1st August 1990
Adidas Championship Football
This imaginary competition is between 23 of the world's best football teams, plus Wales. You can pick which country to control and whether one or two players will participate. In the latter case, players can only play head-to-head if their teams meet in the draw.
The actual game is in the Kick Off style: overhead view, multi-directional scrolling and manual dribbling. Rather than having the ball glued to your foot, it's pushed forward by small kicks. To kick it for a longer distance, holding down Fire gives the desired effect; you can also change the angle of elevation by pressing Fire quickly.
You must be careful not to tackle from behind, giving away free kicks. Particularly nasty fouls result in a yellow card. There's also the normal corner kicks, goal kicks and penalties plus an option to save the game.
Phil
If you thought the England vs Eire game was bad, you ain't seen nothing yet! Adidas Championship Football is totally unplayable due to its weird control system with totally unusable shot power - a Match Day II-style pulsing kickometer would have been far better.
Without instinctive controls it's impossible to play skilfully. With a four-part multi-load and omission of two-player friendlies, Adidas Championship Football is parrot-sickeningly bad.
Stu
After all this time it's a pity Adidas Championship Football has turned out to be so bad a game. On the positive side it's tried to emulate Kick Off's superb simulated dribbling, but unfortunately failed.
The system's much too fiddly, with the gauges too small to be easily seen. An even more fundamental mistake is that while obviously the main aim of gameplay is blast the ball up and down the field, the screen is much wider than it is long.
The large instrument panel would've been better placed vertically, or made smaller. And to top it all, there's an horrendous multi-load.
Verdict
Presentation 45%
Audio cassette, competition entry form and attractive options screens cannot compensate for an agonizing multi-load and awkward two-player option.
Graphics 59%
Decent overhead-view sprites, but illogical screen layout.
Sound 75%
Good intro tune, usual whistle and kick in-game FX.
Hookability 36%
Awkward to get into with fiddly control system...
Lastability 39%
...so although it's challenging, most won't persevere.
Overall 37%
Plays worse than Wales!
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