To make things even more interesting, random events can occur and you have to choose the option you consider fit. For example, when a fan of my team asked me to search for her lost dog and I accepted, I got injured for two days by the little beast. On another occasion, the manager was upset with my poor performances lately, so I decided to spend a few extra hours in the gym to impress him (and upset my friends who were waiting at home). There are tons of similar events and the effects of your actions are unpredictable.

Of course, it’s not all sugar and honey when it comes to New Star Soccer 4. The most annoying thing is the overall speed of the game: progression is usually very slow and, if you make the mistake to select four nations to be simulated, as I first did, you should prepare for a really long wait. Even with just one nation selected the game progresses quite slow. But at least it’s worth the wait!

Also, the game offers no choice of selecting how long a match lasts (in real life minutes, I mean). This is not at all a deal breaker, since the match doesn’t last an eternity, but I would’ve loved to have the option of tweaking durations. However, the good thing is that you can choose to “skip action” at any given moment, which proves to be very useful especially after that poor run of form that kicks you off the starting eleven.

As I said, New Star Soccer 4 is an indie game. This means that there are no licenses for team, players, stadium or competition names. But a huge database (over 30,000 players and 3,000 teams and stadiums) will soon make you forget you’re playing for Ruchdale, Criwe, Menchester and so on. To be honest, there are big budget games that lack license agreements too and, up to a point, they’re not as fun as NSS4.

The visuals in the game are outdated and you will most likely not be impressed by the quality of the graphics, but I can assure you that if you liked SWOS you will have no problem coping with the NSS graphics. The game’s soundtrack is something I instantly noticed and I must admit that I became a fan of, even though I have no idea who is singing or what is that. But it’s incredibly cool. Things change, however, when the match starts and some sub-par sound effects take the place of the incredible soundtrack. At least there’s no boring, repetitive commentary either (just to make things clear – there’s no commentary at all)

Conclusion
For a game created by one person, New Star Soccer 4 is an incredible title. It is a great, solid football simulation and surely one of the better indie sports games ever created. Although its visuals are outdated and there are a few bugs and glitches present, it still remains a quality title. NSS 4 is an incredibly complex game, yet easy to learn and master; it is a low budget release, yet with a more solid database than full budget titles and a match simulation engine that really, really rocks. If you are a passionate football fan searching for a quality simulation title that challenges you to become a true legend, get $19.95 out of your pocket and buy this game!

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