World Cup Soccer

INTELLIVISION CARTRIDGE [INTV #8100]

Release 1985

AKA Super NASL Soccer

Produced by Nice Ideas (Mattel Electronics, France)

Program: Mark Grant and Armand Barraud

Includes code from the previously released NASL Soccer

Originally released in Europe by Dextell Ltd

CATALOG DESCRIPTION (INTV SPRING 1986)

The ball is yours...now move it down field. Teamwork and footwork are the name of this game. The defense is pressing...pass to a teammate! Get the ball in close to your opponent's goal. Move quickly...evade the defense...keep the ball in bounds. You're in the goal area. Fake out the goalie and shoot. It's a score!

World Cup Soccer is an advanced version of the original, successful Soccer. It enables you to play with an opponent or against your Intellivision unit. It offers more real life-like gameplay with such added gameplay features as heading the ball, tackling, the option of changing players during game play, and direct or indirect kicking after penalties are called. It's so life-like that you have a full team of players.

DEVELOPMENT HISTORY

This is a Dextell release that received its US debut in the INTV Corp. catalog.

It still qualifies, though, as a Blue Sky Ranger game since it began life at Mattel Electronics as a one- to four-player game for the Entertainment Computer System (ECS). Development was assigned to the French office.

The nearly-complete cartridge, called Super NASL Soccer, was shown at the January 1984 Consumer Electronics Show, but Mattel Electronics closed two weeks later. An agreement with the French office, which stayed together under the name Nice Ideas, gave them the rights to the game.

Nice Ideas completed the cartridge as a one- or two- player non-ECS game and it was released in Europe by Dextell Ltd. INTV Corp. negotiated the rights to distribute the cartridge in the United States, introducing it in Spring 1986.

FUN FACT:  Mattel Marketing tried to interest several companies into advertising in the cartridge. A version was produced with brand names, such as Coca-Cola, appearing on banners around the stadium. No deals were made before Mattel Electronics closed, but a photo of the game showing the advertising banners was inadvertently used in one of the INTV Corp. catalogs.