412 - Nintendo World Cup

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Nintendo World Cup. Pass. Shoot. Score! It's world-class fun. And welcome to Nostalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. And I'm Sean. And this is our first time we're recording in 2026, which is kind of timely because, Sean, there is a World Cup happening this year and in America, no less.

I guess it was like a 25% chance that that was going to happen. Well, I guess not the America one. Yeah. That's like the crazy one. Yeah. But it's also like messy. It's not really. Just the United States. It's technically America because it's all North America, but there's some games in Canada, some games in Mexico. Shouldn't all the games just be at MetLife Stadium and just call it a day?

Actually, that's what I thought it was going to be. So you actually made me feel better in terms of traffic and amount of people. Yeah. No, well, don't worry. You can still consider... airbnb-ing your apartment uh for this summer for four thousand dollars a night yeah four thousand dollars a night sounds about right okay now in 1990 when this game came out there was also a world cup

And the Real World Cup in 1990 was held in Italy. West Germany defeated the defending champions. Argentina won nothing. in a final that ended on a late penalty in West Germany's favor. And that's kind of like the story of the whole World Cup, is that it was a defensive, low-scoring World Cup. There were only an average of 2.2 goals per game. And I'm like, well, 2.2 actually sounds pretty high. A lot of these games end in 1-0, right? It kind of reminds me of the Dead Puck era.

Yes. In hockey where everything was just 1-0, 1-1. So there's the dead puck. There's also the dead ball in baseball. So this is its own dead ball. Right, right. What is football's deflate gate? There is a word that's used for the low-scoring error. I forgot what it's called, though. It has one. I think it was in the 50s or 60s.

Maybe more importantly for the 1990 World Cup, though, is that the United States is back in the 1990 World Cup for the first time since 1950. So that's probably why this game is also like... being licensed for the NES as like a Nintendo World Cup, get this to North America, because it's not this game on the Famicom.

No. And so there's like a push there probably to be like, well, we got to capitalize on this moment because soccer is kind of back. And people always say that, by the way, soccer is on the rise and everything. Is it really? No. I don't think it's ever truly going to be on the rise here. It's fine. Right here specifically. Yes. I mean, I think more people care about like Premier League and that stuff.

than they ever are going to care about like MLS. And I do think that like, you know, there is more interest in MLS these days. But if you look at the, like if we're looking at as a horse race between MLS and even. Not even NFL, because that's not even a fair comparison, but even baseball, then I think that it's losing track there too, you know? Yeah. Funny you mentioned that too, because baseball...

was just soccer beat out baseball in a recent poll of favorite sports, and it was 10% of people's favorite sport. So it's ahead of baseball now. Well, you just countered my claim. No, no, but think about this for a second, okay? So the question is, what's your favorite sport, right? So obviously a lot of people are saying football, some people are saying basketball, and then it kind of gets divvied out between the rest.

But I would argue that a lot of people who say football or basketball would probably say baseball is like their number two. Right. So it's like no one's saying the people who are saying soccer is their favorite are insane. And then and then like they wouldn't those same people like nobody.

who watches the NFL is putting soccer as their number two. They're putting it at like, I forgot that this sport existed. You know, there's gotta be some word for the statistical analysis of, of these kinds of preferential rankings, but. I think you got us beat on that one. Yeah. So let's see. Where was I going with this, though? Because, oh, yeah. So the low-scoring defensive World Cup of 1990.

uh is juxtaposed by this nintendo world cup video game where it is five on five arcade soccer where you're encouraged to absolutely destroy your opponents there are no fouls there are no offsides players get knocked unconscious and they just lie dead on the field yeah yes every team has uh like super shots uh to do like really crazy trick shots And it's actually in Japan. It's a Kunio-kun game. One of those, the same ones who did the dodgeball and River City Ransom. This was a soccer game.

I'm sorry if I say, I have to say soccer going forward because if I say football, I think I'm going to confuse our primary audience. But yeah, I apologize to the 2% of you in Brazil. You are appreciated. So how funny is it that the real 1990 World Cup was ultra defensive and low scoring while Nintendo World Cup basically rewards you for transforming matches into demolition derbies? It's fun.

I was sort of thinking like, oh, if there ever was an MLS hits or an MLS blitz, then this would be it. It's just, you know. It's basically how I play FIFA. I don't really know anything about formations or how to do or how to make an approach around a defense. So I will just spam the slide tackle button and I end up getting yellow cards left and right. This is me playing soccer with like freedom. And I think when you consider that this was.

part of the Kunio series. I don't think that that's surprising to us anymore because of how we've covered it so frequently on this show with the ports and everything. But also, by now, I think in general... you know, people who bought a lot of NES games might catch on to this because the graphics are now a giveaway. They continue to use the same sprite look across all of these games. And so you do recognize...

They're like, hey, like those are the same people from the dodgeball game or, you know, it's like the fact that they keep this consistent look and that they don't change even the look of the characters when they localize it. I think. helps make that connection even more obvious now than just some chubby cherub situation where it was based on a manga in Japan and they changed the whole thing to Cupid. That was a total redesign.

For me, the thing that actually threw me off wasn't so much the style, which I think is iconic. It's just that the game itself is, it's just Nintendo World Cup. Like, it's not... It's not saying that it's of dodgeball fame or of River City Ransom fame. It's just this generic name for a game that otherwise has a very unique look. It's very strange.

Yeah, because the Famicom game had a whole like high school component to it where it was like Kunio and his classmates are rivaling against like a bunch of other schools in a tournament. And there's... Like there's like a story there. The story scenes are stripped out completely. And instead that the high school teams are replaced with, you know, 13 national teams, Argentina, Brazil.

Cameroon. Yeah, I was going to ask, is Cameroon in the new World Cup? Yeah, I don't know, actually. I do have, because I just wanted to see who the U.S. was playing first, and it's Paraguay, so we hate Paraguay right now. All my homies hate Paraguay. Yeah, they're next on the list. Cameroon, though, I don't see on here. So no, probably. Well, you know who else you don't see on this list? West Germany.

I don't see West Germany competing in 2026 either. Damn. You know what's funny about that is West Germany, you know. The German reunification happened later in the same year. So it's like, I think even by the time we're in December now of 1990, it's probably already happened. So the game like releases and West Germany is not even really a country anymore. It happens, you know? I could see... I think we've had some Soviet stuff in the last kind of...

months of the NES library. So maybe, well, that's all right. It hasn't happened yet. So we'll get there. Not the same thing, but I think about like, um, the board game risk to always had like a, a non-realistic map where like certain countries were just like entire.

regions instead and it's like well hold on there's a couple of other you know like they simplify the game a little bit but i remember like ukraine just being a massive chunk of land going like all the way down to greece and it's like hell yeah i didn't i didn't know it was that big but i guess Alt universe where Ukraine's taken over. I'm sure there's no New Zealand on the map either. Yeah, no New Zealand to even capture. That's true. I think now modern day risk actually does do it.

with with all the countries but who knows maybe it's like i i remember also that there was times where they just didn't even label countries it was like northern europe eastern europe western europe that one is how i think i've played it yeah So there is no Western Europe team on here too. Anyway, the teams, it's the kind of thing where for me, when I see the team selection, I think it doesn't matter until I find out that it does because each of these teams...

has a different special shot. The one thing in this game to like change the play style is that when you press the A and the B button together while taking a shot. You have the opportunity to do this super shot and that changes depending on what team you pick. So I guess there is some strategy there. Yeah. And it also is another, like it looks exactly like.

like the special shots in dodgeball, like the way that they animate, um, the, like whether it turns into like a hyper anime disc, um, Like, like again, like as like a super shot and dodgeball or as I think the United States has just like that kind of stylized spinning disc shot. So it's another connection there. Yeah, there are people doing, like, backflips and hitting the ball in the air. There's the headbutts. All great stuff.

The story being removed from the Famicom version of the game and just now having it be like this loose story that you have in your head of just it's the World Cup national teams competing to see who's going to win. Does this kind of game ever need a story like how Punch-Out kind of had between rounds or between, not rounds, but between different circuits, you would see the training and everything. Does it need a little flavor like that?

it doesn't have to go like if you recall in one of our nostalgia bites episodes we did captain Tsubasa

which was like an anime soccer game with crazy cut scenes and everything. It doesn't have to go that far, but does it need a little something to drive the player? I feel kind of like I'm missing out on this. I like when... sports games Go don't try and man in no world is this game trying to be a simulation But it is trying to be a sports game and I really like it when sports games try to be something else

Like, that's why I've mentioned it before on the podcast, but like Blitz the League is a game in which a story, not a great story, but like, it's not just a... a franchise mode in a football game. It is a story in which your, your stupid team ends up playing in a very corrupt league and, and all that kind of stuff. I would have liked to see.

the high school tournament mode in this game instead of what ends up being a kind of goofy version of soccer and Having the audacity to call it World Cup when it doesn't even have offsides I prefer the more fun cartoony version Where it it makes sense to play with the rules and stuff

So yeah, I like that kind of stuff. Yeah, for sure. And I mean, it's leaning into it in gameplay, so it might as well have it. The core gameplay loop, we're not going to explain the rules of soccer here, but just explain how they... translate soccer we mentioned all the there are no rules thing but there's still time uh so there's about time still exists there's two halves four minutes each uh there are five um

players on the field on each side. It's 5v5. That is not how real soccer is. I believe real soccer is 11 on each side. I don't think... The game needed to go to that level, especially because one, it's not trying to be a sim. It is arcadey. It is fun. It is silly. I think the five on five is the appropriate way because of the sizing of the screen. They made it so that you don't have this.

vertical scroll in addition to a horizontal scroll because the field is so big they kept it so that it's all just kind of um just you know it it does it does vertically scroll obviously but not like in a way where you can't see the immediate action in front of you. Yeah. The other thing, you only control one player on the team. So the whole time, there's no button.

to switch over and take over one of the computers. Yes, I agree. But I think they did that because they wanted to make one button a pass and one button a shoot. And because of the super shot, taking... A and B together, I just can't think of another button combination for them to do to give you control of another player. Well, all you do is, I mean, we've already solved this problem. You just sort of, uh, oh, I see what you mean.

It would also be used to pass to you. Yes. But you could say what I thought you were going to say is when you, whoever... As soon as the computer gains control of the ball, then you become that person. Yeah, then the pass button becomes changed person. Right, right. So...

We've done it before. I think it makes a lot more sense if you're going to have some kind of story and you're only playing as one person, like, canonically. And I'm not sure how the... original game plays or if that is the case uh but it seems like a holdover of that um in which case i think it would make sense if like your character is one guy however uh this is national team and there's no main character on the national team so I think it's weird

Right. And we know it's possible to control other characters on the field at the same time because the game actually allows up to four players at once. So it's not like there is some. coding rule for why it's like you can only be this one character sean you mentioned that the uh the knocked out players for lack of a better word the the incapacitated players

They stay incapacitated on the field. Nobody comes to retrieve them. Nobody swaps out either. There's not like, okay, he's injured, so get somebody from the bench. Now that's just where they lay until the end of the half. So that creates the, to make another hockey term here, like a power play. Basically, you could have a... Right. A six on five, a six on four, a six on two situation if you're ruthless enough to take everybody else out. Yeah, I think it stops.

I think there needs to be two people on the opposing team. Not that they're even thinking about fairness here, but I think it's a limit to... losing three players, but still like it, they don't get back up. Like there's no stoppage in play. So you don't get them back. I think you get them back at the half maybe, but otherwise it's way too.

It's way too punishing if you're going to, especially if we're playing against each other and we just keep losing guys. I think that's just a frustration engine. Yeah, do you think that any of these guys are faking it? Like they're hoping to draw a card? Hey, that's how you fix diving. You just get rid of any kind of referees. Right, right.

So no, they're actually in dire pain. And, you know, the power play component of it, I think, is actually the interesting part of it. It's one thing to incapacitate a player, but to actually change... the balance of the two teams knocking the player out and having it be like yes i could see it being frustrating if you know you're playing against somebody else and you are literally handicapped down to two people however i've i've got a thing that like

That's part of everyone's strategy is also just like, how fast can I knock out the other guy's players? Like maybe I don't even give a shit about the ball for a little bit and I'm just tackling everybody I can. Spot me five goals while you try and break all their legs and then make it up on the back end.

Well, that's another thing, Sean. You said spot me five goals. These games get out of hand. Yeah. They are unrealistic scoring for soccer. I know that much. I don't think I've ever seen anybody score more than seven goals in a game. I think it was. It was that Brazil... It was Germany-Brazil, that World Cup game. Do you remember that? I have never watched the World Cup. Okay, I'm pretty sure Germany scored like seven...

seven goals against Brazil in like the first 10 minutes of the game. And it was like, wow, everybody was worried about the Brazilian team. Like, are they going to be able to come home? I don't think they would. Yeah. They're still there, right? I think it was 2016, that World Cup. Okay. Maybe 2014. Maybe 2018. Yeah, definitely an even number.

But I haven't seen a game that high scoring. But every game of this that I've played was this high scoring. Because also, you don't even need to do special shots. You can kind of juke the goalie. Pretty easily just by doing little twirls in that little crease area and guaranteed goal. Yeah. Yeah, juking the goalie is kind of the only way, too, because if you don't do that, the goalie will almost certainly block your shot. Even a super shot?

No, no, I guess I just mean like if you just take a shot directly at the net, like the goalie is going to block it. Like you need to do something with your shot in order to make it so that it doesn't just like, like there's not enough. There is no limit to how close to the net you can be, which I know is also a rule in soccer. You do have to be outside of that box. Do you? Yeah, you do. I didn't think so, but okay. I think to take the shot, you do.

I've seen, but I've seen like highlights of soccer matches where the guy's just like there. That's true. Maybe there's like a rule of like, because, you know, like it's like an offsides thing. Like you can't be parked in there. You can't be parked. You have to take the ball with you into that zone. That makes more sense. That does make more sense. It's a little important that I learn these. rules before World Cup 2026. Is it? No, I'm definitely not going to go. Have you seen those ticket prices?

But it's funny because it's like in our backyard and we can't like I can't even see it from with binoculars. But meanwhile, I don't I just feel like this is the one time to get excited about soccer for somebody who's not. I think you're right. I would say. Um, if, if you really want to get into soccer, you gotta, you gotta watch like the, um, like, didn't we just do conca calf or however you say it? Like when the, when all the American countries kind of. Yell at each other. Excuse me?

Look that up on your own time, I think. CONCACAF, okay. Yeah, all the European people are out of the way. They've got their own way to play soccer. It's when Brazil and all those teams. Get to like get to kick the shit out of the Americans and Canadians. That's when all the fun stuff happens.

The fun stuff might just be limited to beating the shit out of players and the super shots, but the super shots also have a limit. Just like you can't knock out an entire team and cause a forfeit, you can only use five super shots per half.

And that's probably necessary as well, right? Sounds pretty arbitrary, considering everything else they let you get away with. But sure, it's probably for the best. Yeah. But there are some play... uh elements in the versus mode if you leave the tournament you you do get the ability to play on other types of turf not just grass you can select between grass sand dirt and ice each one

Obviously changing the traction and ball behavior. I don't think the players are more slippery on ice, but I didn't play on the ice either, so I can't confirm that. But one neat little trick here.

If you do a verse match on, let's say, the sand, and then you finish that match and go into tournament mode while the game, without ever resetting or turning it off, you will... inherit that field type in the tournament mode wow that sounds like a huge mistake yeah i don't think it was intended but it definitely happens they just don't have a way to like reset the field type

unless you choose grass again in verse mode. I think that should sort of be a thing. If you're hosting the World Cup, you should be able to make all of the fields ice.

like that should be within your right like kind of how in the olympics you get to pick whatever like not real sports you're going to make sports just so you can get some medals like you should be able to uh force all of these world-class athletes play soccer on ice right right now now before each game there's like a couple like boxes you have to tick uh they basically work as like on off switches but or like yes no's like do i want to play this way or yeah

And those strategy things of how you want to play offensive or defensive, how aggressively your teammates go for tackles versus shots. It's a smart way, I think, of especially to a audience that might not be too familiar with soccer, of communicating strategy to these, you know, especially for assigning to your computer rather than having to control.

all of the players and and and executing that play style all on your own yeah i mean again i would prefer to just be able to play as whoever but if you're going to force me to stay locked To one guy, this is a good way to at least customize how you want to play instead of I just causing Just saying pass to me over and over just so that you can finally take control of the game

And then the other thing you get to do besides setting up the strategy is you get to choose which six players from each team's roster get fielded. But... There's no stats. There are stats. The manual mentions that all players have their own characteristics. So why wouldn't you include the stats somewhere? Why does it have to be a mystery? You've got to fill it out. You've got to play it over and over.

How many matches do you think it would take you to figure out specific characters, too? Like, who is who? Yeah, you know? I understand the idea of, like... figuring out all the different super shots across the team so that you don't just play as the usa every game but

To figure out who that guy specifically was and where he is on the field when he's behaving that way and if he actually moves faster or shoots harder, I don't buy that. At least they all have specific... faces which is nice um i mean i think they get like they're kind of duplicated between teams but i think per team they all have unique uh unique faces so that you are right on both accounts yeah

So you would figure it out eventually. Like, oh, the guy that just has a huge circly eyes is probably Frank. But I don't think that I'm paying attention enough.

or ever, to be able to say, I'm going to sub in Lucas. Right, right. The versus match, as I mentioned, can go up to four players. It's also one of those interesting games where you can play three player. You don't have to have either two or four. It does allow you to do 2v1 as well with the rest being computer. The four players simultaneously with the NES four score was a big sell of this game in all promotional material, but also in the manual. It straight up tells you.

to buy the nes foursquare fourscore or the nes satellite which is basically the wireless version of the fourscore i can't imagine buying a wireless controller product in you know back in 1990 and hoping for like a uh an input lag free experience i'm sure there's no lag at all uh i'm sure that it gets interfered with with by a hairdryer but Okay, yeah. But all that to say, this makes a little more sense for why Nintendo of America...

And Nintendo as a whole is like getting involved here and rebranding this game that they didn't even really make. You know, they're borrowing Technos Japan's game and saying like, hey, let's... Localize this and get a reason to sell the four score in America, right? Like to do during World Cup fever, USA is finally back. Four player soccer is where it's at.

And you just for the cozy price of buying a four score, which was probably like 50 bucks and this game, which was probably like 40 bucks or 50 bucks, you could do that. Would you?

I wouldn't, but that's going to lead me to my next topic. So thank you, Sean, is that when you don't care about the sport, right? How...

How hard is it for you to get into the video game version of it? Obviously, you are communicating that you are barely even interested in the World Cup that's happening in your backyard, let alone... past soccer results like you're not about to start watching this sport but is it as hard for you to get into the video game side of it too or are you like well because now it's in video game form it's a little more accessible

No, I mean, OK, I don't hate soccer. I guess like it's just low priority for me. But that's how I got into football. That's how I got into. I mean, I do like playing FIFA. it's how I started to finally understand baseball. Like I just like sports video games. Like we, it's sort of my shtick at this point. So, uh, no, I mean, this is, this is fun. I like, I liked it. Yeah, and I think in general, I'm weirdly like with soccer, I need it to not be like a sim game. Yeah. When it gets to like a...

full-scale giant field, like you said, knowing the formations and the strategy stuff. It's like... I love hockey and I can barely play the NHL games, the modern ones correctly because of just like, you know, I'm not, I'm no coach. I have no, I'm just like running around, skating around on the ice, hoping that I don't.

you know that that i can get over without doing an icing or something so uh all that to say is like i think for me i can be interested in any sports game too but the ones that i don't The ones I'm not super familiar with, I feel like I need the more arcadey, like light on the rules version of the game. So this is way more approachable to me.

than the FIFA games are. Absolutely. On the, I call it sequels and spinoffs, there was a Game Boy version of this game. just some trimmed features. But the Cuneo version of this game also came out on PC Engine and Mega Drive, which is the Genesis in other countries. And all those things are just like expanded teams, better graphics. The CD version has an arranged soundtrack. Nothing like nothing that changes the core experience. Nobody ever added rules.

Nobody ever added referees. No one made the, you know, if anything, they just made the soccer longer, like the time and the ability to like play soccer and all that. The game did not get a follow-up, though, for North America. So while it got the PC Engine and the Mega Drive, it never got a Nintendo World Cup 2. This didn't become a series that Nintendo would revisit.

It maybe didn't sell that many four scores. I did see some footage of the Genesis, like the Mega Drive version, and it looks really good. And maybe it's not like a true sequel. Slash spin-off. I guess more so spin-off, but I saw footage that there's like a hockey version of this. Oh, I didn't see that. There's like a whole Cuneo hockey game.

And it never came to the States. So I want to play that game. Yeah, yeah. Thinking about that, it's like he got to play dodgeball. He got to play soccer. It's like, is there a baseball game too? Like, let's get everything. That would be funny. If they somehow found a way to like punkify baseball rules. There were a lot of other World Cup games, though, that didn't, you know, for other systems, home computers, arcades, Mega Drive, that I'm not going to go too in-depth on, but...

Just to throw out their names, there's Tecmo World Cup 1990, World Cup Soccer Italia 90, Kickoff 2. The one thing that all three of these games that I mentioned have in common is that they all go for the sim aspect, where it's like, obviously the graphics are still either 8 or 16-bit, but they have like a... a top down realistic view with the 11 on 11 approach. And they try to best give those, you know, some will have still no fouls. Others will have like, you know, different.

Not all the players on the field, but the idea is that Nintendo is the only one who's leaning into this fun, chibi style of soccer that's a little more carefree and probably better suited for... video games in 1990 like it's great that these other ones exist for the purists but I feel like out of all of them from a video game fun standpoint Nintendo gets that best and that's why they chose

what they went with for the localization still feel like again just feel like we're missing out well we might be missing out chum but we won't let our listeners miss out on this final section

The Essential Games List. I think Nintendo World Cup is a smart move by Nintendo. If I'm putting on my marketing hat and everything, like... Sure, soccer isn't the biggest thing, but I can totally see this from the four-player standpoint, the arcadey nature, the quick gameplay, too. It does not take long to do one of these matches, so even playing with a friend.

or having multiple friends around. Even if you don't have the four score, you can kind of like quickly get in a bunch of games. I could see all that working and this being fondly remembered by the people who grew up with it. But I think that's where it stays. I don't know if it's like, it's not even anything about the controls or anything like that. I think it's just what I want from like a soccer game.

isn't going to happen on like eight bit because I haven't even seen it happen on the modern games. Like I was talking about with the FIFA games. Like I'm not sure I've found the kind of thing I'm looking for in a soccer game to like recommend it. Closest thing I can think of is maybe like, you know, football manager where it's like, damn, they really went all in on owning a club and building it out year over year over year. And like.

That's the kind of thing that's a totally different kind of sports game, but still falls into that same like scratching the itch as the simulation games of today do. So that's going to be like. My recommendation, having only spent minutes in those games that are supposed to be hundreds of hours, is maybe start there. Sean? Yeah, I mean, I didn't dislike the game, but we didn't even really get into any of the...

nitty-gritty about how the game feels to play. We talked a bit about the sort of no rules. But one thing that's really important about a sports game... um that this one didn't really quite hit the mark on is just how it kind of feels to play like it feels kind of it feels kind of jank like i feel like passing is always going to get intercepted

Uh, or it's going to be some kind of, it never feels like you're, you're setting up a smooth play. Um, but when I try to do like a crosser or whatever, like, uh, the equivalent of a one timer is, it just kind of. They end up like passing it backwards and I'm, and you just kind of have to go in. You have to basically play the jank version. You have to cheese the game.

in order to play it correctly, which I'm not a big fan of. But it's okay. It's still fun to play, but not essential at all. Yeah, I think that's a good... Shout out though to Sean about the gameplay feel because it again is another thing that like is probably more rewarding when you're playing with other humans as opposed to the computer because any kind of jankiness becomes more fun when playing with friends.

than it does against something that you can't shove. And we're just going to keep shoving these episodes down your ears if you'll listen to us every Friday. We're still doing that somehow. I'm not quite sure, but we're nearing the end of 1990. Are you feeling it, Sean? I'm really feeling it. Good, because that was episode 162 of 1990. So we have been doing this for a few years.

But you know what the end of 1990 calls for? That I have to go back and somehow remember every game we played so I can make some kind of grand judgment on the entire year as a whole? Yes! Ugh. I can't wait. Yep, it's coming up soon, but we have a few other big ones to come out first, notably Star Tropics and Ultima 4 and the second TMNT game. But neither of those are next week. Next week, we are going to be talking about North and South. So East and West, stay out of it. you