''Tecmo Cup Soccer Game'', known as in Japan and ''Tecmo Cup Football Game'' in Europe, is an

association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

sports video game A sports video game is a video game that simulates the practice of sports. Most sports have been recreated with video games, including team sports, track and field, extreme sports, and combat sports. Some games emphasize playing the sport (such ...

released in 1992 by

Tecmo was a Japanese video game company founded in 1967. It had its headquarters in the Kudankita district of Tokyo. Its subsidiary, Tecmo Inc, was located in Torrance, California. Prior to 1986, Tecmo was formerly known as Tehkan. Tecmo is known for ...

for the

Nintendo Entertainment System The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the ...

. The objective of the game is for the player to fight his way from junior league all the way to the finals of 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 ...

. Based on the ''

Captain Tsubasa is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yōichi Takahashi. The series mainly revolves around the sport of association football focusing on Tsubasa Oozora and his relationship with his friends, rivalries with ...

manga are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long history in earlier Japanese art. The term is used in Japan to refer to both comics ...

series, ''Tecmo Cup Soccer Game'' is a Westernized version of the Japanese ''Captain Tsubasa'' game released for the

Family Computer The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the U ...

system, featuring a different main character, a different introduction and more western-looking players. The game contains elements from

role-playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of player character, characters in a fictional Setting (narrative), setting. Players take responsibility for acting out ...

s as the players have skill levels and are mostly controlled by different kinds of text commands.

Summary

Considered to be the first of many games based on the series, which have appeared on many systems, this game was the innovator of games that would be known as "Cinematic Soccer". Rather than having direct control over the action like a standard soccer sim, the game has a cinematic angle where the player must choose his actions from a timed list and the results of these actions are animated on screen. Present-day games with a " career mode" setting would be inspired by this game's setup.

Reception

''Captain Tsubasa'' topped the bi-weekly Japanese ''

Famitsu , formerly , is a line of Japanese Video game journalism, video game magazines published by Kadokawa Game Linkage (previously known as Gzbrain), a subsidiary of Kadokawa Corporation, Kadokawa. ''Famitsu'' is published in both weekly and monthly f ...

'' sales chart in May 1988.

Differences

The changes from ''Captain Tsubasa'' to ''Tecmo Cup Soccer Game'' include: * The game's intro was slightly changed. When the game was turned on, a soccer ball can be seen on a blue floor, rather than being accompanied by a young Tsubasa (on a green floor, probably to indicate grass) as in the Japanese version. Also, in the Japanese version, the plane was still shown (without the sky) in front of the logo, while in the American version, the plane was not shown in front of the logo at all. * The main character (and pretty much all other characters except for the announcer and the referee) have been altered. Tsubasa, a spiky-headed, black-haired kid, has been changed to Robin Field, a blonde young adult. * ''Moete Hero'', the theme for the ''Captain Tsubasa'' anime, used in the intro and the second half of the game, has been replaced. * When a new game begins, the words above the announcer that say "ON AIR" have been replaced with "TECMO!". Also, the "JBS" logo has been omitted. * The board behind Billy, the instructor, goes from green to blue. There are no kids sitting down with him. * The password system has Japanese characters replaced with the

Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...

. * In the first half of the game, the song that plays while the player's team has the ball has been changed because it was a part of the song ''Moete Hero''. * In ''Captain Tsubasa'', the player had to go through a short little sidequest after each match to have Taro Misaki play on his team, but Taro's ''Tecmo Cup Soccer Game'' counterpart joins the team right away and is portrayed as Robin's brother, Cecil. * The quality of all goalkeepers in the game was dramatically upgraded, with some GKs (particularly the Zaps and Ninjas) being able to stop the special shot of Robin. Also, the GKs of Arabia (Argentina in the original), and Cameroon (formerly Uruguay) are hard to beat. * There is a version in Spanish which was released in Spain, called ''Tecmo Cup Football Game''. It is similar to ''Tecmo Cup Soccer Game'', except the game is in the Spanish language.

Notes

References

External links

''Captain Tsubasa''
(infobox details) at

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