football

Word of warning: Stock up on your consumables because this one is addictive. I've gone through half a season (using the Cowboys) and I'm STILL learning the PRO mode. (Rookie mode is way too easy). And as all the other reviewers have said, the DC graphics are without equal. They're so cool even people who don't DO vid games are impressed. And in Season mode there are not only stats for the top 20 or so in each catagory but stats for EVERYONE. Anyone that catches a pass or makes a tackle during a play week is accounted for in the stats.

Now its not perfect; creating new plays could be a bit simpler, you WILL need a VMU to save seasons (I have two), and the commentary doesn't always quite match the on-field situation - but those are nits that will likely be refined in future versions. This is the first football game you could watch play itself and truly be entertained. And you can't get tendancies from watching it play itself, it even switches strategies in scrimmage. Like someone else said, there will be no "money" plays. I can't WAIT for the NBA, NHL, and MLB games to come out.

This game really sets a new standard for football games, no, for sports games. Very realistic presentation -- right down to little details like team- and player-specific banners in stadiums. My favorite feature was the way plays were displayed on the screen...made play calling a lot more meaningful to me, someone who is just starting to learn football. The tutorial mode was also a great feature, though I had already learned how to play by the time I realized there was a tutorial mode. The control scheme is the best I've seen in any game, very intuitive.

I am still on the rookie mode, as I haven't yet developed the skills to go up to the next level. Rookie is starting to get easy, but I hear that the other difficulty levels are very challenging.

I also have Blitz 2000 for the Dreamcast, and while I do like that game, NFL 2K blows it away. Graphics are far superior, as is the gameplay itself. Play calling is much better in NFL 2K.

One thing I didn't like (and this is also true for NBA 2K) is that saving a game pretty much takes a whole VMU! I only had ten blocks left over, which I used to save my Vigilante 8: Second Offense game. I just don't see how NFL 2K can take up that much space on a VMU. That's my ONLY beef with the game, and it doesn't stop me from giving it five stars.

Don't pay a penny for this, folks. Move on to an EA game. There is very little in the way of actual physics calculations between players in this game, every interaction is merely a scripted animation. RBs are stopped in full stride by shoestring tackles. WRs run their routes at half speed while the DBs shadow them *IN FRONT* of their routes. Offensive line programming is horrible. Guards and tackles blow assignments on EVERY play, doubling up on a DT and allowing LBs to come free and tackle the RB at the handoff. There is no player momentum, a flaw I've noticed in a number of Sega Sports games, meaning any player can stop in mid-stride and immediately run full stride in the opposite direction. Sit back and watch the computer play: 3and out, 3 and out, 3 and out... This was an incomplete game that should not have been released. So what if it looks pretty? It plays like crap.