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90 Minutes Review
Chris Leyton
00/12/0000
A new dreamcast game, but does that mean you should all flock out and buy it???
90 Minutes appeared out of nowhere a few months back, as a footie mad dreamcast fan I followed the title closely. Despite being shrouded in a veil of secrecy, we learnt that it was in the very capable hands of Jet Set Radio developers; Smilebit, things were looking good. Finally long suffering Dreamcast fans might have the football title that theyāve deserved, snubbed by EA and Konamiās reluctance to show support for the machine and plagued by a list of conference league football titles, surely now would mark the turnaround.
Well Iām afraid itās a big fat no, and with this the last football title to be released on the Dreamcast, it looks like the need for a decent title will go unfulfilled. Many of us have fond memories of Segaās orphan, it offered us many hours of extreme fun, pushing boundaries with games that were innovative, the machine itself held itās head up nobly against supposedly superior hardware, and yet the one thing that we wanted hasnāt been fulfilled. If only Visual Concepts were British!!!
Oh well enough of the obituary, on to the game. 90 Minutes opens up well, thereās an extensive choice of modes offering club and national competitions, an extensive player/team create mode and a handy training facility. Unfortunately itās as soon as you get onto the pitch that things begin to go from bad to worse.
The first thing that youāll notice is the abysmal graphics. Coming from the creators of the visual masterpiece, Jet Set Radio, Iām appalled. The visuals have a very rough feel to them, the best comparison to be made is with a mid-life PSOne title. Textures lack detail, whilst player models look nothing like their real life counterparts. I suppose the visually supreme This Is Football 2002 has spoilt us recently, but still there are no excuses. Dreamcast titles have produced some of the best visuals around, seeing this is indeed enough to make a grown man cry.
To be fair, there is occasionally some nice animation, when players run with the ball and face opposition, shirt pulling and little shimmyās occur, however the word is āoccasionallyā.
If 90 Minutes gameplay had shone through then we could have excused the primitive visuals. Unfortunately the gameplay will frustrate, passing is unresponsive, slow and sluggish. Shooting and tackling are implemented at an extremely basic level, you have no real control over where you place shots or long passes, forget the chance to whip in a 40 yard Beckham style cross, youāll be lucky to get the ball anywhere near your players. Whilst you only have one tackle button, a sliding one at that which usually results in your player being booked by the card happy refs. You can tackle by simply running into the opposition, which is another major problem as this happens too frequently, so the game never really gets going, if youāre a fan of lower league scrappy matches you may find some fun hereā¦ maybe!
Player AI is awful, kids in the playground could show these players a few things about runs off the ball and moving into space. Youāll be dribbling and just watch as your teammates stand in place and watch you, whilst when you pass to a teammate heāll just wait for the ball to arrive to him, and thanks to the laggy player select you might as well give up on trying to play an attractive passing game.
On the plus side, there is an extensive tactics section that allows you to change everything you could possibly want. The standard tactics, formation and kicker select options are there; but you can also alter player awareness ā“ to see if they push forward on to loose balls or hang back; man-to-man marking or zonal; etcā¦ Itās probably the most extensive Iāve seen in a console football title, but when the game plays this bad you just donāt give a toss.
Its quite apparent that Sega knew they had a stinker on there hands with this one; very low-key publicity, we didnāt know anything about it until a few months back; Smilebit have a games index page on their web-site detailing every game theyāve ever made except 90 Minutes. What I want to know is why they didnāt just do the right thing and cancel it, after all they canned far better projects.
