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NFL Quaterback Club 2000 Review
Noel Brady
00/12/0000
NFL Quarterback Club 2000 definitely didn't make the play-offs this season.
One game that did wonders for the popularity of American football on this side of the Atlantic was EA's John Madden Football, released on the Megadrive in 1991. Anyone trying it fell in love with the sport, even without any prior knowledge to the game. A certain numbers of gamers even stayed up till 3am in the morning to watch live coverage of the Superbowl during the early 90's.
The NFL Quarterback Club series started a few years later, and has now developed into a very popular game with many American gamers. It's huge selection of plays and real-life players, both current and historical, help it impress those already following the sport, but it's obvious right from the main menu that this new edition will cause problems for anyone new to the sport. The unpolished presentation gives the game a very basic, techincal feel-- enough to turn most Irish and European gamers off immediately.
Graphically, it's not bad- the players look solid and move well, but the motion-captured animations are often just too long, meaning you can't always get players into exactly the right position when needed. Also, the resolution of menu screens makes picking your plays awkward, especially as you need to study the squiggly lines to figure out what the hell is going to happen when you 'snap' the ball.
In NFL Quaterback Club 2000's case, I am just curious how they managed to skip a few dozen frames every second like that and not feel bad about charging full price for admission. This game has problems everywhere...even in play selection the game stutters, and every second or so, players just seem to "jump" a few clicks through the animation routine, almost as if they are severely lagged participants in a network deathmatch game. Not only does this look utterly ridiculous, but it is harmful to gameplay, as well. You can never seem to zero in on a play because of this, and it is really hard to anticipate the ball or a defender because you never know where you really are on the field, as it can skip around so much at any given second that you'll be 5 yards past the ball before you even realize what has happened.
Not quite as pitiful, however, as the receiver's apparent inability to catch the ball under said conditions. This hurts bad enough when you are wide open and on the catching circle, but it is even worse when you go to the trouble of pushing the catch button and still manage to repeatedly drop the ball. Even some of the top catchers in the NFL like Andre Riseth have trouble catchng a ball. They would just wander off to the wrong side, hands out-stretched to the sky and then look down at the turf when they finally caught on that the ball had hit the turf a good 10 yards away.
Thanks to the game's overall control scheme, you can't simply run and cut unless you are really moving. Unlike NFL2K where players can choose to walk, run, slide or juke based on how they manipulate the analog, Quaterback Club 2000 forces you to play the "foot nailed to the floor" game. To make matters worse, it often sticks you on the back of a guard for up to 3 seconds at a time when attempting to follow a blocker.
Not that the game was 100% unworthy. The running mechanism actually works pretty well when you're going full steam, and you can pull off some highlight-reel worthy runs every now and again. The problem is how few and far between these sequences are due to the lack of functional blocking. And difficulty in actually making catches. I also enjoyed the extras like the chain gang and team doctors rushing on to the field, but there isn't much use trying to save spilt milk as we all know.
As a multiplayer game, NFL Quarterback Club 2000 works pretty well. Up to four people can play, either all on the same side or with a regular two-on-two set-up (three-on-one is also possible but can degenerate into mindless violence). However, you'll have to get four people who know about American football together to do this, as it's unfriendly presentation won't lure anyone new to the game. Sega's own NFL 2K is going down a storm in ths US and we generally feel that it is the best American football game to own.
Please, please, please leave NFL Quarterback Club 2000 on the store sehlf. When compared to NFL 2K, Acclaim should not only hang thier heads in shame but pull this game off department store shelves. If you're desperate for American football before Christmas then buy NFL Blitz. Five minutes of this and you'll become increasingly aware of how some games are rushed out for the Christmas sales period.
