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A soccer-driven RPG game? | Soccer Story Review

2K View2022-11-30

At a glance, the gameplay and graphics of Soccer Story looks like a mashup of Pokemon and Stardew Valley with a nice touch of clean 3D graphics, but the comparisons end there, as within Soccer Story is a fun semi-physics driven gameplay that has a very healthy obsession with soccer.

The entire premise of Soccer Story revolves around the namesake sport, blamed to have caused some kind of calamity in the previous year, ultimately leading to its worldwide ban. That is, except for usage by Soccer Inc. in its heavily regulated matches, effectively being monopolized.

You play as a boy: Leo, or a girl: Kai — depending on your choice — that has been mysteriously chosen by a magic flying soccer ball in his/her quest to revive the sport and remind the world what the forgotten sport of soccer is.

The gameplay centers around free roaming and exploring the different locations starting with your hometown. Completing various quests to advance the story, convincing the people to rally back to Soccer, As well as doing optional mini games scattered around the map to gain rewards or skill upgrades. Just your run-of-the-mill typical RPG gameplay, fused with Soccer.

Most of the mini-games and quests revolve around using your trusty magic soccer ball — which you can summon at will to play around with — to perform tasks; such as hitting trees to drop acorns requested by an NPC, or hitting toppled trash cans, bringing them back up to help a local with her job.

Soccer Story starts off a little too slow and honestly boring. Most of the introductory quests are just there to introduce you to the mechanics. I feel that they are a bit uninteresting, a chore-ish to do with little to no assistance from the narrative to drive you and keep you interested in moving the game forward.

The map is also a little bit too spaced out and I found the travel time a little tedious, but I believe it is a conscious design decision to emphasize soccer and to have some distance for the soccer player and the ball to travel and mess around with.

Furthermore, Soccer Story rarely deviates from its heavy utilization of the soccer ball to its gameplay, to its own demerit. Most of the different mini-games and quests ultimately boil down to hitting some stuff with the soccer ball, which can get old pretty fast.

That changes though as soon as you finally progress through the game and start getting into some real Soccer matches and competition cups. The gameplay suddenly transforms from a chill RPG exploration into an authentic high octane sports game. A fun and exciting game mode that is a whole different game on its own. If Pokemon has its turn-based battles in heavy contrast to its map exploration, Soccer Story has these Soccer matches.

You play as a team of five, technically only four as the goalie is controlled by computer, and have four minutes to score more goals than the opposition. Pass to teammates, outmaneuver the opposition, and shoot the ball to score. On the defensive side, you can try and steal the ball, or perform a risky tackle; if you miss, you temporarily stun yourself, if not, you stun the enemy.

This game mode is simple but largely fun and is rightfully the most exciting part of Soccer Story, except for a few frustrations that I’ve encountered mainly with the computer goalies: They are quite inconsistent, they will sometimes miss defending a pretty straightforward shot, and yet sometimes completely be impenetrable.

The same game mode also appears and is directly accessible from the main menu's Quick Match and playable with up to 4 players local co-op or PVP, although entirely unrelated from the story and its progression.

With its relaxing ambiance, soothing soundtrack, along with high octane soccer action, Soccer Story is a very fun ̶n̶a̶r̶r̶a̶t̶i̶v̶e̶ soccer driven adventure RPG game with a bit of local multiplayer in as an added bonus. Highly recommended if you’re already on the fence.

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