“Jumpers for goalposts” – This is Football 2002

Endings are funny things. You don’t always know a last time is a last time while it’s happening. It might even seem like it couldn’t possibly be one. But then, a pause becomes a gap becomes a chasm becomes forever, or at least forever until a hazy potential future point where it might suddenly turn out not to have been a last time. When what you’re measuring is peaks, a binary look at something which isn’t, last times become an even less straightforward thing. Still, this is a last time.

This is Football 2003 sold moderately well and the series carried on until This is Football 2005, and even, sort of, thereafter under different names. But This is Football 2002 was the (first and) last time one of them would be #1 in the charts. It was also the last time that feat was achieved by any football sim from any British developer. It’s remarkable and sad that it should have come to that so soon after the mid-nineties boom. None of the British giants of 2D football games managed to spin that success into the 3D era, Kick Off and Sensible Soccer falling off completely and their wide circle of alternatives faring no better. Meanwhile, EA and Konami were collectively shaping up FIFA and Pro Evolution Soccer into a duopoly all the stronger for each having an alternative built in. It wasn’t the only sports genre this was happening in. As I played, I had in mind the excellent podcast The Life & Times of Video Games and its Premier Manager episode which more broadly discusses this phenomenon.

The complete domination of the Sony PlayStation, just beginning to be replicated by its successor, had a massive narrowing effect on the field of British developers able to make chart-topping games in general. It’s not surprising that This is Football developers Team Soho were helped to make it in the PlayStation world by being part of Sony, just like the new Studio Liverpool over in the world of Formula 1. In fact, This is Football 2002 has a lot in common with Formula One 2001. Both were visual treats, using their presumed early access to the new console to show off its capabilities to the maximum during its first year. And both games were otherwise not much more than a new generation upgrade on a familiar game, because that was enough.

The difference is that Formula One 2001 was an update on a formula which Psygnosis/Studio Liverpool had mostly developed themselves, while This is Football 2002 could pretty much pass itself off as a PS2 update of FIFA 2000 if it had more real teams and fewer of the likes of ‘Highbury’ and ‘Firenze’ (its attempts to distract from this with the option of a league of retro teams is a brilliant idea fatally undermined by the dissonance of ‘60s Manchester vs ‘60s Glasgow (C) playing out in front of Pizza Hut ad hoardings). For all the most important functions, the same buttons do the same things as in FIFA 2000, and compared to ISS it was supremely easy to come in as a new player and pick things up based on my FIFA experience. It was also immediately fun. 

This is Football 2002 is slick and fast-moving, and builds in some exaggerated effects without breaking the flow of its matches. Making crunching two-footed tackles with a dedicated button is a delight, and can actually be used to win the ball as well as for desperate fouls. The grey arrows at the edges of the screen pointing towards out-of-view teammates are a more elegant solution to the limited field of view than had been previously managed. It’s not a new ball game, but it’s a distinct refinement.

Its focus on little refinements might help explain why it didn’t establish its own identity more, and why a contemporary review from the BBC had it pegged as merely something for PS2 players to while away the wait until their own FIFA and Pro Evo with. Yet that doesn’t give due credit. If producing a smooth next gen version of FIFA 2000 was that easy to do, FIFA 2002 might have done it (spoilers: it didn’t). And This is Football 2002 shows the possibilities of advances in technology even better than Formula One 2001 did. 

It takes plenty of opportunity to zoom in close to players, even outside of replays, and to give them more personality. One nice illustration relates to diving. Having a button to make your player dive to the turf wasn’t a new idea, and was in FIFA 99. But seeing opposing player turn around and lean down to yell his objections at the faker, body language brilliantly captured and resembling Psy yelling at a butt, makes the moment into something new. The result feels closer to the reality of a game played out between emotional, messy humans. 

It’s not as important as getting the passing, through balls, competing for tackles and everything as right as This is Football 2002 does. But it’s still proof that even a game based on someone else’s template brings its developer’s own insights, and can point to new ways ahead. Another special mode in the game, the Jumpers 4 Posts league, where matches are played in a football-pitch-sized school playground by teams including London Nautical, managed by Mr. Sailor, has rather more of the joyously daft spirit of Sensible Soccer than we’ve seen in a while, too. Sony wouldn’t need its own British football and F1 games so much in future, as Britain and Europe would increasingly fall into following the same global games as elsewhere. But if this is the last time, it’s worth noting what was lost.

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Top of the charts for week ending 6 October 2001:

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