Remember, this is a statement made when the Spectrum was the most advanced home computer in the world and the reviewer had no history to make reference to as we do nowadays.
Come off it. There was bugger all advanced about the Spectrum's hardware when it launched, let alone in February 1985 when that review was written; it had captured the market by having the right features at the right time and at the right price. Leaving aside the likes of the Atari ST (launched the month before), IBM PC/AT and Apple Mac, there were quite a few machines on the market with hardware support for sprites and scrolling which is basically what you need for a 2D football game.
As far as history went there had already been several popular football games on the Spectrum and other computers. International Soccer, which Match Day was heavily influenced by, was a big hit on the C64 in 1983 and even Artic's World Cup Football on the Spectrum picked up some fairly positive reviews in 1984:
"This is the best football game for the Spectrum and football fans should get it!" - Crash 7 p87.
"The game is addictive and should even be of interest to people who know nothing about football." - Sinclair User 29 p57.
The football games in the 80's were hardly realistic and that includes Kick And Run. You were basically just bouncing a ball around the screen until it went in the goal.
FIFA 2009 is far more realistic with tactics, moves, skills and lifelike movement. If you look at Match Day you couldn't envisage it morphing into FIFA 2009. That's just a huge advance in computer technology.
Where did I say you were comparing Kick And Run to FIFA 2009, I was the one making the lack of comparison.
I'd agree that FIFA 2009 is rather removed from Match Day, but the likes of Microprose Soccer (1988) and Kick Off (1989) were only a few years down the line and really moved the genre towards mainstream respectability. The Spectrum versions of those two games might not have been terribly good (hence the continued reputation of Match Day and its sequel) but they were very playable on certain other computers that were around in 1985 when the aforementioned review was written.
I'd agree that FIFA 2009 is rather removed from Match Day, but the likes of Microprose Soccer (1988) and Kick Off (1989) were only a few years down the line and really moved the genre towards mainstream respectability. The Spectrum versions of those two games might not have been terribly good (hence the continued reputation of Match Day and its sequel) but they were very playable on certain other computers that were around in 1985 when the aforementioned review was written.
Good post Matt, this is exactly what I was saying. There was plenty of other football games around at that time that were very playable. (Not that Match Day wasn't IMO)
Just played it for the first time since the eighties and I actually thought it played a pretty good game. Especially for the era it is from. I remember my friends and I all liked the game back then. I had the 128k version that came with the computer when you bought it, along with Neverending Story and Daley Thompson.
Comments
Come off it. There was bugger all advanced about the Spectrum's hardware when it launched, let alone in February 1985 when that review was written; it had captured the market by having the right features at the right time and at the right price. Leaving aside the likes of the Atari ST (launched the month before), IBM PC/AT and Apple Mac, there were quite a few machines on the market with hardware support for sprites and scrolling which is basically what you need for a 2D football game.
As far as history went there had already been several popular football games on the Spectrum and other computers. International Soccer, which Match Day was heavily influenced by, was a big hit on the C64 in 1983 and even Artic's World Cup Football on the Spectrum picked up some fairly positive reviews in 1984:
"This is the best football game for the Spectrum and football fans should get it!" - Crash 7 p87.
"The game is addictive and should even be of interest to people who know nothing about football." - Sinclair User 29 p57.
I'd agree that FIFA 2009 is rather removed from Match Day, but the likes of Microprose Soccer (1988) and Kick Off (1989) were only a few years down the line and really moved the genre towards mainstream respectability. The Spectrum versions of those two games might not have been terribly good (hence the continued reputation of Match Day and its sequel) but they were very playable on certain other computers that were around in 1985 when the aforementioned review was written.
Good post Matt, this is exactly what I was saying. There was plenty of other football games around at that time that were very playable. (Not that Match Day wasn't IMO)