Neo Geo Cup '98: The Road to the Victory

Overview

Neo Geo Cup '98: The Road to the Victory is an arcade soccer game published by SNK. It was released in 1998 everywhere but Europe (European release was in 1999). Due to SNK never acquiring the FIFA license (because EA had it), the tournaments in the game were all unofficial. SNK also failed to get a FIFPro license, which meant that there were no official player names or numbers. The game therefore made small tweaks with player names. For example, Eric Wynalda is Wyoming and Luis Hernandez is Hernardo.

The game was ported to the Neo Geo Pocket Color in 1999 and was called Neo Geo Cup '98 Plus Color.

Differences between Versions

In the arcade version, the game is shorter when playing against another person and there are no tie breakers. Should a match end in a tie, then it would be game over for both players. The arcade version used an 8-way joystick and 3 buttons: [Shoot/Low Pass/Slide | High Pass/Rough Play-Tackle | Short Pass/Action Player Shift].

The home version tries to be more of a soccer simulation game. Differences include the home version being more slowed down, and more realism added to shooting and passing.

Playable Teams

The game featured teams from around the world and divided them up into eight categories. These categories were:

• Europe A (Italy, Holland, Switzerland, Norway, England, Turkey, Portugal, Croatia)
• Europe B (Germany, Spain, Belgium, Romania, Denmark, Republic of Ireland, Scotland, Czech Republic)
• Europe C (France, Bulgaria, Sweden, Russia, Greece, Hungary, Austria, Yugoslavia)
• Africa (Nigeria, Cameroon, Morocco, Egypt, South Africa, Zambia, Cote d'lvoire, Tunisia)
• Americas (United States, Mexico, Canada, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Jamaica)
• South America (Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Paraguay, Chile, Ecuador, Uruguay, Peru)
• Asia A (Australia, China PR, New Zealand, Taiwan, Iran, Iraq, Vietnam, Singapore)
• Asia B (South Korea, Japan, United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Hong Kong, India, Thailand, Malaysia)

Team Power-Ups

After picking your team you were able to choose one of eight power ups for your team. These power ups were:

• Full Team-Power Up
• Attack Power Up
• Defense Power Up
• Speed Up
• Teamwork Up
• Technique Up
• Captain-Power Up
• Goalkeeper-Power Up

Playable Tournaments

The game allowed you to pick one of six tournaments to play in, which were based on real tournaments. On the stage select screen the tournaments were in order of most difficult to least difficult, with the World Tournament being the hardest and the Asia Tournament being the easiest.

• World Tournament (1998 FIFA World Cup)
• Europe Tournament (1996 UEFA European Football Championship)
• South America Tournament (Copa America 1997)
• Americas Tournament (1998 CONCACAF Gold Cup)
• Africa Tournament (1998 African Cup of Nations)
• Asia Tournament (1996 AFC Asian Cup)