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Tecmo World Cup was quite popular in arcade form, mostly due to its arcade-style approach to the game. Technical aspects of the sport are lost in place of fast action and hundreds of goal attempts in the limited playing time.

The ball is passed with superb accuracy at the touch of a button, and shooting is done with another. When you're off the ball, the shoot button does a slide tackle which if timed correctly wins the ball from the opponent.

They don't call it Tecmo World Cup for nothing you know, because should you fancy tournament-related horseplay, the World Cup awaits! Take charge of one of twenty-four teams in your attempt to win that elusive statuette. The tourney is run in the same way as the real thing, with the first heat being decided on a points basis and subsequent rounds run as a knockout competition.

Professional footballers have made quite a name for themselves with their uncanny knack of kicking the ball in a number of ways. If you've always envied this, Tecmo World Cup gives you a chance to realise your dreams.

Your on-screen players are capable of everything from standard short passes to chip shots, overhead kicks and banana shots!

Unfortunately, the more complex moves require some practice and may even require the ball to be passed to a pre-positioned player from a specific angle!

The Tecmo World Cup coin-op wasn't exactly inspiring (although it was quite fun for twenty pence), and this conversion fails to improve on its faults. The graphics are exceedingly bland in their two-dimensional jerkiness.

The sound is limited to one effect and a Chesney-esque warble of a tune. What really puts the boot in is, of course, poor gameplay. The loose collision detection makes it impossible to run around opposing players and tackles are ridiculously easy to perform.

This means the only way to score goals is to boot it right down field with a succession of long passes. The World Cup is also badly run. The first few rounds are far too easy and then the computer activates its "telepathy" mode, anticipating all your moves before your computer-operated players have a chance to react. Even in two-player mode Tecmo has lost all of its appeal. Looks like it's still a case of hanging on for Super Kick Off.

For three years the Megadrive had but one football game in its cartridge range, and that was the rubbish World Cup Soccer. Now there's a new one - the rubbish Tecmo World Cup.

Yes, indeed, it's big disappointment day for football fans as, once again, we're forced to wait for a decent game of the sport to appear on this machine. What's wrong with this one? Well, the graphics and sound are average, but it's the playability where the game falls flat on its face.

For a start it's ridiculously easy to beat - I slaughtered it on the lowest level, then cranked it up to its highest difficulty setting and still stuffed it 2-0. Another problem is that it simply doesn't play like football. The best way to get the ball up the pitch is to continually press the Fire button - the players pass to one another like magic! - and when you're in the 18-yard area simply run at the keeper on a diagonal line and hoof it into the net.

Tecmo World Cup is simply a very dull game which fails to provide footballing fun even with two players. Soccer fans should sit on the bench and wait for Super Kick Off.

Presentation 76%
Quite a few options and static screens to interest you.

Graphics 43%
The sprites are wooden and the backgrounds are dull - even for a football game!

Sound 31%
Poor tunes and effects fail to generate any sort of soccer atmosphere.

Playability 51%
The simplistic soccer action and the low, low difficulty setting makes playing this a doddle.

Lastability 39%
Limited controls and lack of challenge destroys the single-player game, and the lame gameplay means that even the two-player mode gets dull quickly.

Overall 47%
A naff conversion of a poor arcade game, which fails miserably as a football game.