There’s always something to be said for timing, and in light of the current World Cup tournament this is a smart release. While Soccer Kid isn’t a game I can say I recall bumping into back in the day, the idea behind it is simple (and silly) enough. Armed with your trusty soccer ball, you’re on a mission to retrieve the fractured pieces of the tournament trophy which had been stolen by aliens before their ship was destroyed, with the pieces then falling in various places around the world. While utterly bizarre, given the era it was made in I’d say the story tracks with my expectations from those days.

What’s odd, and somewhat disappointing, is that there’s no question that this was an ambitious game where the controls are concerned, but they simply do not translate well into consistent or reliable play. Your soccer ball works very effectively as both a weapon and a means for getting you to higher areas, and it’s really wild to see the various animations play out as you kick it around and interact with it. The problem is the combination of a lack of proper explanation of how all of these work (the provided manuals do help, but mechanically trying to master the ball control is another matter), and consistently executing them since a combination of timing and specific positioning are critical. Playing with the D-Pad instead of the joystick did help, but trying to get consistency out of your repertoire of moves was irksome to say the least, especially since refined control was necessary pretty quickly, depending on what you find.

Where this “collection” further falls down is that it comes up short on the promise its name implies, not only coming in with only 2 variations of the title in question, but also neglecting to include something like the Amiga version that is also out there. I would imagine that could be related to emulation for the Amiga not being reliable, or there being a rights concern, but regardless there ends up being a problem here where truth in advertising is concerned. No matter what, I’d say this amounts to being one of the retro games I’ve run into that’s absolutely the most ambitious, but as implemented that also makes it exceedingly hard to want to stick with. I appreciate it as a curiosity, and a timely release, but in terms of a must-play experience I’d say it falls flat.