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Madden NFL 2000 Review
Noel Brady
00/12/0000
The fat man is back! He's back and it looks like he's been eating even more meals at McDonalds.
Every year EA return with the annual update that is Madden The problem is that most of us Europeans don\'t even notice, and the small fraternity of American football fans in this continent are left rubbing their hands with glee.
Off the field, Madden NFL 2000 has tons of extras that you would expect to see in any football including multiple play modes such as Exhibition, Season, Franchise, Tournament, Practice, and my personal favourite, Situation. There\'s nothing better than to skip all the bull, and get right into the last play of the game. Just imagine, you just scored a touchdown, but you\'re still down by one, do you go for the extra point, or the two-point conversion for the win... ah! I have to go play that scenario -- I\'ll be back in one sec. Madden NFL 2000 has loads of other play features that ups the value as well. Fantasy Draft options, customise your play-book, there\'s all sorts of extra goodies.
The good news for this adept group of followers is that Madden NFL 2000 looks positively superb. After the main grievance with last year\'s title being poor graphics, many Madden fans will be happy to see that there\'s little slow-down or pop up in this year\'s update. Player photographs are shown at every opportunity, you can view the action from nine different camera angles and there are more statistics than even Einstein could eat his way through.
While calling the plays is easy, because you\'ve already selected them pre-match from the playbook, actually getting them to work is a lot trickier. As with the real thing, gritty shoulder-pad to shoulder-pad running and blocking plays are a much safer bet than any of the Disney-style \'dream catch\' moves. You can try them but chances are that your quarterback will be lying flat on his back before he even has a chance to launch the pass. If you want to hold onto the ball to start with then you will need to keep it on the ground. And you will soon learn that defence- especially when forcing the opposition into turnovers in their own half- is the best form of attack.
When compared to last year\'s Madden, the game alone just moves so much faster. Madden NFL 99\'s players were polygonal and looked great, but they moved so sluggish. But this year, Madden 2000 isn\'t hindered by slow on-field players, oh no, these suckers, although they look a little grainy, move quick, almost life-like. Seriously, the players are freakin\' fast and that alone just makes the flow of the game go so much quicker -- there\'s never a dull moment, it\'s constant football.
Although Gameday looks better, I have to say that Madden NFL 2000 isn\'t too far behind. The stadiums alone are detailed to the max and players look and move just dandy. Not to keep mentioning the on-field players, but that\'s where EA Sports really focused its energy, is in the player\'s look, speed and movement. It\'s totally cool, like the extra animations alone are sweet. Players can get completely racked with a shoulder, get picked up, by their feet, and dunked head first into the ground, and the jukes, oh, you can just see all the fat defensive linemen\'s ankles just cracking.
This new Madden captures the rhythm of each drive almost perfectly as you battle, not just against the other team but against the clock, to move upfield and get on the scoreboard. There are a few minor faults, however. The views are sometimes confusing, preventing you from seeing the real action, while playbook selection can get fiddly. The sound could also do with being spruced up. When doing a dive tackle, or when you smash into someone with your shoulder, the sound of the pads crashing together is great. You can\'t help but to flinch sometimes when one of your guys gets tackled. But other than that, the sound isn\'t that exciting.
But to compensate, the grandstand atmosphere carries you along. Games turn on split-second interceptions and spectacular bombs tossed into the end zone. Staggering moments can be milked with numerous replays while the commentators enthuse \'\'Whoa, he\'s gotta be out of the game\'\' or \'\'There\'s a helmet loose\'\' obviously hoping that some poor fool will have to leave the game with at least one broken bone.
Madden NFL 2000 will never reach anyone beyond the hardcore fans. Among other American footie sims, it comes out on top but against the arcade likes of Midway\'s NFL Blitz, it simply can\'t match the competition. It\'s addictive, it\'s playable and it\'s good but it\'s simply too hard for non-extremists of the sport
