If all these publishers were releasing unofficial Italia ‘90 games, then who was actually in charge of the legit one? Step forward Virgin Mastertronic, who had the official licence from FIFA. US Gold wasn’t alone in its skullduggery, mind: there were a bunch of unofficial Italia 90 games, including Codemasters’ Italia 1990 (which was only £4.99 but was a bit piss) and Italy 90 Soccer, which was published by Italian studio Simulmondo and was also rubbish.įormats – Amiga, Atari ST, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, PC, MSX
Speaking of which, all 24 qualified teams featured here, from host nation Italy and eventual winners West Germany to teams that instantly date the game, like the U.S.S.R. To its credit, it was an original game this time (playing a little like Kick Off, but with the ball sticking to your players’ feet much easier), and it also came with a hefty 64-page booklet covering all the teams in the actual World Cup. That didn’t stop them releasing a new football game anyway and conveniently getting around the licensing issue by not giving it the official Italia 90 name, but calling it Italy 1990 instead. When the next World Cup came around, US Gold lost the licence (perhaps unsurprisingly, considering how much they ballsed up the Mexico ‘86 game).
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This wasn’t enough to satisfy angry gamers, though, who felt they’d been tricked into buying a rubbish two-year-old football game.įormats – Amiga, Atari ST, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, PC The game was hastily tweaked with the officially licensed touches, and released in a box with goodies like a World Cup wallchart, a poster and a sew-on badge. It quickly emerged that Ocean hadn’t done anything and time was running out, so the pair got in touch with Artic Computing, who’d released an unofficial game in 1984 called World Cup Football. Amazingly, though, yet another misunderstanding meant that Ocean sat there waiting for the nod to start working on the project, while Chaney and Brown thought they already had. When they realised their mistake they got hold of the ever reliable Ocean Software, who had already had huge success with its football game Match Day. You see, managing director Tim Chaney thought founder Geoff Brown was hiring a developer and sorting out the game’s production, while Brown thought Chaney was handling it instead.
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The licence was acquired by British publisher US Gold, but due to a massive misunderstanding months went by without a single line of code being written. The first World Cup to get an officially licensed game was Mexico ‘86, but things didn’t exactly get off to the finest of starts. Teams – 10 (C64 and Amstrad), 24 (Spectrum) Enjoy!įormats – ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC I’m a massive fan of ‘event’ football games like this, so I’ve decided to put together this extensive feature listing each of these World Cup games and how they fit into the gaming landscape at the time. What you may not realise is there have been official World Cup football games since way back in 1986, each trying to help gamers get into the World Cup spirit by capturing the atmosphere of the real-life tournament going on at the same time. And what do you get when someone ticks both boxes? People who love football video games, of course. There are people out there who love football, and people who love video games. Not that I’m bitter.īut hey! Never mind that. It’s World Cup time, that lovely quadrennial football occasion where English football fans start thinking they’re going to become world champions again while Scots like me moan about the BBC cutting to the England camp at half time during every single match, regardless of who’s playing.