''World Cup Soccer'' is a 1994 pinball machine designed by John Popadiuk and

Larry DeMar Lawrence E. "Larry" DeMar (also known as L.E.D.) is a video game and pinball designer and software programmer. He is known as co-designer, alongside Eugene Jarvis, of the classic arcade games '' Defender'' and '' Robotron: 2084''. He is the found ...

and released by Midway. It is based on the

1994 FIFA World Cup The 1994 FIFA World Cup was the 15th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national soccer teams. It was hosted by the United States and took place from June 17 to July 17, 1994, at nine venues across the country. The United States ...

Digital versions

This table was formerly available as DLC for ''

The Pinball Arcade ''The Pinball Arcade'' is a pinball video game developed by FarSight Studios. The game is a simulated collection of real pinball tables licensed by Gottlieb, Alvin G. and Company, and Stern Pinball, a company which also owns the rights of machines ...

'' until it was removed on June 30, 2018. This was previously published as ''World Champion Soccer'', as

FarSight Studios FarSight Studios (formerly Farsight Technologies) is an American video game developer established in 1988 by Jay Obernolte. They are an official licensed developer for all current home and handheld consoles including the Sony PlayStation 4, Play ...

was unable to secure the World Cup license from FIFA. This digital table has many changes; the ''W-O-R-L-D-C-U-P'' lights leading to the left loop are replaced by ''C-H-A-M-P-I-O-N'', ''World Cup USA 94'' on the plastics between left inlanes and outlanes are renamed to ''Champion Soccer TPA 17'', (TPA bring an abbreviation of “The Pinball Arcade” and 17 being in reference to the year it was released as DLC: 2017) and the backglass is also changed to avoid possible lawsuits from FIFA for using the tournament's mascot Striker, ''World Cup USA 94'' name and any other references to World Cup USA 1994. without required license.
The table will be available in the 2022 game PinballFX by Zen Studios. Unlike the TPA iteration, this version is fully licensed by FIFA, after FIFA's exclusivity agreement with EA expired. As a result, the game now more closely resembles the 1994 original, with the only notable difference being an updated FIFA Licence notice on the backglass and on the playfield above the lockdown bar.

Trivia

* Raiden, a character from the '' Mortal Kombat'' fighting series, makes a cameo in a bonus round. *The flyer for the machine depicts an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

field Field may refer to: Expanses of open ground * Field (agriculture), an area of land used for agricultural purposes * Airfield, an aerodrome that lacks the infrastructure of an airport * Battlefield * Lawn, an area of mowed grass * Meadow, a grass ...

instead of a soccer

in the background. However, the stadium shown is the

Soldier Field Soldier Field is a multi-purpose stadium on the Near South Side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. Opened in 1924 and reconstructed in 2003, the stadium has served as the home of the Chicago Bears of the National Football League (NFL) since ...

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, which held several matches during the 1994 World Cup, among them the opening match.

References

External links

*
''World Cup Soccer'' on Pinside.com''World Cup Soccer'' promo video (part 1)''World Cup Soccer'' promo video (part 2)Recent Auction Results for ''World Cup Soccer''
1994 pinball machines Bally pinball machines 1994 FIFA World Cup {{pinball-stub