FIFA 95

Lore & Background

FIFA Soccer 95 is a video game that simulates football. The game utilizes an isometric viewpoint. The player controls one of the eleven footballers on their team, with the ability to switch to control another footballer. The game allows up to four players at the same time, each controlling a different footballer. The players can choose to control a footballer on the same team or on opposing teams. The remaining footballers are controlled by the computer. Club sides are included for the first time in the series, with clubs from six leagues across Europe; the Premier League in England, Ligue 1 in France, the Bundesliga in Germany, Serie A in Italy, the Eredivisie in the Netherlands and La Liga in Spain. Several clubs from the Campeonato Brasileiro leagues in Brazil and clubs named for cities in the American Professional Soccer League in the US are also included. The licenses did not cover the player names, so fictional names are used instead. Other new features compared to the previous game include the implementation of the penalty shootout to resolve games that finish in a draw after extra time (FIFA International Soccer had instead used next-goal-wins at the end of extra time).

In Their Own Story

The CRT hums. The PS1's blue light spills across the carpet of a bedroom that smells of instant noodles and the faint ozone of a blown fuse in the hallway. You press Start, and the loading screen resolves into the familiar green of a well-kept pitch seen from above, slightly tilted, the way a stadium floodlight would catch it. The crowd is a low, textured roar—more suggestion than sound. You line up your XI, scrolling through names that are real, that you saw on the telly last weekend. The kickoff whistle is a sharp digital chirp. The ball rolls. For the next forty-five minutes, the rest of the world is a muffled argument through the bedroom door, and you are the manager, the striker, the goalkeeper, all at once, in a game that still feels like the future.

Reader's Guide

In their review, Mean Machines Sega noted the improvements made to three elements of the gameplay that they considered weak points of the previous game – passing, set-pieces and goalkeeping. Also drawing praise was that the developers had 'improved that which didn't seem to need improving'. They concluded by describing it as an 'excellent update' and the best football game available. GamePro was similarly approving; though they were disappointed that there was less chanting and singing than the previous game, they rated FIFA '95 to be 'the best soccer game yet.' They particularly praised the removal of one-touch passing, saying this makes the game play more realistically, and the retention of most of the elements that made the previous game great.

Did You Know?

• FIFA Soccer 95 was released in 1994, not 1995.
• The game was released only for the Sega Mega Drive, not for the Sony PlayStation.
• It was the first game in the FIFA series to include club sides.
• The game introduced penalty shootouts to resolve draws after extra time.