Sega Worldwide Soccer ’97

Sega Worldwide Soccer 97 (known as both Sega Worldwide Soccer PC and Victory Goal Worldwide Edition in Japan) is a football video game by Sega released for the Sega Saturn in 1996. It was followed by three more titles: Sega Worldwide Soccer ’98 still on the 32-bit console and two editions of Sega Worldwide Soccer 2000, the second being Sega Worldwide Soccer 2000 Euro Edition for the Dreamcast.

Sega Worldwide Soccer 97, produced by Sega themselves, was one of the killer apps in the peak of popularity for the console. It was the sequel to Victory Goal, one of the debut titles of the console, which had a poor performance critically and commercially. However, there was little overlap in the development staff of the two games.

The game featured international teams and league, play-off and tournament modes. Although it used fictional player names (due to the lack of a license), the non-volatile memory of the Saturn allowed editing of names. The team kits were as close to the official 1996 kits as possible. The gameplay was also highly praised, and was the top-rated football game until International Superstar Soccer 64 was released one year later. On the same year, the game was ported to Microsoft Windows and released in Japan only on September 25, 1997.