Captain Tsubasa: Rise Of The New Champions. Kick Balls Like A Pro!

Captain Tsubasa is a famous Japanese franchise based on the homonymous manga by Youichi Takahashi. It falls in the melodramatic, yet somehow addictive category of the Shounen Manga, or visual novels for boys generally telling the troubled story of a weak boy, getting stronger and stronger through the tear-draining loss of friends, relatives, pets, and (very seldom) virginity. In these stories, courage and latent skills are generally proportional to the size of the eyebrows. Our hero Tsubasa Aozora, however, is a most illustrious exception, sporting a dashing pair of thin and aerodynamic furry bushes. Here’s our thoughts on Captain Tsubasa: Rise of the New Champions!

Captain Tsubasa: Origins

The manga was almost immediately transposed to a successful anime, loved in the East as well as in the West. Many western countries have seen adaptations of the heart-throbbing series and sequels. What we uncouth westerners mayhap did not know is that there have been several excellent games based on the series, if you knew the tongue of the Rising Sun, that is. The latest digital incarnation is Rise of The New Champions. It comes in a vastitude of platform flavours, all subtitled and enjoyable by non-Japanese speakers.

Rise of A New Champion

ROTHC once again breaks the original strategy turn-based tradition of Captain Tsubasa titles, and brings a full action football game to your recreation. This guide will help you to identify this title well and enjoy it for what it is. In fact, contrarily to how it may look like at a first glance, this is not a sports game. This is absolutely nothing even remotely close to FIFA or other technical, realistic football titles. This is basically Marvel VS Capcom with balls, fiery balls, and begs to be played exactly as such.

Rules? Where We’re Going, We Don’t Need Rules!

Forget the rules of Football and forget even more the laws of physics. This is all about the Ki, baby. The inner, fiery spiritual energy of true warriors, exploding at the exclamation of secret techniques involving the summoning of spirit animals and blazing waves of elemental havoc.

Passing the ball, being hit by a foul, and most importantly remembering that bestie of yours who died helping you to find your secret hissatsu move will raise your Ki. And then dispense it through a multitude of extra-slick dribbling and supernova-class shooting moves.

And just like eyebrows, not all (team) members are the same. It is up to the player to build the ultimate team with a smart balance of ace footballers and cannon fodder. All team players have a pentangular stats graph consisting of Offense, Defence, Power, Speed, and Technique. It is a great general strategy to use fast players to pass the ball and build the Ki of great Technique masters and then bend it like Beckham like it’s humanity’s last day.

All Filler, No Killer Through Ball

Another ideal, albeit not always valid strategy is to use weak filler players to tire as much as possible the strongest enemy players and their impressive finishers with fiery phoenixes, raging bears, rabid wolves and such to preside over the spectacular animations. Goalkeepers are Ki masters too, of course. And in certain cases they will not budge with a single special attack. Their Ki will take a hit with every shooting technique until ultimately be shattered by that final, screaming, field-burning attack.

Human Interaction

The game can be highly enjoyed also online VS human players of all skills, through a proper league-based system. Just like real life, fireball privy football. Obviously, standard strategies will not necessarily apply to PVP. Although the base concept of Ki-gathering and releasing still applies and is the conditio sine qua non of the game. Screaming random Japanese menacing phrases is not required, but highly recommended. And do not forget that if the ball ain’t bendin’, yer just pretendin’.

In substance, Captain Tsubasa: Rise of the New Champions is very enjoyable, if you are not expecting a sports game. Those are generally not for true bushido-driven warriors such as yourself, who will sacrifice everything for a higher goal. 

Pun obviously intended.

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