Aftertouch Soccer

A love letter to old-school arcade action and computer football games of the 1980s and 1990s, a retrogame made by Kick Off World team running at a blistering 60 frames-per-seconds.

AWARD

9/10 - This game recreated the soul of old school football games adding a lot of new features that make it a must-have for retro gamers - ilvideogioco.com

The most obvious feature on Aftertouch Soccer is the lightening-fast pace, which probably can put many people off the game initially. But you set slower speed on options.

Another feature is the way the ball doesn’t "stick" to your players’ feet, as has been the convention in football games for years. You can however set ball control to glued on easy setup.

However, perseverance (and practicing with the game set at 75% or 50% speed!) eventually pays off and you’ll be so glad you stuck with it when it does. Suddenly, what had been frustrating battles to keep control of the ball will become skilfully orchestrated passing moves. As you get to know your team’s formation and each player’s strengths your confidence grows, seeing you spread cross-field passes to that speedy winger on the left (R. Shaw!) or keeping it on the deck and playing it through the middle to the feet of your star striker to turn and shoot from 30 yards.

The game features the usual friendlies, league and knockout cup tournaments, plus a "EURO CUP 2016" finals with the almost real player lineup.

It's how the game performs on the pitch that counts and once you have mastered the "beautiful game" you'll find there really is no substitute for Aftertouch Soccer. Add in the classic "after touch" allowing you to bend and dip your shots, and a randomness to the action – if the ball hits the frame of the goal, you never quite know where it will rebound to – and you end up with a classic football game which still plays very well today. It might not look as pretty as other football games, but this just adds to the charm and suggests that more development time was spent perfecting gameplay rather than aesthetics – substance over style.

This game is not using source code or it's not cloned /reverse engineered and using artwork from original games. It's a free managerial game tribute to football games made in the 80s and 90s, but coded and designed from scratch by Kick Off World team. Aftertouch Soccer sprite animations are recreated to be a tribute to original creator Steve Screech.