I wanted to create a similar page a long time ago, but I always hesitated. I didn't really know what to write. How can you persuade people who have never played Kick Off 2 that the best game of all time could fit in a 720KB disk, and needed only 512K of RAM in order to run? Before the internet.. Before 3D accelerators.. Before the 64MB graphics cards.. There was the Amiga. In 1989 Anco, with Dino Dini in charge, releases a game that changed history: Kick Off. The graphics, though well drawn and detailed, were not impressive even then. The sound effects were good, but nothing out of the ordinary. So what was so good about it? What else? The gameplay. In the years that followed, several releases followed the original one, and the best of all was Kick Off 2.

Even though the graphics were more detailed, Kick Off 2 was even faster than its precedent. It ran at 50 frames/second, a great achievement at the time, as after all that was all the monitors could handle. As you can see in the screenshot above, you could practice your skills, play a friendly match, participate in a league or cup of national teams, change the names and kits of the teams and finally play the 1990 World Cup in Italy.

The first thing you notice after starting the match is that, exactly as in a real soccer game, the ball is not glued to the player's feet. This means that skillful moves are needed in order to pass, control the ball or avoid the opponents. That's exactly what was different about it: you had a feeling of total freedom. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that in Kick Off 2 you could never score the same goal twice. The "Aftertouch" option gave the ability to perform excellent curve balls. Don't forget you had to do everything with a one button joystick, unlike today's games, where every action is assigned to a different button.

On the top left of the screen you can see a scanner, which is a micrography of the game. With a quick glance, you can locate an open teamate and the formation of the adversary. The adversary could be the computer, however if you want to experience the real magic of Kick Off 2 it's better to play against a friend. Software magazines of the early 90s faced severe problems, because reviewers were constantly playing this game instead of writing articles. Just between you and me, who could blame them?

More choices: Different surfaces (plastic, wet, ice etc.) and an option of a strong wind. Another thing that was different than the other soccer games was that every player had different skills in shooting, tackling, heading etc. An experienced Kick Off 2 player could understand the abilities of each player and make the necessary changes to the team in order to win. You could also choose between 4 different formations: 4-2-4, 4-3-3, 4-4-2 or 5-3-2. And if this wasn't enough, you could load your own team and tactics of you owned the previous Kick Off game, Player Manager.

Anco soon released Kick Off 2 in every format, but the quality was never as good as the Amiga version. The best of them was the Atari ST version, and the worst the PC version (yes, worse than the one for Spectrum).

Atari ST version

Commodore 64 version

Amstrad 6128 version

Spectrum version

PC version

I'm a proud member of the Kick Off Association, an online gathering of friends who travel all around Europe in order to participate in national and international Kick Off 2 tournaments. We will never stop playing the game of our hearts.