4-4-2 Soccer PS1 Review

4-4-2 Soccer for the PS1 was released in 1997 and published by virgin interactive and this follows a long line of soccer games that were being released on the console during that period. 

You had the likes of FIFA 97 and you also had the Adidas Power Soccer series among many other experimental and yet inspirational titles that were starting to see life on the PlayStation at that time. 

This game does take somewhat of a different approach from your typical soccer games while it does utilize aspects seen in older games but it has a real roster of players with different abilities that you can manipulate and alter to help you progress throughout the game and you also have access to a multitude of different International Teams and even clubs that you can play as depending on different types of modes, multiplayer campaigns, tournaments or whatever you want to get involved with. 

The game itself when you compare to other games, this was still a very relatively early soccer game and football games are still trying to find their way, this was long before the days of the likes of FIFA 98 and ISS Pro 98 where they are considered to be two of the greatest football games ever to be on the PS1. 

So the likes of 4-4-2 Soccer would have been before that so football games are still yet to find a place and to really kind of be more refined. 

And as a result the game got relatively mixed and average reviews and to many people the game can be quite difficult to play and master although there are plenty of reasons to play it as there's a lot of content in the game especially when the platter of teams that are available to choose from from the get-go that you can play casually just in like friendly matches or you can jump into tournaments. 

So there's more than enough opportunities to get involved with the content that's already in the game. 

Now I heard about this game back in the day but I never really seen copies of it floating around in game stores so it was relatively a hard game to find for the most part. I was always interested to see what it was like and even what it looked like and played but haven't spent time with it you definitely know that it's an earlier title. 

It is playable but it is very very difficult yes it is fast-paced but the controls are very clunky even on the easiest difficulties I found that the AI can be quite aggressive which I suppose kind of relates to the somewhat mixed reviews of the game got because it wasn't as refined compared to other soccer games. 

It was a bit kind of like all over the place, there was so much going on and everything was happening so fast you didn't really have time to react or interact with everything because before you knew it the AI was that aggressive that they would have the ball stuck in the net before you even know what was going on because the game was just frantic was just end-to-end stuff. 

If anything I find with a lot of these types of games even these older type of PS1 games and even a lot of games I've seen and played on the PS2, yes they are playable to some degree but you can see why they got the reviews that they did because in reality and I don't really like to speak negatively of games because they all have their own unique preferences, there is things in this game and other games that definitely stand there compared to what are more popular more refined games. 

There's always something in every game that will stand out but with the majority of these soccer games if I'll be brutally honest you feel like more of a glorified spectator than you actually do feel like a player because even though you have control of the characters, nine times out of ten the only real player that you'll have any sort of controller or is the goalkeeper where you'll be picking the ball out of the net to kick it up the field or you'll be just hitting from a goal kick just to kick it up the pitch again only to lose the possession and then to fight constantly trying to pick the right player and to try and get them to move in a position that you can even have a chance of getting the ball and nine times out of ten you won't even get close to it because the ball is taken off as soon as you've actually gotten it. 

And trying to pass the ball you can't even it's very very hard with these type of games even string two passes together without messing it up or without someone taking the ball off you because these all the games that were just the ai was just it wasn't refined it wasn't dynamic and it wasn't beginner friendly. 

It was relentless and there was no room for any errors but even at that you didn't even have to create errors for these type of games because everything was just so aggressive, you literally would just sit and just watch the game just play out and just hope that if you did get a chance that you might have a chance to score which nine times out of ten you wouldn't because the keeper on the other end would nearly catch everything you threw out of it anyway. 

So it that left a lot of frustration with a lot of these games, I know myself and I've played a ton of football games on both the PS1 and PS2 and I found that a lot. 

Now I'm not going to sit here and say that I'm great at football games, I'm not but I know games that I can generally pick up and play and somewhat get into versus games that for me that just feel genuinely unplayable and honestly this feels like one of those games that's more on the latter side where it's unplayable. 

You won't really get much interaction with this game apart from just chasing around the place like I said you're just really glorified spectator at the end of the day and that's all it really feels like because at the end of the day a lot of these games do have some really cool features and dynamics but they're just not while executed if I will be brutally honest and I know I hate to sound negative with games and I genuinely don't like doing that but at the same time you also do have to be realistic because that is the way it plays out when you're experiencing these games. 

They are worthwhile just to experience and just to try out but I can guarantee you you won't enjoy it. You might play one game of it and you'll quickly move on to something else and in most cases if you're building up a collection of games, if you're an avid collector the chances are you won't even play this at all. 

You literally just get the game just added to your collection to fill up space on your shelf that's about all you'll get out of it really which in a lot of ways is a pity but that's not the only game like that there's quite a number of games like this on the PlayStation even the PS2 as well and even on more modern consoles. 

There's just games out there that just lack in the quality department and even the playability department that just are not user friendly at all. 

So this game honestly wouldn't be for everybody. 

If you are looking for a more genuine game to get involved with you would be better looking at the likes of FIFA 98 or any of the later FIFA games on the PS1 and even the ISS pro games even in regard the Adidas Power Soccer series for me even is much more playable and you feel like you're a little bit more control over what's going on even though those games are tough as well but you genuinely have more of an interaction and some level of control over the game to a certain degree. 

So they would be your best bet but it really just depends on your own preferences, you never know you might actually like it some people might actually be able to figure this out or if you did play it back in a day you might have been able to master this. 

But I would love to know your thoughts on 4-4-2 Soccer for the PS1 if you have played it back in the day and if so what did you think of it overall. 

Be sure to share it in the comments below and be sure to keep watching to see more content on other games similar to 4-4-2 Soccer, you can check out the blog where we will be diving into the iconic elements of these classic video games and as always keep those gaming memories alive...