:There is a football crossover in it. It's like a world exclusive. It's not a world exclusive, it's boring, in fact. But don't let that put you off carrying on listening.
Speaker 2:So exclusive. It's boring, in fact, but don't let that put you off carrying on listening. So what's the first football game you can remember playing? I don't even know if I know the answer to this for me.
Speaker 3:The thing is I do because I'm like a couple of years older than you two, aren't I? So I think when I kick off this, it's like it is ego-centric, it's my life in football, video games, so it's sort of. I think what we've talked about before and what we'll probably end up doing is sort of the 80s 90s, because for me, that is your sort of retro era. If you're going to remember something, remember that.
Speaker 2:Well, post-90s I'd argue that it would just be from Pro Evo. But ask for that. Wouldn't it really Like there were no other real Well, like Chris, kamara's Street Soccer and obviously Chris. Kamara's Street Soccer as well. Yeah, they were the big three, weren't they?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so yeah, it kind of just tailed off after that. But yeah, so you two probably I'll probably start talking about stuff a bit before your time, but obviously jump in when I start missing stuff that you're aware of. But for me it was. I didn't get into football until I was sort of fairly late I was probably about eight or nine, rather than you know if a lot of lads get into it when they're sort of five or six. So like sort of a lot of it passed me by. My sister got Commodore 64 many years before, so this was brilliant. Five-year-old sister, or my cousin's had a commodore 64, so she sort of must have demanded one. Or my dad got one cheap or something, um, within no time. She couldn't be arsed with it, so I inherited it.
Speaker 3:So it's like a free christmas present yeah yeah and uh, but I was just more into I don't know a team and stuff back then.
Speaker 2:So on the c64. By the way, my dad made me first computer I'm gonna get you. I borrowed an Atari off my cousin. Then he said I'll buy you a computer. It's got to be one of those that you can do some work on it. I went about eight. We never did anything, we just played games. One of them. We've got a keyboard, so you're not just pissing around on games. And then yeah, we just play games.
Speaker 3:I look at you now. I look at me now Recording a podcast on a computer you've not turned off in 30 years.
Speaker 2:This is true. I dare turn this computer off because I think it's never going to come back on again.
Speaker 1:So yeah, no, to be fair though I was saying I got an Atari ST and they said it's not just for games, and I remember just typing Liam is Mega in different colour fonts for multiple months and that was my Atari ST.
Speaker 3:in Amiga, though, you could do more than just type your name in different fonts. You could get it to speak at you, couldn't you? I'd like a synthesized. Do you know what? I'm telling a lie.
Speaker 2:Me and my dad once typed in. It took us about four hours Gunshot sound. Do you know how coded it in? I didn't listen. P-pew, p-pew, that was it. I thought we were amazing. Yeah, sorry anyway, yeah yeah, you typed out a magazine and it just went papiom, papiom, papiom, papiom.
Speaker 1:That right gunshot sound. So my first knowledge of football games is they were incredibly bad. Mark, would you agree with that?
Speaker 3:I think they were. Did you have a?
Speaker 1:kind of an opening. That was good, Because mine wasn't my first. Goes were awful in football games.
Speaker 3:Well, my first one one at the time I thought was good uh, and luckily it's probably so there's this game, uh, released by ocean software. Who just did?
Speaker 2:yes, they were they were brilliant.
Speaker 3:And match day two it was, and I played it on my mate, spectrum, because he was more into football and he was, he was like the kid who kind of got me into football, pretty much. So, um, obviously, I've been playing on commodore six for a few years and it sort of thought he'd pass me by a bit. Um, and he got this game and we went around and I was starting to get into football a little bit, played it and it was an eye-opener, let's say, um, absolutely shocking graphics. Looking back, you know, spectrum, we're just all two-tone stuff yeah, which obviously regular listeners will have learned about now I like it.
Speaker 3:I like it but, um, it was just like it had, basically you, but big fat men running about um chunky, chunky sprites, we'll call them, and it had like a shot. I don't know if you played it I kind of shot meter over their head. So rather than holding the button down for how hard you wanted to kick it above their head, they kept going one, two, three, one, two, three.
Speaker 2:I'm like I have seen. I've never played this.
Speaker 3:I've never had a Spectrum so I've never played it. Yeah, and it'll probably come back to dribbling in football games, not dribbling on football games. It's just like back and forth these things. You had to time it. You know, three big punt one, it just like went along ground. Two was somewhere in between and, yeah, we just played it for hours and hours and hours, and that was sort of my first in.
Speaker 2:The first I can, yeah, the first I can think of there must have been one before that, and I'm sure you'll come on to it is Emlyn Hughes' International Soccer, which is obviously a a giant of the C64.
Speaker 3:I thought you were going to say Emlyn Hughes was a giant of the of the game. No, no, yeah but it's weird.
Speaker 2:Sponsor though, any Emlyn Hughes. I like this on games, though, like when you'll just get rammed, like you say, Chris Kamara's street soccer.
Speaker 1:Would Emlyn Hughes have been question of sport? Would he have had that sort of BBC star icon power?
Speaker 2:I think that's yeah, Sue Barker's or Bill Beaumont's international soccer, yeah, so.
Speaker 3:I suppose they went with what they got, and, yeah, I think that might have been a year or international soccer, yeah. So so I suppose they went with what they got. Um, and, yeah, I think I think that might have been a year or two later, and I certainly played a year or two later. There was more games before this that were utterly rubbish. Um, I'll probably come on to them, but um, that was the first one. I remember. Emlyn hughes yeah, that came along at a time, I think, when mid to late 80s they just licensed anything. Video games were taking off and it was just like an easy way they did like do a video game for any film that came out. They'd try and convert all the arcade classics and then they just licensed anything. So you get like they were game based on frankie goes to hollywood. They were. Oh yeah, I remember that. It's very it's actually.
Speaker 2:I've never played it, but I remember reading this magazine at the time and it got voted the best Commodore 64 game of all time.
Speaker 1:This sounds like Doth protest too much, doesn't it? I've never played it. No, no, no.
Speaker 3:I've never played it.
Speaker 2:Apparently it's brilliant. Yeah, apparently it's a fantastic game.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I bet, if you put your camera down now, you won't love the caps.
Speaker 2:You fill them with your joystick as we speak.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but yeah, sam Fox's strip poker, which, incidentally, I did play as well as a nine-year-old, so they just sign up anyone. I mean they didn't do Sam Fox's international soccer, which.
Speaker 2:I mean missing a trick. You haven't done that. Yeah, they are yeah.
Speaker 3:So they just sign up anyone, I think, just to stick a name on something, and it'd sell a few more copies, wouldn't they? So, um, yeah, you're probably talking that here. I mean, what this got me into? Obviously, match day two. So then that's what I started doing. I started looking at any football game because I'm starting to get into football and it and I've never really got any footy games. So then it was just like trolling back what is there available? And there was some absolute shite available. I can. Can tell, did you go?
Speaker 2:to the store in town marketing town, not marketing town, more should I say where they were. That guy used to sell them all for like £1.99 tapes, cassette, tapes of like games.
Speaker 3:I didn't indulge in piracy. I can't confirm or deny. Everyone were tape-to-taping, weren't they back?
Speaker 2:then yeah, yeah, yeah, they, and he was just making money off it obviously. Unbelievable. I was more of a Rotherham boy Went to Microfun in Rotherham Market which Microfun, don't know what it is never heard of it, but it sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun anyway.
Speaker 3:Well, microfun, it sounds like. It sounds like it's not a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:Well, I suppose, yeah, you have a bit of fun, then that's what it should be for people that age you have a bit of fun, but not too much fun.
Speaker 3:It's not the biggest, but you know, and yeah, so yeah, I'd just be looking, you know, buying the computer game magazines, looking for what I could get. A bit late started high school and, yeah, borrowed games off people. And that's when, first of all, I played on this absolutely appalling international soccer which I think Emlyn Hughes is sort of based on. Yeah, I was going to ask you about this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to ask you about this Because international soccer and Emlyn Hughes international soccer. I think people get the two confused Because when I've looked at shittiest games of all time, emlyn Hughes' international soccer often comes up and I think they've got confused with international soccer, which is a completely different game.
Speaker 3:I think what they've done is one of the reviews I read of what? Because I did the same, because this was originally again behind the velvet curtain. It was going to be the like crap footy video games weren't it, and I was going to shock, jock a few opinions just for the sake of it. But yeah, I did the same thing. I Googled for that and they kept saying Emily Hughes and I was like, yeah, I think some people mistook it for the original 1982 or whatever. It was this international soccer, I think some of it, though I read some reviews I think it was just Americans that couldn't play it, so I don't know if it's difficult to score well, we'll get on to that and what I want to talk about but is it still like so?
Speaker 1:are we still the era where because I got some really poor early Atari, I'm talking late 80s, start of the 90s the gameplay was appalling. It was more about training your players, it was more about doing things in a gym and your player would get out of breath, and there was no sort of actual gameplay that represented football in these games. Are we yet into an era where you actually feel like you're playing a game of football, or were you just button bashing and, and you know, have we got anywhere near a football game yet there was certainly some nuance, I can tell you.
Speaker 3:I think there's some proper footballing in this and I think what's probably happened there is your dad's got you playing, uh, just things where you have to type into your computer there because that's what he wanted to do, because mid to late 80s they were low, just, I mean, we're talking about them licensing any old crap. They made a game, peter shilton's and ball maradona brilliant about 86 yeah, I mean for one.
Speaker 3:Why would you want a game that all you do is goalkeep? You literally there was. It wasn't a game of football. You just get scenarios where, oh, they throw on goal, you've got to try and stop it, and that would just hit again and again, and again. Secondly, why would you name it after your biggest failure, getting outjumped by a man a foot smaller than you? It's like what was he called Chris Woods' gaping legs, chris.
Speaker 2:Woods' penalty shootout.
Speaker 1:But that sort of felt to me like a time where computer games were to fill time rather than to be enjoyable. It was like I've got an afternoon I need to fill, so I'll play this, not I tell you what. I cannot wait to log on and play whatever it is.
Speaker 2:By the way, sorry, just going back to that, why was it called? It's such a shit title.
Speaker 1:Peter Shilton's Handball.
Speaker 2:Peter Shilton's Handball Maradona. I don't know, peter.
Speaker 3:Shilton's Handball Maradona is the way I read it, but you read it a different way. Peter Shilton's Handball Maradona.
Speaker 2:Peter Shilton's Handball Maradona, that's it. That's what I read it as Peter Shilton's Handball Maradona, maradona, maradona. This should be like a sectionary, actually. If you save a pen with Shelton, that's it.
Speaker 1:you complete the game so, even if it was the subject of Maradona's handball, should it not have been Peter Shelton's Maradona handball?
Speaker 3:I don't quite get the title, I don't get the title Peter Shelton, going back to Match Day 2. Imagine that, as a game.
Speaker 1:You've got Peter Shillen's shit.
Speaker 2:His face on side.
Speaker 3:You're right, the aim of the game is to make him not shit and it's practically impossible. But I mean going back to Match Day 2, the artwork on that and the artwork on all the games from Ocean at that time I think by some guy called Bob Wakelin, and he basically did these amazing paintings. But the football ones were clearly based on real people, like there's one that was Lineker you knew it was Lineker and it's like a montage and there's basically at the bottom of it there's a diving goalkeeper, which is clearly Shilton, and the ball is passing he's literally caught the classic he's dived after the ball has gone in and it's brilliant artwork, I mean it.
Speaker 3:You could get a million different pods out, even just things we skirted around. You know c64, the artwork, all the titles and stuff, like sam fox's strip poker, I know it is so funny.
Speaker 1:It is so funny because at the time, as you said, it's not too late, by the way, to change episode to sam fox's strip poker who remembers sam fox's strip poker?
Speaker 2:Who remembers? Who remembers Sam Fox's?
Speaker 3:strip poker, you didn't have to type your credit card in either. I don't remember that, but I wish I did to be honest, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2:I wish I had memories of that. What I want to say is that you look at the boxes of these games and you think, fucking hell, this looks Like you said the artwork is absolutely fantastic on all of them. And then you put it in like, and you watch it now and it's like oh, fuck's sake this is shy.
Speaker 3:Well, you turn over and you'd look at screenshots and they'd be crap. But then you'd like you'd squint even further and it'd say screenshots from amiga version.
Speaker 2:So many times that stung me. That is where, like graphics on this now look at this is like the proper size players. Amiga version for fuck's sake.
Speaker 3:yeah, and who could afford Amiga in 80s? Eh?
Speaker 2:No, not in 80s or a mid-90s Amiga man, but we'll probably get onto some Amiga game. Well, one in particular anyway.
Speaker 3:Of course we will, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, and peter shilton. But yeah, so did you move on from.
Speaker 3:He said that was spectrum. You're onto commodore 64 now. Yeah, so this, which is what?
Speaker 1:I own.
Speaker 3:So this is me, yeah, hoovering up any game I could and same with my mates.
Speaker 3:So they, they. This is the beauty about, um, you know, just going out your house when you're a kid back in our day I know they don't anymore, but you'd, you may have a spectrum, you'd have a commodore, you could play the best bits on each one. So, yeah, just oomphing up any game that I could and basically got Football Manager, the original Football Manager, which Kevin Toms Well, this is it. So this is kind of the moral panic was taken off, wasn't it of video games? You know, rot your brain, get you addicted and stuff. What was it sold millions, this, but what was he playing at? So, basically, football manager, this again the artwork of this, like some crappy picture, but the main thing about it was the fact that it was by addictive games, which you know, straight away his alarm bells ringing and it had his face on yeah, his face and it said and he looked like the yorkshire ripper.
Speaker 3:So you've got this. So you've got this guy that looks like the Yorkshire Ripper saying he's going to get you addicted to something for only £1.99. Do you know?
Speaker 2:for years, I thought he must be a manager that I didn't know of, because I'm obviously really young, and I thought, well, it's obviously Kevin Toms. You know what I mean it's obviously a manager, like a I don't know a manager of Liverpool in his 70s or something like that. I never actually had that game, though I used to see it all the time. It was one of the non-budget games. It was difficult to get that one.
Speaker 1:Do you guys class football management games as a football game?
Speaker 3:Well, this is where the grey area was going to be. I mean we could talk forever about Champman Football Manager Company.
Speaker 2:We should probably do a separate episode of that.
Speaker 3:But this when we were going to do the crap video games thing, this got all the accolades back in the day. The original came out in about 82,. They were follow-up in mid-80s and they were both rated off the charts and all that. And of course so was Champ Manager and so was Football Manager. But my shock jock opinion was going to be and it certainly holds true for this one on the Spectrum and Commodore 64, it's basically just a spreadsheet simulator, you know you just numbers against numbers, yeah, and it doesn't matter whether it's a farm or if it's a factory or a theme park.
Speaker 1:It's not football, is it? But don't get me wrong, some of the champ managers went on to be incredibly addictive and really great games, but I'm not sure they're true. Certainly not football simulations, are they? They're strategy games, I would say.
Speaker 2:I've always thought a really good game would be championship manager format, but it's probably really boring.
Speaker 1:But you have to play the games.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no. But forget the football thing you're. You're ahead of a political party, because it's the same sort of thing you're like so like you have to react to, certain things. Forget the match engine. You don't need that and it's like oh, one of your mps is all the time it says, do you want more immigrants?
Speaker 2:and you have to say yes or no, yeah, yes or no yeah then you get people like daily mail headline coming up like saying yeah, so get this guy in yeah, you're going to play a low block on the boats. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and your approval rating goes like higher and stuff. I think this is an amazing game. Get it made.
Speaker 3:Hang on. So to be clear, it's still a football management game, but you're also a politician, it's not? About football man.
Speaker 2:Forget football. It's the same as Chapman it's the same layout as championship managers, it's got the same background.
Speaker 1:Oh, but you're a politician.
Speaker 2:You've got all your MPs, all your councillors, You've got to like, and you're Keir Starmer going. Oh God, what am I going to do with it? Yeah, and then every four years you have an election and yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:So you play like a creative, attacking sort of parliamentarian. That's going to yeah, and if you lie.
Speaker 2:You could lie to get approval rating up just to get in, but then you've got to answer once you get into power.
Speaker 1:Then you need a solid number six to fend off their.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:What's your match engine? Is it like Prime Minister's Question Time?
Speaker 2:Yeah, prime Minister's Question. You have to pick the right answer.
Speaker 3:And then you get that commentary thing and you get flashing text for a goal it's like Keir Starmer's, called you a wanker.
Speaker 2:Flashing. You could start as a counsellor and then work your way up to prime minister. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3:Anyway, this is a massive tangent, but that's going to make me millions that game.
Speaker 2:Unfortunately, all I can do is a gunshot sound when I'm coding.
Speaker 1:That's going to work.
Speaker 3:I reckon that might be where your political career would have finished up anyway, Anyway sorry, carry on, anyway, away from assassinations and back to where we were, which I can't. Oh, it was Kevin Toms, wasn't it? Yeah, Kevin Toms.
Speaker 2:So the football management games.
Speaker 3:they were just, and you know, my shock jock opinion was going to be that management games are just spreadsheet simulators. They're rubbish. But what I would say is what all of these games sort of cash in on is the fact that they know people buying these games love football, and they'll sort of fill in the blanks in the head, won't they? So even the good games that we're going to come on to later, I actually don't think there's. I think there's only a handful of truly good footy games. The rest we thought were good because oh, it's got the real team names.
Speaker 2:And then you're like you're there, aren't you?
Speaker 3:in your head and it's all a bit. It's got the proper kits and all that. You can sort of forgive it for being a bit shit.
Speaker 1:I completely agree. By the way, that's jumping a little bit towards the end, but I but I think there's such a small amount of actually good football games. I think most of it just fills a need for people to. They want some interaction with football, so I'll play this game. I've only played two or three different football games that I've actually thought were very good, and I've spent lots of hours on tons of games, but there's only a couple I've actually thought were great.
Speaker 3:Yeah passing the time.
Speaker 1:Yeah no, but it feels like it's sort of oh yeah, it's a footy game, I'll play that and you've spent a lot of time on it, but actually, when you think about it, it wasn't actually a great game.
Speaker 3:Wasted my time, wasted my life, yeah wasted my life playing Kevin Tom's football, this football manager, was it, and I thought you could. You saw the gameplay and I thought for days, weeks, I thought you could control it. I'm pissing about with my joystick, thinking I'm trying to shoot. It's like why is it not shooting? I've pressed fire 20 times. Well, because I'm not controlling it. So there was nothing there apart from press one to continue. Buy this bloke.
Speaker 3:You know that sort of stuff and it got all these, like I say, all these awards. But it wasn't actually that good, I didn't think, and but it wasn't actually that good, I didn't think, and there were loads of games like that.
Speaker 1:I mean ultimately as well, those sort of games, because I think when you move into, like your Pro Evas and your FIFAs and the good versions of both, you are in control of those great moments that you can really celebrate. I think with football management games it is ultimately a roll of the dice. It's a random number generator Someone shared that man but ultimately you can do everything right and if the random number generator goes against you, you'll still lose that game and I think that's why it's so frustrating.
Speaker 2:I'm going to come onto this later, I think. Really.
Speaker 3:But yeah, no, no for champ manager. I mean, that's the greatest one. But I'm going to make that same point.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll make Brendan a coin, chap man, and I'm like oh, I'm doing this. It took ages doing my team, because you do know that it's probably just a toss of a coin, don't you Do? You know what I mean? It's just a. It's already decided before you put it in that box.
Speaker 1:Well, I think you can influence it and you can sway it one way or another, and I suppose, like real life, that there are things out. Roy, when we used to play Pro Evo or FIFA, I used to hate the concept of what I call a dog shot, which is so a well-worked goal I love so it's passed around, it's manoeuvred well into a goal-scoring opportunity and it's placed in the net. I hated a long range where, effectively, if somebody had put their controller on the floor and gone in the kitchen to get another beer and a dog had happened to put his paw on the controller and press shoot that, that goal would have still counted. I don't like the fact that a dog could have scored that goal. I was kind of really against the fact that, like I said, if people used to score outside the box, they'd be jumping up and I'd say it's a dog shot, you can't, I'm not having that, it's a dog shot.
Speaker 3:It's a dog shot. I've got a talented dog. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but is it that? Time, if it just puts its nose on a square button, which I think is plausible, a dog could do that I agree with you, because I agree with you in real life on this, because goal of the season always is someone's twatted it from 30 yards.
Speaker 1:You smashed a one in a hundred goal. I could twat it from 30 yards.
Speaker 3:Yeah exactly. If I did it 100 times, I'd probably get that same goal. Maybe that one time, if I'm lucky.
Speaker 2:It's like if you put 100 monkeys in a room in the right shape, if you put 100 dogs and they play pro-evo, could one of them score from halfway on the play line, I think they all would, given by what Liam's saying yeah, you have to pour on the pad at the right time.
Speaker 1:But yeah and I think this to me is a big part of the football game concept where they became good and I think we're probably just about moving into that era is where it felt like you had to control your players. You had to do the good things. It wasn't just about oh, you've picked the right players and let's help the stats work for you. You had to play the pass at the right time. You had to play the through ball at the right time. I think we might still be a little bit early for that, but I think, as we move into sensible world soccer games, where actually you were much more in control, it was much less just an algorithm, I felt.
Speaker 3:Well, me and Hegy or Egy or whatever you call him. This week I think we're going to put that forward for Emlyn Hughes, which came out in 88. I didn't play it until about 89 when I went to big school and I borrowed it off someone. But for me that had it.
Speaker 3:But where it also fell down is not the dog shot, the I don't know what you call it, the twat shot, one where you find out where there's a certain shot that always goes in, and then you just do it every time and virtually every football game suffers from this you'll find something that you can do that will always work, and then you can see your opposition, especially when you both get really good and then they start manoeuvring into the position where you know they're going to do that shot and you're like you twat.
Speaker 1:This, even maneuvering into the position where you know they're going to do that shot and you're like you're twat, that's this even works. Really interesting that we we've talked. I loved my mate, I did, I didn't. On the mega drive, uh, european club soccer it was brilliant. It was all champions league teams, the music was great, it had all the right players. But if you got just past the sort of circle on the halfway line and you did a chip ball forwards, you would always have a player there to head it in and we'd have games that were like 13-12, because you just had to get into that right spot and you're right even though we had that control over the players.
Speaker 1:That was a real frustration in the area.
Speaker 2:But that even happens on manager games, where I think it was like 97-98, Chapman, I think it's that one you play 2-3-5 and you will score like 10 goals a game. So everyone's playing against you and, like you say, it's like 25-0 and stuff like that. It's like they all have these little Were, they bugs. Would you classify them as?
Speaker 3:bugs, well, kind of, and I think so I would argue that every football game has got like a few things that it's got to get right, which is dribbling, tackling without every tackle being a foul, the viewpoint, because that's pretty much a big one, and this not having it, where you can get a goal from a certain situation every time, and I think that's why virtually every football game is shit, because every single one of them suffers from one of these things. And even though me and me and agate um argue that emily news is an absolute classic of its time, I played it on an emulator yesterday because, you know, I do research for these things regardless what dead bat says I'm I take this thing seriously yeah um, and, and I I can remember more.
Speaker 3:I can remember the these three goals that I know I can score every time when I'm on a Commodore 64 and I'm 10 years old. And I did one of them yesterday just straight. Basically, you cut it and you run diagonally, you get to the bit of the area where the D intersects the line and you just do a shot along the ground and it always goes in the bottom corner every single time and I just did it yesterday like 1-0 straight away. I've won that match.
Speaker 1:It amazes me that when you've got we've talked about games like Champ Manager that are effectively random number generator creates a scenario. Why couldn't that be from that spot? 6 out of 10 you will score it. Why is it so easy that they're building a fail, where this always happens from this spot?
Speaker 3:I think it's just a bug, isn't it? The testers never figured that out, so it's not a bug, it's just the goalkeeper can't get there.
Speaker 2:Whatever it is based on Peter Shilton's in goal. That's why, yeah, he dives three hours later, yeah so yeah, so yeah.
Speaker 3:Emlyn Hughes absolutely loved the game, but unfortunately it falls down there. And that's probably the Americans say you know it's too difficult to score, you're dickheads then.
Speaker 1:You didn't learn the bugs. Yeah, you didn't learn the glitches.
Speaker 2:To be fair, they say that about normal football. World Cup 94, when they want the goals like double size and stuff. So they want like 400, got 400. They wanted it like what you were speaking about actually, where there's bugs in all the games and there's 50 in all and things you can always score, yeah.
Speaker 3:So yeah, when did you?
Speaker 2:go from that then? Do you think that's the pinnacle of C64, though?
Speaker 3:Emlyn Hughes. I think that's the pinnacle of the old school stuff. So you know, like C64 and older, even like Nintendo Entertainment System. So you've got to jump to like Mega Drive, to SNES, I think, and Amiga.
Speaker 2:Above Amiga. I was going to say you've put Amiga obviously.
Speaker 3:Although at this time arcade games. So when fair came around, they always had Tecmo World Cup 90.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was another one where you could score all at the same time. By the way, you went to the wing and cross it in and had it in you, where you could score all at the same time. By the way, you go to the wing and cross it in and head it in, you scored every single time.
Speaker 3:Oh, I didn't know that because there was one you could do from kick-off. So you, basically. And by the way, another thing that pissed me off about this game was you pick England, but they played in orange, oh shit yeah, yeah, yeah, and it's like a side-on one which we're talking about views. I think for me, side-on is the best way to play it.
Speaker 3:Because that's how you watch football, isn't it? It's like when you switch it around and there were a few games that did it and we might talk about them later when you switch it, when you're going into it like 3D, it looked wrong. It's like when they had that. Remember when? Was it? A couple of World Cups ago, when they started to decide on?
Speaker 2:penalties, oh, the penalties, they put down middle.
Speaker 3:Nets looked wrong size and everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it looked AI generated.
Speaker 1:Even to a point. Where is it, luton, that the camera's slightly too high and slightly too downwards facing and that looks wrong to me. There's a place where a camera should be. I'll give it some flexibility, but it has to be in a certain region.
Speaker 2:I always used to think people on the games you're talking about, where you could change views. I think people change the views from the side view to the top view and just acting a bit cocky oh, I'm a tactical man. I want to see where my players are all over the pitch. You know what I mean rather than just like that's the fucking best view.
Speaker 3:We'll just leave it at that exactly, but I mean, obviously we're still in the era where you were forced. It's like you got the view you were given and yeah, but this game. I think the reason this game sticks in my memory is one there were different goals. You could move forward a bit massive lob forward and then just keep pushing towards goal and you get a one-on-one with goalie. You get someone running through onto it. You score every time. But the reason I loved it the nets bulged when it went in, which it's just a little. Going back to what we say about, if you're a football fan, you'll fill in the blanks in your head or you'll fixate on something. I was fixating on that the fact that the next ball and they did celebrations and stuff like backflips and things like that there are little things on it.
Speaker 1:If the ball can hit the stanchion like there are little things, to a football fan that like, oh wow, that makes it feel authentic.
Speaker 2:I think I've asked you this one, liam, as well, actually, because I think you might differ from the purists like me and maybe me and me and webding is do you like the ones with gimmicks? So let's talk about football champ, and one of the things a football champ is if you hit a, if you got a ball in a certain position at a certain time, the play was super sharp and it'd take the goalkeeper through the net and it burst all and that wins you the game. Do you like gimmicks in football games? If you want it straight down, the line cards on the table.
Speaker 1:I'm not a football purist like you two guys. You can remember facts and figures from Sheffield United throughout the years. That's not my game. I enjoy the games I go to and I forget them very quickly. Yeah, I don't mind a bit of gimmickery. So, jumping forwards massively Adidas power soccer, where you could do sort of mid-height two-foot tackles. I think you could do sort of mid-height two-foot tackles. I think you could do sort of like headlocks and things mid-game. I didn't mind that because at least I felt like I was controlling my players, that they were doing what I was telling them to do. So yeah, a bit, a bit of gimmickery is fine by me. What about doing?
Speaker 3:what the violent man inside you wanted to do well, not necessarily always violent, but yeah, certainly. If that was an option, I don't mind, you're not going to turn it down, and the game Mr Royston was on about does have that violence as well, not only the power shot through the net. You could do like you could punch ref.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you could beat ref up. You could beat the ref up and then foul their players and it was really good actually, because at that time to have that sort of intelligence, if the ref's on the floor, you can just start punching their players and then get ball and take it to the other end.
Speaker 1:You sound like such a sort of late 80s hooligan there. Really good actually.
Speaker 2:The referee was on the floor, I was doing my hand gestures as well, you were demonstrating punches on camera, yeah. Shadow boxing like Steve Bums. We finally caught that guy who punched the linesman at Portsmouth away Another one like that, by the way. I don't know if we skipped forward, but I don't know if you were going to mention it. Have you heard of a game?
Speaker 3:called.
Speaker 2:Football Glory on the Amiga. This sounds like something. No, it's an identikit of sensible soccer. Type it in after, but it's like a gimmicky version. So you can foul people on that. They'll have stretchers, they have streakers, they have all sorts of things like that coming onto it. But you can file. Yeah, you can be very violent.
Speaker 1:Oh, we're back on Sam Fox poker again. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So what was your next one then, Mr Webstar? What were you going to go to next?
Speaker 3:I'm basically now. We're moving on, aren't we? So I'm still clinging on to the C64 because I didn't get it. My next machine was a SNES, which came out a bit after the Mega Drive, and I was too poor to get an Amiga by this point, so I'm still clinging on to the C64. I'm still buying bloody Gazza 2 and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:Gazza 2, by the way, if you slid, you could slide up the wing faster than you could run. So if one of your players is running, if you press slide button, your player will go sliding up the wing, like he'll get the ball before anyone else.
Speaker 3:A little trick for you there, if any. Gazza 2 aficionados. Yet another bug they never caught. They should have just employed us lot. Yeah, yeah, definitely. So, yeah, I'm getting. I'm getting, like, say, gaza 2 and and man, united europe, which? I remember that rubbish tie-in and like, yeah, I'm just getting all this shit well, but my mates get mega drives and I'm going around their house and I'm now playing stuff with good graphics and, yeah, world cup, italian 90s, the one that stands out yeah purely for the fact that it was shite and we soon found out it was shite.
Speaker 3:So we just what we'd do, because the penalties were gimmicky and that's the same way as we talked about they'd be from behind the net. We would put it on the shortest time possible that you could play, leave the controllers do something else for a bit come back and do a penalty out.
Speaker 2:That's a great idea. Yeah, do you remember a game called I think it was called World Cup Italia Night, but it might have been the same sort of thing and it were on the I think it was C64, where just a normal shit game, and then when it came to shooting, and every time you got in the area it changed the angle and it would be on the goalkeeper you know what I mean.
Speaker 3:And you'd play as you got near net to flip the angle to like be shooting at the net. But yeah, not from behind.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just just pick one and stick with it could you, could you play these multiplayers. So were you playing against the mate or were you playing against the computer? That these sort of? Do you know where you say the angle changes? Was that you against the? Main or was that uv computer?
Speaker 3:well, if you had a friend, you could be lucky enough. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, no you could, you could. You're lucky enough. Yeah, but yeah, no, you could All these. Even from the early days these were all two-player, or could be two-player, should I say, if you had friends.
Speaker 2:On the Mega Drive I was going to mention when we were doing the shit games. It's Pele, if you don't know, if you ever played, or Pele, as the Americans say. It's like the Americans have quite a lot to say. I apologise to Chad and Nour if they're listening. Yeah, pele, the worst thing about that game by a mile is every time you committed a foul or scored a goal or went for a throw-in, it'd go to a cut screen which would show like a referee and throw in, and so it'd just cut the game up. So you're like you know, like having an attack and it goes out. You'd have to wait, you'd sit there for a minute as his referee just pointing for a throw-in.
Speaker 3:Well, I'd never played Pele until you mentioned it, and it's Pele, well, isn't it? What a stupid name he's not even in it. No, and basically because you said you were going to bring it up as one of the worst games ever, when we're going to do that as the pod. I downloaded it and played it and it's just shy.
Speaker 2:That's dedication right there isn't it, it is, isn't it.
Speaker 3:He's played Pele Pele. But the stupid thing about me was that I saw from. It was well the fouling thing. Like you say, all I did was run near a player and it was a foul. But the goalkeepers really, they dive the full width of the penalty area like fully extended, which, given what Pelle was into probably he would be fully extended, wouldn't he?
Speaker 2:The thing is what they've done by that point they've moved away from Shulton, who can't get anywhere in his goal, and these keepers could dive like full length of the pitch.
Speaker 1:Just fully extended, which is not a thought we want.
Speaker 3:It would have been fucking awful I which is not a thought we want it was fucking awful.
Speaker 2:I remember getting it on Mega Drive and they were handing it out on Mega Drive, so I had it a bit later. I'm thinking this has got to be good, considering I had a C64 like itself Fucking so, shit, so shit, but luckily this was the era also going around my mate's house.
Speaker 3:So I was going around my mate's house playing Mega Drive, but also going around my mates' houses playing on the Amiga. And this is where you're basically playing your first ever good football game.
Speaker 2:I would say so, sensible soccer. Yeah, I was trying to think of a funny one, but I can't think of any more games.
Speaker 3:No, no, no, it's going to be SS. Peter Beardsley's Power Soccer. Peter Beardsley's Power Soccer. Was that an?
Speaker 2:Amiga game. Yeah, it was an Amiga game, yeah, oh my God, I don't know if you've seen that one, liam. That's so bad. So in the background it's got like an 8-bit version constantly of like different chants, like I'm forever blowing, but like constantly throughout and it's so slow. It's the slowest game which is unlike Peter Beard's life to be fair, yeah, but I mean there's not like you say.
Speaker 1:I don't know if there's a year or two years difference in our ages between me and Roy and you, mark, but I don't think I played sensible soccer. I remember sensible world soccer being my introduction to it. Now, whether that's just because I was out of the loop in football games, but I don't think I ever played the original sensible soccer.
Speaker 3:The original came out in 92, but I don't think I ever played the original Sensible Soccer. The original came out in 92, and I don't think I played the original. You know the worst thing about the original.
Speaker 2:Sorry, the worst thing about the original as a Sheffield United fan it had three English teams in it and one of them was Sheffield Wednesday because they finished third the season before. So you're going to England and you can only like man United, which are fucking bad enough, and Sheffield Wednesday, yeah.
Speaker 3:So carry on, sorry, yeah yeah, you know, I played the one after that, which which was slightly expanded and better, and you know I had yellow cards, red cards, which I don't think the first one had so it was the one between, I think, the one or two versions between the original and sensible world of soccer, and that's the one I played, which was like, slightly improved, probably still had pigs in it, unfortunately but could you do the ridiculous swerve.
Speaker 3:Or, as I hate the phrase these days, the swaths but swerve, but could you do the ridiculous swerves well, one of the many games I went digging for on c64 back in day were this game called micro pro soccer, which yeah it's an overhead one and which I don't like overhead ones, but, you know, like truly overhead, like straight overhead, and it's based on one, and which I don't like overhead ones.
Speaker 3:But you know, like truly overhead, like straight overhead, and it's based on some like mid-80s uh, like arcade game that would, with the rollerball, which was the first one where you could put bend on it, apparently, but that you could turn the bend, you could actually set it as a setting up to max and you could get it to go round your players if you kicked it in the right direction, which to me, even to you as a Liam, as someone who isn't a purist, that's a step too far, isn't it surely?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is. That's not. That's not football, is it? That's like some sort of superpower One of the things I always bring up on a date.
Speaker 2:As Liam will know not that we've had a date, but he'll know this is that you could swerve throw-ins on actual soccer, which I just you often tell me that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, To be fair, we always talk about football games.
Speaker 2:I just think you know, you never know if it's going to go well.
Speaker 1:I would say one of the few things that we've talked about the most is that you've told me you can swerve throw-ins on actual soccer.
Speaker 2:I just found it incredible. Look at this. You can swerve throw-ins. It's defying physics. That's how good this game is. That was a good game, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Obviously Jackie Long throw has christened, I believe by Blazepod, but Jack Robinson has got a really impressive throw-in.
Speaker 2:That's a really impressive throw-in.
Speaker 1:Can you swerve? But I think it's possible if you sort of throw it slightly harder with one hand than the other. Is it possible to swerve a throw-in?
Speaker 3:This is going into Sheffield United chatting for us.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Quite recently, I think it might be in last season he did swerve one when he did a goal and he basically lobbed it and he did exactly what he said. I think one of his arms was probably more well-developed than the other and it sort of went round and went into the side netting and he just completely missed anyone. Oh, I remember that actually.
Speaker 2:Sorry, this is the last thing we'll talk about. On the actual soccer game, the goalkeeping dive-in was actually done by Simon Tracey. They sort of filmed him dive-in and that's why all the keepers are like you know the Rummy Alderwals.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they start beating people up, yeah.
Speaker 2:I was going to say something else, but I'll leave it. But anyway, so we're back onto the Amiga with Sensible World Soccer which is, pound for pound, the best football game of all time.
Speaker 1:To me, that's the first good football game I played. To me, that's the first good football game I played. As I say, I'd played others to pass time. That's when I started thinking, oh, this is great. Even though I completely agree, the top-down camera angle playing up and down the pitch felt it didn't feel right. I didn't like going downhill and uphill.
Speaker 3:Yeah, uphill's all right, because it's what you do in real life, isn't it? You're facing the way you're playing.
Speaker 2:You can see the net.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you play vertically, yeah, but going down the screen doesn't feel right, does it?
Speaker 2:But what we're incredible about sensible world of soccer is way before Chapman, I think as well. The amount of leagues that you could play was just, and you could have a career mode on it for 20 years where you'd be a manager but you'd be able to play, as we were talking about earlier. Yeah, and you could have 20 years of going out to the faroe islands and you know all these like obscure leads and becoming international manager and things like that and you get sacked and things like that.
Speaker 1:It would just ink so ahead if you did a slide tackle, like an oversized leg sort of popped out was that, yeah, that's right, yeah, yeah, yeah it was?
Speaker 3:it was really. It was quite a zoomed out view, weren't it so like the actual, actual players were tiny and going back to just filling in the gaps. There were like absolutely nothing to these things, but you'd be convinced they were shouting at the ref like when cards came out and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:It's like they're like made up of like four pixels.
Speaker 3:There's nothing there to do that he's furious.
Speaker 1:He's absolutely furious. He knows he weren't a foul.
Speaker 2:Look, he knows it wasn't a foul.
Speaker 3:Look at their player. He's laughing about it Doing a backstreet and nodding right. But yeah, when Sensible World of Soccer was a game changer because the other one you could edit the teams, so you could, and I remember we'd found this one that had got a star player in net you had star players in net. Yeah, three star players. Star player in midfield we used to go to this one. It was like some Belgian team or like Turkish team or something. Edit it to be United, you know, because?
Speaker 3:obviously it would be like Kelly Hodges and Dean sort of thing and they'd be like oh, this is United now, but then obviously you didn't need to do that in Sensible World of Soccer, because it had absolutely everything.
Speaker 2:Every single game they're a transfer market which were really sort of in depth for its time. I can't put into words how impressed I am that they did that in I think it was 1994, since World Soccer. So so far, I'd say it's time.
Speaker 3:One sort of dark element of it is an echo of Deadback, in that he blacked up his players. But you could change the skin tone of your players. It legitimised what Deadback was doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was strange. I like how, just in case he slipped through the net, we've thrown him back in there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, we got him back in there, but that was such a bizarre sort of feature that you could have. But obviously the custom named teams as well, didn't they?
Speaker 1:Where you could have like crisps versus sandwiches which is Was it just skin tone you could change, or could you change?
Speaker 2:player attributes Hair colour as well.
Speaker 1:Hair colour. But could you make players better or worse? I don't think you could.
Speaker 2:no, I don't think you could make them better or worse.
Speaker 3:Well, it depends on where you're going with that, If better or worse just by changing this is very dead-end.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:You could change the names. You could change the team names, the manager names and what they look like, but that was it. Yeah, you couldn't make them better or worse.
Speaker 2:But I think, pound for pound, that is the best ever football game.
Speaker 1:Oh really.
Speaker 2:Yeah for its time. I just think it sort of incorporated Champ man and, at the time, the best playing football game.
Speaker 3:What I would say is it kind of got dribbling right because everyone raves about kickoff, and for me it's shy because it's an overhead view one. It was too difficult, if you if you couldn't, you couldn't dribble, basically because you couldn't run with the ball. Realistic, then we just roll off every time you tried to move where a sensible soccer, like sort of an halfway house of sticking to your feet uh, which were rubbish, obviously, but sensible soccer you'd have to time your turn.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your turn and stuff, Otherwise it would run off.
Speaker 3:But if you did it well, it'd still stick with you. But where it falls down is there were goals you could always score.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean the swerve shots were really easy to score, I think at times you get into a certain area and kill it, but that to me, though, was just rather than I wouldn't even go.
Speaker 1:that's the first great football game. I would say that is the bridge towards. So I think that was the end of the bad football games. And then I think the things that you know. This is, mr Webster, this is your episode, this is your life. You might have loved games pre this, but to me, everything after this became better. I think that was a stepping stone.
Speaker 3:sensible world soccer I mean at the time I started commodore 64 and I were only just getting a snezz. So no no, I probably did have a snezz by this point, but uh. So I would probably have argued emily and hughes on the commodore 64 were better, but that was just schoolboy nonsense, weren't it? So this this at the time was the best, but I I think they got rapper after this for a little while, because the next?
Speaker 2:one.
Speaker 3:I I agree yeah the next one I played um. That was supposed to be better and obviously sensible so I came out in 92 in 93 was the first v front mega drive yeah and I played it.
Speaker 3:This, this is your world exclusive. This is really boring. When I was on Sky TV's Games World with Bob Mills I appeared on that and in the sort of back room thing you could practice on your games and stuff like that. You were supposed to be practicing what the games were going to play on the televised thing but they brought in this like it was just not a proper cartridge, just like a circuit board said there's a new football game here, plugged it into this mega drive, fifa like about six months before it came out.
Speaker 2:So what did you think? What were your initial reactions?
Speaker 3:um, obviously at the time you think, oh, it's brilliant because it's like, yeah, but let's face it, it was shit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah on the saw.
Speaker 1:The sound on the first FIFA was wrong. The noise was wrong when you kicked the ball it was a bit laboured. When you sort of passed or shot, it seemed slow. This completely counters what I've just said about games got better after sensible world soccer. I'm just talking about, selfishly, the games I bought. So I didn't buy this. I played this at a mate's house. I didn't love it, but yeah, I found it. Sluggish is the word I would use to describe it was.
Speaker 2:I don't think FIFA got good. I think the first good FIFA game was FIFA 98 Road to the World Cup we're moving into sort of PlayStation. Playstation ISS. We're moving into sort of a slightly different era.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so PlayStation ISS, so International.
Speaker 2:Superstar.
Speaker 1:Soccer Deluxe.
Speaker 2:Well, Nintendo had it first, SNES. First Was that in 98, 99?
Speaker 1:I don't know. But that to me is when things moved on again and I bought that, and I probably hadn't bought a football game before that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think International Superstar Soccer, like Royston says, with snes I think and um, I think it came out 95 ish.
Speaker 1:I was sorry, it wasn't really.
Speaker 3:Yeah, right came out pretty soon after and it just it's amazing, like for me, this is the when I was going to go the shock jock option of saying every video game was shit that had anything to do with football. This was going to be the one I was not going to throw under the bus because it just it was arcade in a sense.
Speaker 1:It was really playable. Anyone. I could have a game against my dad, who'd never played it before, and we could. You know, I might be him, but we could have a game at least. But it felt authentic. The buttons did what they were supposed to do. The the seemed like you could score unique goals. I don't know if there was certain place you could score from. I never found them. If that happened but yeah, deluxe was was the game for me where I thought oh wow, actually do you know what football games are amazing?
Speaker 3:yeah, I agree with that, and uh, and then and you can make the referee a dog.
Speaker 1:You could do with a cheek.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah you could wait, and he barks instead of a whistle. Yeah cool, I totally forgot about that. I'm going to say another thing. You didn't have to.
Speaker 1:I remember, by the way on that, though, somebody complaining that when the referee was a dog and he gave you a card, it looked like it did a Nazi salute.
Speaker 2:Oh, why do you have to bring it up every episode of this? Something isn't it?
Speaker 1:Compromise, it gets clicks, doesn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, clickbait, clickbait stuff.
Speaker 1:Who remembers?
Speaker 2:dogs doing Nazi salutes. That's what this is going to be called, but obviously they didn't have real player names and obviously it's really renowned, even in the late years, at how funny. Or even now I'll call Ronaldo Ronaldo the new Ronaldo, as you're Chris Yard at Ronarid, because of what it was called on ISS Deluxe or whichever it was.
Speaker 3:I think it was originally called, wasn't it called Alejo or something? Because that was Bebeto. But then, Bebeto retired and they made.
Speaker 2:Ronaldo Alejo.
Speaker 3:Alejo.
Speaker 2:Alejo, alejo, alejo, because Oren, that's another one. Yeah, yeah, yeah, michael Oren.
Speaker 3:But obviously they were and they even continued to the N64 version, which was also brilliant, because I sort of this is around the time where you're probably going to have to fill in the gaps. So, after sort of N64 and Amiga when I'm playing around my mate's houses, we would venture into the area where I discovered drink. I basically stopped playing video games until I got to university and decided to waste my student loan on an N64. And again picked up international superstar soccer and it was the same but better.
Speaker 2:But we used to have pro-evo nights, didn't we, where we'd just like yeah, but if you remember, it was ISS, weren't it?
Speaker 1:International Superstar Soccer, yeah. Then it became Pro Evo. Then, I think, fifa took over a bit and then it was sort of borderline. Do you go Pro Evo, do you go FIFA?
Speaker 2:Pro Evo was the purest. I always felt Pro Evo. I thought that was more playable. People knew something about games.
Speaker 1:yeah, but FIFA had the names and the colours.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, but and the colours, yeah yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:But there was a time when it was like do you want to go FIFA or Pro Evo tonight? Like which one? I still fondly remember Pro Evo.
Speaker 3:That's my favourite. That's something you used to say to your wife.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, come on FIFA or Pro Evo tonight. I'm treating you, I'm checking you out for a smashing chip shop meal.
Speaker 1:And then do you want to play Pro Evo or FIFA.
Speaker 2:I'm not doing Sonic tonight. I'm not doing a one man game.
Speaker 1:We're playing Pro Evo or FIFA we always used to go around to I mean particularly one of our mates, damon's house, and it was always for a while, do you want to come around for Pro Evo? And then it was FIFA, and then it was there. We were going to play, until we got there and said, right, which one are we doing?
Speaker 2:From what you're saying, then, webding, I think that you're saying that you were never really into FIFA.
Speaker 3:No, I basically I bought my first PC about 97, 98, and I got Road to the World Cup with it, the 98 one you know that had.
Speaker 2:Song 2 on it sort of football Was that 98?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're right. Yeah, that's right. Always had to have pulled in commentary All these games in this era did, though, didn't they?
Speaker 2:You can't get worse than Pro Evo and ISS.
Speaker 3:Did record all this commentary and then you'd score a goal in the first minute and they're like that will win it, surely?
Speaker 2:I think it was FIFA 94. Every time Lars Boheeden got the ball for Blackburn, or whoever it was, it always used to go Boheeden.
Speaker 1:Boheeden.
Speaker 2:So we used to play him in defence just to pass it to him, to be like passing it around Blackburn. It would be like Batty Shearer Boheeden, it would be like just normally. He's like in his own area.
Speaker 1:Well, pro Evo had a thing, didn't it? Sorry, it wasn't Pro Evo, it was ISS where, if you transitioned from defence through midfield, it'd say things are heating up, and it'd say that every time.
Speaker 3:The version I had on the N64 version. They obviously thought they'd fixed that and I think it was Peter Brackley.
Speaker 2:Peter Brackley.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he used to do Italian football Exactly the same sort of thing. But when passing yeah, he used to do Italian football yeah, exactly the same sort of thing. But when passing it through, he'd say plenty of opportunities are available which no commentator has ever said before, or since, but it should be said like 20 times a game.
Speaker 1:That's never been a phrase in live football, has it. Plenty of opportunities are available.
Speaker 2:One of the ones is obviously it's a big kick. No commentator says that, not even American commentators in the 80s when they were trying to get to it. It's a big kick.
Speaker 3:More American bashing Will there be more. American bashing than Nazi. References this podcast.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, yeah, I think so. Yeah, that's going to save us again. But yeah, I think that Pro Evo to me was I think pound for pound sensible soccer was the best. Pro Evo to me was I think pound for pound sensible soccer was the best. Pro Evo is still. That era of Pro Evo where we go around to people's houses and stuff like that is probably the most the best game you could play with other people in my opinion.
Speaker 1:That to me, was the most authentic, where you would have to own your mistakes so you couldn't say the game's glitched or it didn't like that.
Speaker 2:Well, I did, I did, you did sometimes do that yeah.
Speaker 1:But we knew that you pressed the wrong button. That was the time where, like you'd say, ah fuck, not, I pressed through ball, I pressed through ball. We say you didn't, you didn't you press chip like. So I can go back in time and say yeah, look, I'm pressing it.
Speaker 3:You pressed it now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, blame the dog, the dog shot. Yeah, On the PlayStation, obviously we talked about actual soccer and stuff like that. Three Lions, which I was going to bring up in the worst games, is absolutely appalling. I think every game ended.
Speaker 1:Did either of you play Adidas Power Soccer Because?
Speaker 3:that was really arcane-y. I think it was the wrong time for me and, like I say, I bought an N64 and then sort of fell out with that as well. But then I bought a PC and, like I say, I played the FIFA game and then that's when I got into Champ Manager. So that's the only football game I played, pretty much from then on.
Speaker 1:I only associate N64 with Goldeneye, which I think was one of the best games I've ever played, one of the best multiplayer games. But, I don't remember playing a football player game, football player Football. What are we calling them Football games? Football, console games on an N64? Yeah, console, yeah.
Speaker 2:I think it's pretty interesting what you just said there, what I'm doing about. After a certain while, you almost become like a player where you just start playing manager games. You're like I've retired now from playing these games. Get the spreadsheets out.
Speaker 1:I've moved upstairs.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm becoming a coach. Now I'm becoming a manager. Get me the manager, lma manager we're a big one on PlayStation and Premier manager and Championship manager, obviously. Track suit manager a really underrated game actually for the C64. But then, yeah, I was the same as you After about other than we went round to people's house to play it. I think the last game that I bought was probably on the PlayStation 1 and it had been Pro Evo 98 or whatever it was.
Speaker 1:So let's do Desert Island football manager game? No, not football games. You go into Desert Island. You could take a management game and a simulation game. Ignore the Island. You could take a management game and a simulation game. Ignore the consoles. You'll have the console That'll come with you, but no other games. You've got to take a football game and a football management game to Desert Island. So mine would be International Superstar Soccer Deluxe to play and Champ Manager I think a 102 or whichever is the commonly played one. Yeah, I'm definitely taking Champ Manager. I think a 102 or whichever is the commonly played one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm definitely taking Champ Manager 102, because I think that's the middle ground before it got ridiculously like I ain't got time for this anymore and then before it, like we're just like I don't know, just not as good, obviously anymore. But yeah, I'd definitely go with that as a manager game and as a console, I'd have to say Sensible Soc, soccer, if we're playing, like you know, pound for pound yeah, um champ manager, I've got a soft spot for 97 98, um, yeah yeah, yeah I mean a 102, I think it is the one that obviously everyone raves about.
Speaker 3:But, yeah, massive soft spot for that one. Uh, and it is such a difficult choice between sensible world of soccer and iss, but I think I think I go iss to look, just because it's just so much more playable and it's left to right rather than up and down.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is true. To be fair, Do you have any other games you want to mention before we wrap up?
Speaker 3:No, I mean yeah, I've got nothing I want to bring up. Like I say, I played some absolute shite based on some of the stuff you suggested. None of them deserve mention.
Speaker 2:Oh, you want to talk about Kenny Dog Leach's soccer. Where were Kenny Dog Leach's soccer?
Speaker 3:I don't want to talk about any of them, to be honest.
Speaker 2:Did you play Graham Souness's Vector Soccer?
Speaker 3:I loaded it and then instantly turned it off.
Speaker 1:I basically downloaded all these I've got some emulators anyway and I've been like from way back when, downloaded some of these games you mentioned, and then I just, yeah, this has been like a bit of a sort of torture treatment, so so dead bat sort of forced you down a certain room and then, yeah, and then andrew sent you like certain horrible games to play.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's been a terrible experience. I've been waterboarding, I've been trying to fit it in into my hectic life I've got to to play Graham Tuna, to get to soccer.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1:Obviously, we're sort of winding down. You're more than welcome to come on and choose your own episode, and you can even choose an episode for Deadback maybe. Maybe we'll get him back if you want to give us an episode to do with the Deadback part two. But no, I think that's. I think we've kind of got where we need to get to. I'm waiting for not much more to say.
Speaker 2:No other podcast or anyone needs to talk about football video games anymore.
Speaker 3:I'm exhausted thinking about it. Yeah, we've needed a long lie down now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but thank you very much for joining us today, Mr Webster. And yeah, we'll do another one at some time. You can pick your. Yeah, you can actually pick what you want to do this time.
Speaker 1:Thank you Cheers guys. Thanks everyone for listening. That was, I think, what we're going to call it. That was the football games of the 80s and 90s, but we didn't stray into 2000s did we?
Speaker 2:No, I think 80s and 90s is what we covered, isn't it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, cheers everyone. Thank you very much. Good night, good evening. Good evening. Okay, cheers everyone. Thank you very much, and goodnight, good evening, good evening.
Speaker 2:Thank you for listening to who remembers. If you want to get in touch with us, you can find us at who remembers pod at outlookcom. If you area right wing fascist, you can find us on twitter at who remembers pod. Or if you're a woken up, you can find us on blue sky atRemembersPod. Or if you're a Wokenor, you can find us on BlueSky at WhoRemembersPod. Once again, thank you for listening and we'll see you next time for more remembering.