Literally, "how do I play this game?"

I've had a kick around in the training mode, and I can run and pass and shoot, but the ball stays close to the ground, and I can't figure out how to play high balls so I can shake the remote and do a diving header or a scissor kick.

The in game instructions seem to suffer from a minor case of engrish, and I have little idea how to perform after touch because of this. After touch can be disabled though.

I'll try out the other features next, because my main draw to this was being able to play with the miis on my console. I'm also happy you can create a custom team.

any season or franchise mode?

My first match, World Cup,
Germany : Italy 0:2 in extra time
Game over. It's simple and fun though.
Like a mix of Sensible Soccer and ISS light.
Now I'm trying to unlock the Mii team editor (you have to play 2 hours to unlock this).
I hope EnjoyUp got the Mii feature right this time. I had some annoying problems with the Miis in Family & Friends Party.

@shingi: There's World Cup, Friends Game and Training.

World Cup (4 or 8 teams), Exhibition or Training. No sign of the custom team or Mii support yet. Maybe I have to win the World Cup first.

Speaking of which, I was 9-0 down to Chile in 20 minutes, before I quit, and continued this post.

First thing, this must be the first game I've ever played that allows you to play a full 90 minute game of football, and that's something I've always wanted to do in a football game (as unbalanced as it would be). However, 20 minutes into my first game, I was already sufferring a comprehensive battering.

Of the something like 100 slide tackles I performed in those 20 minutes ALL OF THEM resulted in a free kick or penalty - bar none. And of those 100 (or so) fouls, only two of them resulted in a card. A yellow, then a 2nd yellow/red.

The music is ok, but you only hear it on the menus. One (which sounds vaguely like The Cure's "Close to Me" and a jingle from SimCity 2000) loops after 10 seconds, and the other loops after 8. If there is other music in the game that requires you to win a match, I won't be listening to them any time soon.

Try reading the out-of-game instructions. You know, the ones that every downloadable Wii game has that can be accessed by hitting the Home button in-game.

Have you read the out of game intructions? (Do you actually own the game? if so, maybe you could have told me how to play a high ball.)

The out-of-game instructions have no information on the controls at all. The summary controls (when you press instructions for the first time before accessing the online ones) tell you the basic controls, but they don't explain the aftertouch and advanced controls. "High kick" for example means high powered kick (or shoot), while "Low kick" means low powered kick (or pass).

Hi, I´m Julio Moruno, Game Designer of EnjoyUp Games. Thanks for your support.
About the After Kick, you can modify the effect on the ball after of shot with a time. Is very funny but is neccesary more training. Sorry for my English.
Best and Merry Xmas.

Figures. Half the developers out there don't know how to write a decent instruction manual anymore.

No disrespect to you, Mr. Moruno, but that made no sense. No wonder he can't figure out what the instructions are saying. If nobody in your company can write in decent English, you need to hire an outside party to localise your games.

Yes, it´s true. Sorry!!!
I wait that you enjoy of Football Up!!!
Thanks for your support.

I'll give it another go. It probably needs practice.

I've figured out game control schemes before without instructions.

But JulioMoruno (or anyone else, who's played the game). What do you have to say about the sliding tackles in this game? Is it possible to execute a tackle without being penalised for a foul?

I played so much better in my first game when I decided to stop seeing if I could do a sliding tackle without fouling the other player, and just ran the ball off the other player.

Hi Edhe, the sliding tackles is only for a extreme situation. the bes action for remove the ball of the adversary is using only the body.
Please, check this movie. Here, I played with the CPU, you can see some possibilities of the gameplay of Soccer Up:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00iqoc34POA
Thanks

@JulioMoruno I played another game, and learned a little more about how to play.

Aftertouch also extends to ball height. So every time you play the ball (be it a pass or shot), you have a small window to affect the ball. You do this by pressing up or down on the D-pad or control stick to swerve the ball left or right, and you press up or down to change the height of the ball, down being up, and up being down (which is hardly a difficult concept, as I was playing Goldeneye 13 years ago). But adding aftertouch - whether it be the optional swerve (which thankfully, you can turn off) or the more crucial shot/pass height gets in the way of controlling your character - because the D-pad or control stick controls your character. In practice (and especially with after touch turned on), you're in danger of spooning your shot or being tackled by the other player.

Anyway, I completed my first game (50 minutes), and was able to hold Israel to an admirable 3-17 defeat. It was infuriating not being able to slide tackle the ball without incurring a free kick (again, with all the fouls I committed, I was only penalised with 2 yellow cards - thankfully for two different players), and shadowing the player like a fly around a turd just isn't good enough. I noticed my opponents never brought out the foul technique (or sliding tackle).

Mysteriously, I was in fact able to perform a successful slide tackle - two of them (one was crucial, and lead to a goal, the other one was a mistake), but every single other tackle I attempted resulted in a foul - and so like the primate capable of learning that I am, I resorted to body tackles, which are pretty much inneffective.

Next up, the dash button - by pressing both kick buttons, you burst forwards for about two or three steps, but that too is largely inneffective, unless, somehow, I'm doing it wrong.

The keepers (and thankfully, the AI, in some cases) are pretty dumb. Keepers would let in easy looping shots from the halfway line, and at one point, on being pursued into my opponents' 15 yard box, they suddenly turned around and retreated, allowing me to score one of my very few goals.

I may have been mistaken, but a ball that rebounded off one of my players was awarded as a throw in to my team. Also, regarding set plays, on being awarded a goal kick, the announcer appears to say "THROW IN............GOAL KICK".

Finally, after completing this 50 minute game, I was awarded the Mii team feature. Unfortunately, there seems little opportunity to be able to see the players faces - in fact, the only face I ever saw was the referee's as he awarded me a yellow card on those two seperate occasions.

Fortunately, I tried switching over to the nunchuk set up, and turned off the aftertouch (which again, my opponents never seemed to use), and it was a little more comfortable to control, but it doesn't solve the fundamental problems I have with this game - namely, not being able to dispossess the opponents, and the difficulty in controlling the height of the ball with the same input used to control your character.

I understand. The IA is very difficult, the best option and highly recommended for Soccer Up is play with another human player. But, I understand your frustrating. If you can, try the play with a friend.
Also, Soccer Up have a very progresive control. is neccesary training for a good control of After Kick and the free ball,
My recommendation is play with a other human player. Us the best option for this game.
Thanks

Yeah, there's no difficulty setting, but that's why I like the somewhat higher difficulty against CPU teams.
I think with practice you get a decent challenge, and that is much more effective than a stupid AI that is no problem to beat.

Congrats to EnjoyUp for having such a good AI in a 500pts football game.

Thanks SKTTR, for us is very important the challenger. Although is very exciting when you plays with a friend. Also the 2P vs 2P is fantastic.

Thanks for your support and Merry Christmas.

@edhe After watching Mr. Moruno's video, I think you have the wrong idea of how to play defense. The idea is to use your player's foot to simply take the ball away from control of your opponent, no tackles of any kind necessary, just like in any elementary school soccer league (or in video game terms, run into the ball at an angle to your opponent while avoiding as much player collision as possible). Like Mr. Moruno said, sliding is a last resort. My guess is that sliding is only effective (without a penalty) when you slide into the ball without hitting your opponent's feet.

Yes, BulbasaurusRex. the system on the fouls is with a real Football rules. If you collides first on the ball and after with the opponent body, this is not foul and if you collides with first body opponent and after with the ball, is foul. The yelow card appear with the distance of the foul with the ball or if the foul is for the back opponent. Sorry again for my bad English!!!

So glad I'm not the only one having problems. I've got the review and...honestly it's the worst football game I've ever played. The controls are just ridiculously inconsistent and unintuitive. No sprint? Impossible to manually change your player? Good lord. The expectations are just insane. I've played about an hour of single player and I have yet to score a goal. Without being able to consistently pass to a team-mate and manually change my players, it's impossible to form a strategy. Does anyone have any tips? So far I'm finding it borderline unplayable.

Hi Kid_A, I undertand and sorry if you don´t enjoy Soccer Up. For enjoy with Soccer Up is very important to play with a friend. About the Change your player, is not correct your oppinion, the user decide that player to controller, you have that to move the player that you want to control to the ball. For the Sprint, with a ball in your possesion, you can to push the buttons 1 and 2 together for the autopass. Please, try again and you see that is different gameplay but is very fun.
Thanks.

This game lacks all the "help" introduced in modern Soccer videogames, no auto passing, no auto crossing, no sticky ball. For this reason is very difficult to play like a modern game. After a lot of matches I have some tips, I hope these are useful:
1) use aftertouch configuration, it's easier to score and play, I prefer Wiimote+nunchuck config for better control of aftertouch
2) aftertouch is your friend, use it for passing and shooting, you can do insane trajectory.
3) you have to play with a sensible thumb, consider that you can always dose the strenght of the shot. For example if you want to cross in the box it's useless to charge the passa, press slightly 1 (or A) and move the stick in the opposite direction to raise the ball.
4) use sliding for emergencies, if your opponent has the ball, try to steal it with your body, I find useful pressing the button when you are in contact with the ball, you'll send away it.
5) to score try to dribble the goalkeeper or use powerful aftertouch shots.

I have some questions for Julio:
1) CPU always score with shots at intersection of the poles, are theese aftertouched shots?How can I perform?
2) is it true that pressing A near the ball controlled by opponent is useful to steal it?ù
3)some advice to score easier?