football

Indeed, this game looks like it was put together by a bunch of first graders. Every function of the game-gameplay, sound, graphics-are laughable. Anyone in their right mind would take this godforsaken joke of a game back within hours after their purchase. Thus garbage makes some old 8-bit NES game look magnificent by comparison; this will make you wonder if Acclaim Sports is just trying to get some laughs out of it.

This game has nice graphics and sound. Unfortunately, the gameplay is so horrible, I cannot believe this game was play-tested before its release.

The controls are more complicated than necessary. For example, three separate buttons must be pressed to complete a pass, one to fade back, another to select a receiver, and finally another to catch the ball. You have very little time to do this even at the easiest level. Even if you keep backs in to block, you rarely have more than 2 seconds to complete a pass. Even bad rushing teams can sack the QB 10 times per game playing 5 minute quarters. This is not realistic, which is consistent with the rest of the game.

Passing is also blind, since your perspective is from behind the QB, you rarely see the receivers and have no idea what the coverage is. Your completion success has little to do with these factors, which are critical in the real game. It's easy to complete passes once you get the knack of pushing the right buttons quickly, but there is little sense of accomplishment when your success or throwing has nothing to do with throwing to the open receiver or exploiting a weakness in the defense.

In fact, the type of defense called seems to have no effect on the outcome of a given offensive play. You can stack the line against the run, completely plug the hole, and the computer running back will stay on his feet for 10 seconds, then break into the secondary for a long TD. This can happen with mediocre backs and excellent defenses. Conversely, the computer will routinely complete long passes into triple coverage and score long touchdown passes against a prevent defense.

Despite the difficult and non-responsive controls, once you get the hang of passing, you'll throw one TD pass after another. Interceptions are few and far between. Ridiculously high scores are common even when playing 5 minute quarters.

I tried to play a season with my favorite team, and gave up after two games because the gameplay was so unrealistic and irritating.

Another annoying feature is if you want to switch players, you can only do so for one play at a time. Playing the Rams, I wanted to use Kurt Warner instead of Terry Green. The game allows you to switch them by formation, so if you haven't decided on a formation, it won't work if you happen to choose a different formation. After the play is completed, the game reverts to the default player setting. Extremely annoying.

I gave it 1 star because that was the lowest rating possible. It deserves 0 stars. Sega's NFL2K is far far better.

See Jack Buy-See Jack Play-See Jack cry Ok first i gave it a one because there was nothing lower. This game tried to challenge NFL 2K and didn't even get as good as Super Nes Football. Before this game i never thought a football game could stink so much. Linemen running as fast as Deion Sanders. I rented it and returned it 5 minutes later. FOR THE SAKE OF YOUR JOY DON'T BUY THIS GAME OR ACCEPT IT AS A GIFT!