What is Backyard Soccer?

Backyard Soccer is a sports game developed by Humongous Entertainment and published by Infogrames for the Windows and Macintosh operating systems in 1998. It is the second game in the Backyard Sports series and the first in the Backyard Soccer series. In 2001, the game was ported to the PlayStation by Runecraft, Ltd.

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If you’re a 10-year-old who’s totally into soccer, Backyard Soccer is for you. For starters, as the coach you can choose from 30 cute multicultural characters for your team. Each player comes with a mini-bio and special skills. You can also pick your team’s name and colors and what type of field to play on. Once your team is on the field, you can choose to be a spectator or actually play. (The controls are a bit hard to master at first, so starting as a spectator is a good idea.) After the game, you can see what happened in instant replay, with kid-level sports commentary that goes on a bit too long. If you’re into stats, all your players’ and teams’ numbers are available for a whole season of play.

We recommend this game to any preteen soccer fan, but we don’t think it’s appropriate for the low end of the stated age range. Five-year-olds might not understand the controls or strategy. (The game offers three skill levels, so older kids can ramp up to regular or hard play.)

Gameplay gets easier with practice, and you can customize it on the fly by substituting players or making them play more aggressively. But the Mac version suffers next to the Windows version because you can’t use a two-button mouse to control running and kicking at the same time. You also can’t play against a real opponent, just against the computer. Still, Backyard Soccer is a groovy sports game for kids and adults alike, so put on your virtual cleats and kick off today.

Anzovin, Miriam. (March 1999). Kids' Stuff. MacAddict. (pg. 63).

Download Backyard Soccer for Mac

Architecture

IBM PowerPC

System Requirements

From Mac OS 7.5 up to Mac OS 9.2

Compatibility notes

System requirements as listed by the Soccer Readme file:

Macintosh CD-ROM
Power PC/90MHz
16 MB RAM
System 7.1 or higher
640x480 8 bit video
Quad-speed CD-ROM drive

System requirements as listed on the rear case insert:

PowerPC™ (90MHz recommended), System 7.1 or higher, 16MB RAM (8.3MB free), 640x480, 256 color video display, quad-speed (or faster) CD-ROM drive

Tested working under MacOS 9.2.2 on a Power Mac G4.

NOTE: Despite the binary technically being a FAT binary, attempting to launch it under BasiliskII produces a "This game requires a Power PC Macintosh computer in order to run." dialog box.

Emulating this? It could probably run under: SheepShaver