The eternal question, isn't it? You know it's mostly going to be the same game, that it's going to have some infuriating bugs, that it is eventually going to break your spirit and leave you in the fetal position going "no, no, no." But... you're probably still going to buy it, junkie.Well, if you can hold of the Fanhouse will be going full-force with a multi-party liveblog starting at 5 PM. Every Fanhouser that gets his sweaty paws on the game will be posting impressions of all sorts; if you couldn't resist, junkie, you can offer up your opinions as well. Interesting comments will be posted for general consumption.
For now, you can check Bill Abner's blog for advanced impressions. Abner's had the game for a couple weeks now and has been a busy man since. I've summarized Abner's posts on the home blog; Operation Sports also has an excellent "should you buy it" article that assembles the opinions of their message boarders with game in hand. The main points of all these things:
- there are major problems with roster editing, which could be a gamekilling bug for some
- gameplay is supposedly much more fun, though slanted heavily towards offense on default settings
- kick returns are stupidly easy
- EA is promising patches
Same as it ever was, eh?
Comments (Page 1 of 1)
I just wanted to say, for accuracy's sake, that since the OS article was posted on their front page, there have been many reviews of the game by the users that it is a fantastic game and many of the "bugs" are just people over-reacting. The QB accuracy problems can be fixed with sliders, and roster edits appear to be beginning to work. There's a 97 (currently) page impressions thread that has gotten much more positive about the game as it has gone on. This appears to be one of the best football games in a while.
/not an EA shill
/avid blog reader
Gotta disagree Doug. The sliders for QB accuracy don't do anything. Defending the CPU passing game is possible, but it ain't all that fun, and it doesn't allow for any defensive diversity. Man defense is pretty much suicide.
Other problems, such as kick returns being too easy, are definitely true. Even on Heisman, kick returns to the 40 and 20+ yard punt returns are very easy. The CPU defense pretty much never tries the deep-pass. The CPU running game is borderline inept, unless they manage to break a very long run.
Don't get me wrong, it actually not a bad game. However, it's definitely got some bugs that keep it from being the truly great game it ought to be. As a longtime fan of the NCAA football series (which I've always preferred to Madden), I can safely say that I'm not overreacting.