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LiberoGrande

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LiberoGrande
PAL cover art of LiberoGrande
Developer(s)Namco
Publisher(s)
Platform(s)Arcade, PlayStation
ReleaseArcade
1997
PlayStation
  • PAL: October 31, 1998
  • JP: November 26, 1998
Genre(s)Sports
Mode(s)Single-player, multiplayer
Arcade systemNamco System 12

LiberoGrande is a 1997 arcade game by Namco. It was converted for the Sony PlayStation in 1998.

A typical arcade football game in its nature, LiberoGrande introduced a novelty factor previously found in Namco's Top Striker for the Nintendo Entertainment System: the ability to play as just one player, instead of controlling the whole team, always swapping for players nearer the ball. This idea was later used by Konami in Winning Eleven / Pro Evolution Soccer titles in the Become a Legend mode, and by EA Sports in its various sports game franchises with the name Be a Pro.

Gameplay

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The player starts to choose one of the star players, and then a national team. Each star player, based on a real football player but with changed names, except for initials (Zinedine Zidane is Zenon Zadkine, for instance) is rated in both ball skill, speed and shooting abilities.

In addition to the original arcade mode, the home release adds an International mode (basically, the FIFA World Cup format), a league competition (up to eight star players/teams), which can be all human controlled and a skills mode where the player has to complete several training ground tasks such as hitting a target floating in the goal mouth or hitting an area from distance.

The player roster in the arcade version consists of: Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Pos. Nation Player
Brazil BRA Raimundo
Netherlands NED Rudolf de Buys
Italy ITA Antonio Del Pacino
France FRA Zenon Zadkine
Japan JPN Naoki Hidaka
Cameroon CMR Philippe Empson
England ENG Alfred Shaffer
Argentina ARG Gaston Balmaceda
Colombia COL Cornelio Valencia
Germany GER Jordan Krüger
Italy ITA Raffaello Balbo
Netherlands NED Dirk Berlarge
Germany GER Oswald Bismarck
Italy ITA Patrizio Mazzini
Brazil BRA Richard Castro
Germany GER Ajax Möbius
No. Pos. Nation Player
Romania ROU Godwin Hasdeu
Spain ESP Renato Gallegos
Croatia CRO Deron Slojacek
Wales WAL Robin Garrick
Serbia SRB Dorman Smixolovic
Italy ITA Gregorio Zonaras (Hidden player)
United States USA Arnold Lang (Hidden player)
Brazil BRA Roland (Hidden player)
Japan JPN Minoru Kai (Hidden player)
France FRA Edgard Cailaux (Hidden player)
England ENG Powel Gardner (Hidden player)
Liberia LBR Gerald Wells (Hidden player)
Netherlands NED Ruprech Goes (Hidden player)
Argentina ARG David Magellan (Hidden player)
France FRA Maurice Poulenc (Hidden player)

There is a total of 48 national teams, but only 32 of them to choose from, depending on which version:

a Only playable in the Arcade version
b Only playable in the Japanese version
c Only playable in the PAL version

A sequel, LiberoGrande 2 (known as LiberoGrande International in Europe) was released for PlayStation in Europe and Japan only, but with less success than the first title.

A playable demo of the game was included in Ridge Racer Turbo (Ridge Racer Hi-Spec in Europe), which was sold with Ridge Racer Type 4. The demo includes three players (Zenon Zadkine, Alfred Shaffer and Jordan Krüger) and three teams (England, France and Italy), which a person could use to play a ten-minute game.

Reception

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In Japan, Game Machine listed LiberoGrande on their February 15, 1998 issue as being the seventh most-successful arcade game of the month.[3]

References

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  1. ^ "Libero Grande". GameRankings. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2018-01-07.
  2. ^ James Mielke (1998-12-30). "Libero Grande (Import) Review". GameSpot. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2018-01-07.
  3. ^ "Game Machine's Best Hit Games 25 - TVゲーム機ーソフトウェア (Video Game Software)". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 558. Amusement Press, Inc. 15 February 1998. p. 21.
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