Soccer Brawl

Soccer Brawl is a futuristic soccer game first released in arcades on February 14, 1992. It was available on the Neo Geo on March 13 the same year and later for the Neo Geo CD on March 31, 1995.

The game was developed under the working title of Cybernetic Soccer and was originally going to be published under the Pallas brand, which was phased out before the game's release.

Overview
Soccer Brawl is a futuristic football/soccer game that uses either bionic people or cyborgs for the players. It is a two-player game where you pick a home land from one of ten countries including Italy, Germany, Brazil, Spain, Japan, et. al. After selecting one of two stadiums, either a dome or an open field, the 5-on-5 soccer match begins with a goalie for each team. You can hold either A for a power shot while on offense, or A for a super punch to disable opponents while on defense.

Rules
There are no fouls. Throw-in is made in case of the ball landing outside of field line. Match time is 2 min 30 sec.

Teams
There are 8 teams, which differ by color, super shots and, possibly, some parameters.
 * United States (purple and white)
 * Germany (yellow and black)
 * England (yellow and purple)
 * Spain (pink and yellow-green)
 * Brazil (yellow-green and yellow)
 * Italy (pink and blue)
 * South Korea (blue and yellow-green)
 * Japan (red and white)

Super shots

 * USA and England: super shot flies on a "figure eight" trajectory.
 * Italy and Germany: super shot flies on sinewave.
 * Spain and Brazil: super shot is energy sphere surrounded by eight small balls.
 * South Korea and Japan: super shot flies in a circle behind captain and flies straight.

The half time shows are humorous monochrome skits with the referee.

Neo Geo CD version
It is possible to choose the difficulty level: Beginner, Normal, Hard, MVS. A match consists of 2 periods. It is possible to set period time (15, 30, 45 or 90 min), but it is not actual minutes. The half time shows are humorous monochrome skits showing unlucky attempts of engineers to build robots. Also, there are no women on the score screen.

Critical Reception
In Japan, Game Machine listed Soccer Brawl on their April 1, 1992 issue as being the eighth most-successful table arcade unit of the month, outperforming titles such as Hat Trick Hero. In North America, Play Meter listed the game in their April 1994 issue to be the sixty most-popular arcade game at the time. The title received mostly positive reception from both critics and reviewers alike since its initial release in arcades and Neo Geo AES.

Credits

 * Killer List of Video Games