Review By: Jared Black
Developer:	Tiburon
Publisher:	EA Sports
# of Players:	1-12 (alternating)
Genre:	Football
ESRB:	Everyone
Date Posted:	8-20-01

Secondly, a lot of the same plays that were "money" in Madden (such as Out passes) are here also. While a few plays have been fixed, a lot of these plays still exist. This is offset somewhat by the differences between teams (NC A&T’s money plays don’t work that often against a team like Florida State), but it’s still a major problem that should’ve been addressed.

Third, as a result of flaws in the passing game defensive backs have been tweaked to drop nearly everything they touch. Even if the ball hits your defensive back in the hands, he’ll usually drop it. To make sure it wasn’t just my secondary’s general suckiness, I even recruited (more on that later) an incredible roster of cornerbacks and safeties. The result was still a lot of dropped balls, and very few INTs. I can understand why they did this (I usually bat down around 10 passes a game), but it’s still very unrealistic.

Finally, blocking still needs a little work. While the blocking game is very realistic, defensive players will get "sucked" up into a block. Imagine you’re chasing down a running back who just broke into the open field. Now imagine that as you get ready to tackle him, an opposing offensive lineman approaches you from behind. As a result of the offensive lineman attempting to block you, you’ll often turn around and get sucked into the block. It’s very frustrating to see the offense break a big play due to that, especially since no defensive player is going to purposely get blocked. This also happens on the line as well, as you’ll often get blocked by an offensive lineman that you should’ve been able to speed rush around. This is definitely a product left over from Madden, as you still can’t really get a good pass rush up the middle.

Don’t let these flaws discourage you however, because the rest of the game is near-perfection. The running game is perfect (especially with the addition of the option play), as the momentum-based gameplay allows for very realistic cutbacks and running lanes. The analog trigger buttons work pretty well here also, as juking the shoes off of a defender can result in a huge gain. You also get a very real sense of speed, as the differences between a power running back and a speed running back (both are equally effective if you know how to utilize them properly) are very noticeable.

However, the most important (and yet subtle) gameplay improvement lies in the kicking game. The kicking meter is now vastly improved, functioning almost like a golf club swing in most golf video games. Before starting the meter, you’ll first decide where you want your kick to go by using the analog button to adjust an arrow onscreen. Hitting "X" then starts the meter, which has an optimum point about ¾ up it and a yellow area near the bottom. Hitting "X" again as the meter hits this point will give you the most control over your kick. It will then begin to descend down the meter slowly, and hitting "X" again (to stop the meter) in the yellow area will result in a very accurate kick. However, if you want to get more power into your kick you can also allow the meter to go past the optimum point. This results in it descending very quickly, thus making it harder to stop it in the yellow zone. The result is a kick that will travel farther, but won’t be nearly as accurate (until you master the timing anyway). For perhaps the first time ever, I feel like I’m in total control of the kicking game.

Page 3 of 4-->