''Sensible World of Soccer'' is a 1994 football video game designed and developed by

Sensible Software Sensible Software was a British software company founded by Jon Hare and Chris Yates which was active from March 1986 to June 1999. It released seven number-one hit games and won numerous industry awards. The company used exaggeratedly small sp ...

as the sequel to their 1992 game ''

Sensible Soccer ''Sensible Soccer'', often called ''Sensi'', is an association football video game series which was popular in the early 1990s and which still retains a following. It was developed by Sensible Software and first released for Amiga and Atari ST ...

''. It combines a 2D football game with a comprehensive manager mode. The game includes contemporary season data of professional football from around the world, with a total number of 1,500 teams and 27,000 players. Although the gameplay is simple (eight directions and one fire button) a large variety of context sensitive actions can be performed without any predefined keys. In 1996 the game was ranked best of all time by ''

Amiga Power ''Amiga Power'' (''AP'') was a monthly magazine about Amiga video games. It was published in the United Kingdom by Future Publishing and ran for 65 issues, from May 1991 to September 1996. History The first issue of ''Amiga Power'' was publi ...

''. In 1996, ''GamesMaster'' ranked the Amiga version 36th on their "Top 100 Games of All Time". In 2004, the Amiga version of ''Sensible World of Soccer'' was inducted into

GameSpot ''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady, and Jon Epstein. In addition ...

's list of the greatest games of all time. In 2007, Henry Lowood, Curator for History of Science and Technology Collections in the

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

together with game designers

Warren Spector Warren Evan Spector (born October 2, 1955) is an American role-playing and video game designer, director, writer, producer and production designer. He is known for creating immersive sim games, which give players a wide variety of choices in how ...

and

Steve Meretzky Steven Eric Meretzky (born May 1, 1957)
''Infocom''. Retrieved July 11, 2011. is an American

a definitive list of "the ten most important video games of all time". This list included ''Sensible World of Soccer''. ''Sensible World of Soccer''s inclusion in this list is notable on three accounts: it is the only game in the list developed in Europe, it is the only sports game in the list, and it is the most recent game in the list.

Career mode

The career game mode in ''Sensible World of Soccer'' enables players to manage a club through 20 seasons. Basic manager options include a transfer market (buy/sell players). Every team has a squad of 16 players, by default. Every player has individual skills (speed, tackling, heading, finishing, shooting, passing, ball control). Player prices are calculated relative to their skills. Players can be transferred from other clubs by offering an amount of money and/or own players in a part exchange deal. To be able to buy stronger players and to keep them it is necessary to earn money with success in the various competitions. Job offers from other clubs and also from a national team may roll in, depending on the success.

Title song

"Goalscoringsuperstarhero" by

Jon Hare Jon "Jops" Hare (born 20 January 1966) is an English computer game designer, video game artist, musician and one of many founder members of the early UK games industry as co-founder and director, along with Chris Yates, of Sensible Software, on ...

(born 1966) and Richard Joseph (1953–2007), with vocals by Jackie Reed, was composed for ''Sensible World of Soccer''. The original song published in 1994 only had one verse; for the version of the games published in 2006, Hare wrote two more verses and he and Joseph re-recorded the song with original vocalist Jackie Reed who also appears with the Sensible team in the intro video to the game on some formats. The CD versions of the 2006 version of the game, entitled ''Sensible Soccer 2006'', also include the 2006 studio recording as an audio track.

History

''Sensible World of Soccer''

The first release from 1994 for Amiga had some bugs which were fixed with a free update disk a few months later (SWOS v1.1). A PC version came later, in 1995, as floppy disk version and as CD-ROM (including voice commentary). Teams present included all European nations as well as (in this version only) 64 fantasy squads whose line-ups were references to and parodies of other concepts. Gameplay was noticeably easier than in subsequent versions, with computer opponents rarely able to tackle the player or create chances. Unique to the release was the choice of an "astro turf", whose conditions mimicked artificial pitches installed in the 1980s by some clubs.

''Sensible World of Soccer '95/'96''

The ''95/'96'' Edition was an improved version for Amiga, with updated data, new menus and an enhanced gameplay (now with the possibility to do headers from standing positions and low passes with curling effect), which was also found in subsequent releases.

''SWOS '95/'96 European Championship Edition''

In time of the

UEFA Euro 1996 The 1996 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as Euro 96, was the 10th UEFA European Championship, a quadrennial Association football, football tournament contested by European nations and organised by UEFA. It took place in ...

, the European Championship Edition (aka ECE or SWOSECE) was released. This version is equal to ''95/'96'' Edition, but included the actual European Championship as a preset competition with updated teams. This version was released for PC as well as for Amiga computers.

''Sensible World of Soccer 96/'97''

The release of 1996 was the final version of the SWOS sequel, for Amiga (two floppy disks) and PC (CD-ROM). It contained the updated data of the season and a new cover. It is also the base for the remake on

Xbox Live Arcade Xbox Live Arcade (or XBLA) was a video game Digital distribution in video games, digital distribution service that was available for the Xbox (console), Xbox and Xbox 360 consoles. It focused on smaller downloadable games from both major publisher ...

in 2007.

Other releases

Also in 1996 an upgrade was released in a double CD case of SWOS '96/'97, for PC (CD) and Amiga (disks), upgrading an older version of SWOS to ''96/'97''. Nowadays they are considered as rare collectors' items. Later there was also a White Label version containing the European Championship Edition, published by

Virgin Interactive Avalon Interactive Group, Ltd., formerly known as Virgin Interactive Entertainment, was a British video game distributor based within Europe that formerly traded as the video game publishing and distributing division of British conglomerate the V ...

. After SWOS development ended in 1996, some fan projects tried to keep SWOS up-to-date, like the Cresswell brothers from England who collected data from several internet forums and created an unofficial update to '97/'98 for Amiga. During the 1998 World Cup in France they made a special update, which was based on ''97/'98'' and contained also some new graphics. This "World Cup 98 update" was officially supported by

and released on the Cover CD number 24 of the magazine "CU Amiga". To use this update a hard disk installation was required which officially does not exist. There were some demo versions (Amiga) on several cover disks. One of the best known is "Sensible World of Moon Soccer" which allowed users to try in-game options. On pitch action was placed on the Moon, with craters on the pitch and Moon-like ball physics. The Amiga version received a fan update for the 2022/2023 season in 2023.

Comeback

Any attempts since 1998 to bring back ''

'' as a 3D game were not successful. It became quiet about ''Sensible Soccer'' after

Codemasters The Codemasters Software Company Limited (trade name: Codemasters) is a British video game developer and former publisher based in Southam, England, which is a subsidiary of American corporation Electronic Arts and managed under the EA Sports ...

' takeover of Sensible Software in 1999. In 2005 ''Sensible Soccer'' was released as a mobile phone game. Although the controls on mobile phones are usually a bit complicated, the game sold well enough to make new releases of the series possible. After a 2 Player Plug 'n' Play version, a small mini console with two controllers and TV-out (containing ''

Mega Lo Mania ''Mega-Lo-Mania'' is a real-time strategy video game developed by Sensible Software. It was released for the Amiga in 1991 and ported to other systems. It was released as ''Tyrants: Fight Through Time'' in North America and ''Mega Lo Mania: Jikū ...

'' and ''

Cannon Fodder Cannon fodder is an informal, derogatory term for combatants who are regarded or treated by government or military command as expendable in the face of enemy fire. The term is generally used in situations where combatants are forced to fight agains ...

'' besides ''Sensible Soccer''), Codemasters decided to release ''Sensible Soccer 2006'' right in time for the

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the name is ...

in Germany. The game seemed to be unfinished and had major bugs. About the same time they released ''Sensible Soccer Skillz'', another game for mobile phones which contained just a few mini games such as penalties or corner kicks. Due to recent popularity of retro games, Codemasters decided to release SWOS on

Xbox LIVE Arcade Xbox Live Arcade (or XBLA) was a video game Digital distribution in video games, digital distribution service that was available for the Xbox (console), Xbox and Xbox 360 consoles. It focused on smaller downloadable games from both major publisher ...

. It was originally planned for August 2007, but was delayed until late December. After its release, the online mode became the reason to pull the game from the Xbox LIVE Marketplace. SWOS saw its final release two days later on December 2, without any official announcements. The game is a straight port of the Amiga version of ''SWOS '96/'97'' and uses some elements of the PC release. The graphics are enhanced (HD mode) and features the music from ''Sensible Soccer 2006''. During the game graphics can be switched to the classic mode. ''SWOS'' is the first XBLA game which uses the technology of Massive Inc. to show commercials within the game, updated over the network. The game's price is 800 MS Points. Meanwhile, there are packs of ''SWOS''-related gamer pictures and themes, the price for both in each case is 150 MS Points and they could be downloaded on the

Marketplace A marketplace, market place, or just market, is a location where people regularly gather for the purchase and sale of provisions, livestock, and other goods. In different parts of the world, a marketplace may be described as a ''souk'' (from ...

. Bugs in the online mode were reported by consumers in the official forum and were also mentioned in critically acclaimed game reviews, but Codemasters said that there are no plans for patches, bugfixes or other ''SWOS''-related releases in the near future. In regard to this the previously announced

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, released five years earlier, which was then the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft W ...

version was not released.

Competitions and events

Peter (Denmark) vs. Coolio_Jack (Croatia) at Sensible Days 2007 Tournaments are mainly organized by the fans themselves. Events in the past were the World SWOS Tournaments (WST) of the "SWOS Witnesses" in Serbia and the tournaments of the ISSA (International Sensible Soccer Association) in Copenhagen, Denmark, both played on the PC DOS version of the game. The game is also very popular in Poland and Germany where tournaments take place on a regular basis (Amiga and MS-DOS). Since 2004 SensibleSoccer.de offers ''Sensible World of Soccer'' online play, and national and international tournaments and leagues are being organized and played on a monthly basis. The community uses

Discord Discord is an instant messaging and Voice over IP, VoIP social platform which allows communication through Voice over IP, voice calls, Videotelephony, video calls, text messaging, and digital media, media. Communication can be private or take ...

to organize online play. SensibleSoccer.de is host of the "Sensible Days", an annual meeting of ''Sensible World of Soccer'' fans with international championships on PC and Amiga in the manner of a

LAN party A LAN party is a social gathering of gamer, participants with personal computers or compatible game consoles, where a local area network (LAN) connection is established between the devices using a router (computing), router or network switch, switc ...

. Since 2008, the "Sensible Days" are acknowledged by Codemasters as the official SWOS World Cups. Since then the place of event changed yearly throughout Europe. Game developer

visited the tournament in Berlin in 2013.

History of Sensible Days (SWOS World Cup Tournaments)

In 2023, the Sensible Days World Cup will take place in

Wandlitz Wandlitz is a municipality in the district of Barnim, in Brandenburg, Germany. It is situated 25 km north of Berlin, and 15 km east of Oranienburg. The municipality was established in 2004 by merger of the nine villages ''Basdorf'', ' ...

near

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

on 5/6 August.

References

External links

www.sensiblesoccer.de
– SWOS United community, host of online leagues & offline tournaments
www.swosit.com
– Italian community, online career mode
SWOS - Xbox.com
– Xbox Live Marketplace
database.swoes.info
– complete database of SWOS '96/'97 {{DEFAULTSORT:Sensible World Of Soccer 1994 video games Amiga games Association football management video games DOS games Games commercially released with DOSBox Kuju games Multiplayer and single-player video games Sensible Software games Sports video games with career mode Video games developed in the United Kingdom Video games scored by Richard Joseph Xbox 360 Live Arcade games