Hyper Formation Soccer PS1 Review

Hyper Formation Soccer is a sports game that was developed and published by human entertainment and released for the PlayStation in Japan in 1995. 

This game would only see a release in Japan and would also be one of the first soccer games to ever see a home on the PlayStation during the early months of the console's launch back at that time. 

This game would also be the spiritual predecessor to the formation soccer 97 and 98 games that would also be developed by human entertainment some years later that would take a very different approach moving away from the 2D visual seen here to focus on more 3D aesthetics that will play very very differently from this type of game. 

But at the same time although the games did have some unique features they wouldn't have been considered as good compared to the heavy hitters of the soccer genre primarily with ISS Pro and the FIFA series. 

But with this being a very early soccer game scene on the PlayStation it makes great use of the 2D visuals that are on offer and it puts you very in mind with games similar to those seen on earlier 16-bit consoles primarily with the Super Nintendo with games such as Striker and even the earlier FIFA series as the game has the same type of visual aesthetic and it plays and feels very like the early FIFA type games even the early Striker games. 

Even myself going back I played one of the versions of Striker originally on the Super Nintendo a mate of mine had it and we used to play that literally every weekend. 

We'd always play a batch of different types of games that my friend had between Mortal Kombat 3 Super Mario Kart, NBA Live 96 and Striker and we used to always play the indoor mode in Striker because it was just so much fun and you could literally score from the halfway line that once you hit the ball you could use the directions on the pad to serve the ball in any direction and it just added so much more dynamics to the whole experience and it was a lot of fun. 

And having spent time playing this game it does remind me of that an awful lot although it's not as well refined or as easy to pick up and play if I'll be honest. 

The game itself is definitely a lot more on the slower side compared to that game and it plays and feels very more like the earlier FIFA games seen on the early days of the 16-bit consoles especially when you consider it to FIFA International Soccer that would have been released say around 1993-94 on the Sega Mega Drive and so forth as it has the same kind of overall feel and even speed and the clunkiness of the controls. 

It definitely feels more like a 16-bit era game rather than a 32 bit era game if I'll be brutally honest. 

But it is an interesting take on soccer games and it is interesting to go back and to look at the history of games that were released on during the early months of the PlayStation and for many people out there a lot of us would never have known that this game even exists. 

The fact is that it only saw a release in Japan proves that and even regarding information the funny thing about it is the entire formation soccer series when you go looking for information to try and do a bit of research online there's some really very little information available regarding these games and the history, how they were developed, how popular they were even in terms of how many copies they intentionally sold there's literally nothing really out there that you can find. 

So it really just leaves you down to having to make up your own experience just try playing the games themselves and you can definitely tell this was an early soccer game on the PlayStation as again it's not really that well refined and it plays very like a 16-bit era game. 

It is very clunky and you're just kind of like snatching at everything hoping that you can gain or hold on to possession for long enough and there's a very good chance that you'll concede many goals because I found that the AI can be quite clunky and at times quite aggressive and especially with the likes of the keepers can be very silly because on your end the keepers will can see calls very easily and just be very silly in how they operate. 

But the computer AI opponents are totally different when you take a shot on them, nine times at a ten it's almost impossible that I found a score or goal no matter how many times I try it just is a very difficult game outright. 

But I remember even going back to playing the likes of the early FIFA games on the Mega Driving, Super Nintendo and they were really tough games for me as well. 

I was never the best at those type of soccer games anyway and I always find them extremely difficult to score goals at the time and this year is no different it's very reflective of those early 16-bit era of soccer games. 

But it's still a worthwhile experience and it's still worthwhile at least trying out just to experience one of the earliest soccer games ever to be seen on the original PlayStation way back in 1995 which is quite incredible to think that this game is as old as it is and that many of us really don't know about it. 

So it is a really good opportunity in fact it's a great opportunity to be honest to go back and I to have the experience and to now have the opportunity to experience these games from a whole modern perspective so that we can compare them. 

While they may not live up to modern standards they were good for their time and I do often mention that the games that we play today were often inspired by these earlier type of soccer games or even just games in general and had these games not existed the way that they did games that we see today would have been very very different and would not have played out the way that they do so if you're a fan of retro gaming this is another one of those games I think that you should add to your list. 

Mind you you will find it difficult, you will find it frustrating but I'm sure there's plenty of you out there that will find some enjoyment out of it and you'll pretty much be able to do better than I've done from playing it so but again I'll leave that up to you. 

You can make your own decisions on that and what you think for yourself but it's not a bad title and it's not the worst soccer game I played and it is reflective of its time it is difficult it is clunky it will take some getting used to and I'm sure there's people out there like I said that are better at it than I am so yeah we'll see. 

But I would love to know your thoughts of Hyper Formation Soccer for the PlayStation and if you have played this game yourself and if so what did you think of it? 

Did you know anything about this game back in the day and if so what were your experiences of the game if you do have any? 

I'd love to hear whatever stories you do have at this game so be sure to share them in the comments below and be sure to keep watching to see more content on other games similar to Hyper Formation 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...