➤ Calcino of other times 🎮

What happened to the lime? Let's not talk about the football simulation, that obviously is now well covered every year by the two giants who compete for the market with the regular releases of FIFA and Pro Evolution Soccer (one more giant than the other to be honest, at least as far as copies are concerned. placed), but of the good old "calcino", with its fast and purely arcade approach, its almost amateur production compared to the maxi-collections of modern millionaire licenses.

And above all, is there still room for football games made that way? Does an interpretation of football that is so different from reality and all based on immediate playability in the modern market, beyond the simple nostalgic re-enactment, still make sense? These are the thoughts that emerge when playing Active Soccer 2 DX, or rather between games, since in the short minutes that pass on the pitch there is actually not much time to think, given the speed of the action. At one time many software houses, mainly European and Japanese, tried to have their say on the subject by bringing out their inevitable Soccer and interesting experiments came out of it, sometimes even titles capable of kicking off cult series, all inevitably fallen into oblivion over the years. In a panorama dominated by a single vision of this sport (although in two different stylistic variants), a game like this is to be welcomed with joy. of the Spanish team The Fox Software, if only for the breath of fresh air it seems to bring, but the doubt about the actual value of such an operation is legitimate, regardless of some objective defects of the game. The idea is therefore that Active Soccer 2 DX can be a game that everyone can appreciate especially for its ability to break the mold, and by more experienced and elderly players in particular for its evident desire to pay homage to the masterpieces of the past, in particular Sensible Soccer and Kick Off.

Active Soccer 2 DX attempts to revive the glories of arcade football on modern consoles

Sensitive calcium

The reference to Sensibile Soccer in particular is clear, starting from the introductory music sung in the style of the historical one of SWOS and moreover the harbinger of an incredible surprise: according to the credits, the author of the song would be none other than the legendary Chris Huelsbeck himself , just to remain in the context of re-enactment of the Amiga era. The feeling is then strengthened by seeing the menus, which seem to have been extrapolated directly from the historic Sensible title, with lots of names appropriately modified to remember the real ones but changing the vowels so as not to run into license problems. Finally, the game is clearly derived from the setting of the era, with the field framed from above, the small players on the screen and an extreme speed and simplicity of the action.

Forget about tactics and articulated key combinations: in Active Soccer 2 DX what counts is speed and one key for the short pass, one for the long pass (or cross), one for the shot and one for the sprint. In the standard settings there is not even the pressure of a button for pressing (however modifiable in the options), since you steal the ball simply by going towards and opposing the opposing player, or with the classic slide, but it takes very little to enter the mechanism and enjoy the immediate gameplay offered by the game. Unlike Sensibile Soccer, here the ball remains attached to the feet of the players, which further simplifies the action but still forces you to play with continuous passes and a few touches due to the simplicity with which opponents can steal the ball by intercepting or countering. The passage is semi-automatic based on the direction given and the shot has the trajectory control system also derived from the old classics, even if it seems equipped with greater randomness given the strange results that can emerge after kicking towards the goal. . The game options allow you to play a single game or take part in tournaments and leagues, which can be created and customized as desired by the player. The multiplayer is provided only in offline form on the same console, therefore any type of online is excluded, in fact significantly crippling the potential of the game. Also present is the Career mode that allows you to both play games and manage the various aspects of your team, from the transfer market to subsequent acquisitions, sales, transfers and budget management, thus merging arcade action with managerial depth as in the classic Sensibile World of Soccer .

Xbox One achievements

Active Soccer 2 DX contains only 10 unlockable achievements, so each of them brings a nice loot of 100 gamerscore points. Aside from those related to Career, which obviously require some time and application, the others are easily reachable after a few games.

The twelfth man

The major problems of Active Soccer 2 DX derive from the evident lack of tests that must have characterized its development, given the presence of various bugs and structural oversights ranging from the uncertainty of some answers to the controls to the mysterious interpretation of some basic rules of the football, such as offside or the management of the corner ball, but also from an interface that is really too spartan and disorganized.

The latter may seem like a marginal and deliberately simplified element to pay homage to sources of inspiration but it becomes a problem especially if you engage in Career mode, which forces you to spend a lot of time in front of these rather anonymous and disorganized screens, which certainly do not they favor immersion in the game. It is clear that a game born with the intention of paying homage to some classics of the past must necessarily appear derivative, as well as the simple and humorous original cut, typically British, is difficult to recover in such a different context. However, there is a remarkable overall coherence throughout the representation of Active Soccer 2 DX on the pitch, where there is actually a good atmosphere of lived-in football, thanks also to the representation of the public and the choirs that seem to be recorded directly at the stadium, as well as a nice general liveliness between animations and colors, all enlivened by the application of some touches of class such as variable weather conditions. The sadness of the menus is therefore counterbalanced by a good realization that emerges in the heart of the action, with a representation that is always very simple but effective, complete with different shots to be used with various levels of zoom and vertical or horizontal scrolling. We note the refinement work carried out compared to the mobile version from which this DX edition derives, even if overall the price of 15 euros applied to the game is a bit high compared to the cost of the original.

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John Hare himself tried to relaunch the formula with his Sensible Soccer 2006 but already at the time, and despite all the trappings of authorship, the operation raised more doubts than anything else, let alone the difficulty of affirmation for a true and just such a late clone. The idea is that there was a time when this type of game was simply football and not just a nice football-themed divertissement, and that time has now inexorably passed, crystallizing the canon exclusively on those historic and unrepeatable titles. Without even taking into consideration the objective defects of Active Soccer 2 DX, this is probably the basic problem of the project, which is partially saved thanks to its excellent and immediate playability. As an arcade digression of football it remains a valid choice, also because it is essentially the only one possible, perhaps waiting for the old Sensitive World of Soccer for Live Arcade to be back available in backward compatibility.