This is actually the middle game in the series featuring "the man With possibly the nicest legs in football" (as I once overheard two women debating on the bus), the other two comprising of Superskills (a boring old waggler) and Superstar Soccer (a flip-screen soccer jobby) which was, well, just try spelling 'park' backwards.

Hot Shot!, however is a far more modern overhead-view 'control one player at a time and another player can join in with the fun if he wants as well' affair, which, despite its moniker, has nothing o do with Gary at all. It strives to be extremely realistic by sticking as closely as possible to 'the book' (the one with all the rules in it, that is), so fouls, bookings and free-kicks are all here, along with lots of moves including sliding tackles, flicks and overhead kicks. In fact the only thing the game doesn't try to do is to be any good. Well, it probably does try but it just lacks that certain something which makes a football game work well. One problem is that it's not surprising to find the screen completely void of any players at all - let alone a member of your team. And then when you do get the ball, actually successfully dribbling or kicking it without giving it to the other side is all far too tricky to make the game playable. It’s not too bad, but when you take a brief look at the other 9,723 billion football games on offer, a vast quantity of which are also available on re-release, then I'm sure you'll see what I mean.