There is a small army of growing sports that are looking to find their place in the overall scheme of things, and one way of getting more publicity and growing a fan base is to create a video game featuring the growing sport. Ultimate Beach Soccer is the debut of beach soccer to any video game console and holds little promise to be the next big thing.
The game is four vs four style play, on a relatively short and narrow playing field. It seems as if they were going for a Street Vol.2 type of game, featuring quick game play, not but a handful of players, style points, and special moves. Right from the get go there is a nifty little training mode to help get acquainted with the controls, rules, and techniques of the game. Once you’re comfortable you can either play a friendly match, a harder arcade match, or dive right in for the full tour and play an entire season.
The game play is quick and the controls seem to stay in check, that is to say there’s not really a problem with the way the players move. After only a few minutes I did however notice that the AI for the computer teammates seems to be a little off, they don’t quite understand what to do with the ball. They’ve got a mind of their own and aren’t really capable of reading what the actions you’re taking should mean in respect to what they need to do. This can become frustrating but there’s a pretty simple solution, make them pass the ball to you right away and keep it away from them if at all possible.
The real challenge of the game comes with reading the goalies. Most keepers each have tendencies to defend the net in a different kind of way, the key is to recognize how they’re playing and find a way to counter it. If you think that kicking the ball straight at the goal is going to score you any points in this game then it’s going to be rough, learn to trick the keeper andup the net or find a nicecorner to place the ball in.
The game features a load of teams from all around the world, there’s certainly no shortage of teams, I’d bet whatever your favorite international team is you’ll find it. There is however a drastic shortage of stadiums, the game includes only four stadiums and in a game with such a small playing area you wonder why. It’s certainly not that there isn’t enough room on the disc to add a few more, or maybe I’m just a fool and there only are four premier beach soccer arenas in the world.
The graphics are fine, nothing remarkably bad about them and definitely nothing spectacular; the real annoyance is the sound. The sound track is just ridiculous, it gets old after about the third game, this normally wouldn’t be a problem but what we’ve got here is another classic example of game developers not bothering to take advantage of the X-Box’s ability to import soundtracks. Don’t ask me why, but it seems like every time a game doesn’t include custom soundtracks it seems like the soundtrack that comes with the game is unbearable, this is no exception.
Multiplayer allows for up to four players to compete against the computer or each other on one console. There is not however system link play or XBL support, it just seems like in a 4 vs. 4 game XBL would be ideal. Four people on one X-box playing against four people on another X-box across the country would take this game to another level and would give it infinite replay. Another feature that would bring this game to a whole new level would be the ability to customize moves for individual characters / players. People seem to like games where they can have a unique character with their own customized moves and appearance. I believe that combining XBL with this would create immense replay value and make this game worth playing.
I really didn’t enjoy this game but I am fair, this game had some key flaws that held it back, but if a second version of this game were released that included things like; better AI, custom soundtracks, more arenas, XBL support, and customizable trick moves for individual characters. Hopefully this game will have sold enough copies to get the funding to create a sequel that brings it up to the next level, if someone puts some time and work into this it could be great, otherwise it will probably be remembered as that game you never played but spent good minute laughing at the cover in the video store.
