Usually, this section is our way to introduce those who are new to a franchise or genre to a game. In this case, Captain Tsubasa needs no explanation as it's one of the most popular manga and anime, and all football fans know it. However, not all football fans will enjoy Rise of New Champions...

This game is catered to the most hardcore fans, those who only care about the story and nothing else. If you're here because you like playing as Tsubasa (or any other character) and doing some fancy shots, then you will definitely love this. If you are expecting a fresh football game that also features your favorite characters and can provide you with hundreds of hours of play, then you won't be able to overlook all of Captain Tsubasa: Rise of New Champions' flaws.

Rise of New Champions features 2 Story Modes, one starring Tsubasa, and another one where you can create and improve your own original character. For that reason, this is more of an RPG than it is a football game, so there's a limited selection of playable teams and all matches are more or less scripted. Other than that, you can play friendly matches for up to 4 players, and you can always test your Dream Team against other online players!

Some dialogue scenes are rendered using 3D models, while the special events are animated in 2D, which reminds you of how good the Captain Tsubasa anime is. However, what happens on the pitch is vital, and since the flashy trick shots are the essence of this franchise, we're glad that all of them look amazing—not only Tsubasa's but all the others too.

Although this involves other issues that we will comment on later, we really like how integrated some scripted events are with the gameplay and how good the players look in the field. We have to say this is a game with lots of gameplay mechanics, but they did a good job keeping the screen as clean and informative as possible!

As it happens with other story-driven anime games, the music perfectly suits the spirit of every scene. You can unlock more BGM just by playing, but there's not a single track that feels out of place. That being said, we know how anime goes, so don't be surprised if the music feels too dramatic! The perfect example would be the track that plays when you meet the Youth Tournament organizer... is he about to unfold his masterplan for world domination or something?!

As soon as you launch the game, you can play friendly matches, penalty shootouts, or a custom tournament. The problem, though, is that only 3 national teams are unlocked (Uruguay, England, and Japan), so you're better off playing with one of the 10 middle schools available. To unlock the other representative teams, you have to play the story mode, be it as the titular Tsubasa Ozora or your own custom character.

To be honest with you, the Tsubasa route is OK, but it's more of the same. Sure, the whole game is predictable, and we all know you'll be lifting the cup anyways, but we found it more interesting to play with our own character first. Once your avatar is ready, you can join one of 3 middle school teams: Matsuyama's Furano MS, Misugi's Musashi MS, or Hyuga's Toho Academy. What we weren't expecting is that each middle school has it's own "rules", so take it as 3 different game modes within the same Story Mode.

If you pick Furano MS, your goal is to get the higher possible team rank. If you join Musashi MS, which focuses more on personal development and individual skills, you can define your own objective (defending, scoring, passing, dribbling). Toho Academy feels like a true challenge once you know how to play, as they will ask you to obliterate your foes and score goals like there's no tomorrow. Regardless of your choices, the plot is the same: the French International Juniors Youth Tournament was canceled, and now there's a new competition held in America. As a talented young player, you're eligible to represent the Japanese national team, but first, you need to make an impression in the Junior Hero League, a friendly competition the JSA organized.

This is more an RPG game than it is a football one. You can befriend other players to learn special moves, you can improve your skills through certain achievements, and you can earn points to buy more player cards, training items, or customization options for your character. In fact, it's obvious Rise of New Champions copied a lot of things from the FIFA games—sadly, only the bad ones. If you hate scripted matches and pack openings ala FIFA, then we have bad news for you... oh, and the story mode is called "The Journey", too!

When it comes to special moves, you have power shots, aerial shots, dribbling techniques, long passes, combo shots and passes, etc. Even hidden power shots! That's why it took us several matches to actually understand what to do and when to do it... but once you learn how to play, all matches feel the same. If you want to score goals, you need to shoot on target as many times as you can, so the goalkeeper's morale goes down; once that bar is low enough, any trick shot is a guaranteed goal.

You can dribble using R1 and R2, you shoot by pressing the square button (charge it for a special trick, plus hold L1 for a hidden technique if available), you cross the ball with the circle button, you can make through passes with the triangle button (charge it for a special combo), and L2 activates the V-Zone, which boosts your stats for a bit. That's all you need to know, really.

The biggest problem with all this is that it doesn't feel like a football game. Since there's no button for running, all you can do is awkwardly move the ball around and spam R1+R2 to dribble past the defense until you can shoot. Another thing you can't do is switching the character you use to defend; well, actually, you can press L1 (or R3 if you're playing with your custom character)... but it's too unreliable, and that's not mentioning most of the times it takes too long to actually pick the player you want to use, giving the opponent enough time to perform a power shoot. Rise of New Champions' worst sin, however, is underestimating you.

Since you need to shoot on target a few times before being able to score, sometimes you know there's not enough time for you to win a match. Even if you score, it's impossible not to feel frustrated after tying the game in the last minute. Who cares about that buzzer-beater if there are no extra time nor penalty shootouts (only available in friendly matches), and you have to play over and over again until you can actually win? Oh, and there was this match against Italy where we were awarded a goal just because it was scripted for Hyuga to score, for example. All in all, it just doesn't feel like a football game. It's just an interactive OVA.

We love Captain Tsubasa, and it would be unfair to say we didn't enjoy this game. It has a couple Story Modes, and both of them are fun to play, but after finishing these, it's hard to find the motivation to keep playing. Maybe if our effort really showed and the scripted scenes weren't so frustrating, we'd be glad to add more hours of gameplay to our PS4 history. As it is now, only the most hardcore Captain Tsubasa fans can find enough arguments to justify paying 60 dollars for a half-baked experience that will last you a weekend before you get bored.

Something we want to make clear is that this review was made using a PS4 copy, and although we didn't find any bugs, we are aware of all the issues that users report in the PC and Switch versions. Hopefully, this can get solved as soon as possible, as Captain Tsubasa: Rise of New Champions could be a really nice game... for the right people.