In the past NFL2K’s weakest aspect was its running game. Instead of instilling some sort of momentum-based system the designers went with the old-style turn-table system which allowed players to pivot and turn on a dime. Of course this allowed runners to change directions and juke out defenders without penalty. This year’s game remedies this by introducing momentum into the equation. When a player tries to quickly change his direction he’ll first have to pivot, stop and then start up again. This inclusion seems minimal at first, until you realize that it’s much harder to juke defenders and burst through holes that is.
This doesn’t just affect the ball carriers though; defenders are caught in the tide as well. This is most noticeable on special teams plays where the players run at full sprint and have little control over their bodies. In previous games there wasn’t much of a penalty for misjudging an offensive juke because you could easily recover and continue the chase. Here, getting juked out is much easier because your momentum forces you to shift to one side, causing you to pause for a split second and effectively taking you out of the play.
These two (and only) Browns fans cheer on their team before the game.Most people I know hate to play defense in sports games but I absolutely love it. There’s nothing better than sacking your opponent and then dancing all over his lifeless body as you laugh in his face. Thanks to some fluid controls you’ll probably find yourself enjoying the defensive aspect of 2K5 as well. The defensive backs in particular are really fun to use, thanks to some intuitive controls. When defending a pass the player has the option of trying to bat it down or trying to go for the big-time interception. Most football games have one defense button and guessing whether they’ll bat it down or try to intercept it is a crapshoot. Here the guesswork is taken out from the game and placed squarely in the hands of the player. Plus, there’s this real satisfying feeling that comes from laying down the boom on the ball carrier. It’s kind of like cracking your knuckles, not only does it have that bone crunching sound, but no matter how man times you do it, it never gets old.
In a move that I’d like to see more of, Visual Concepts designed 2K5 for the Xbox architecture and then dumbed it down for the inferior PS2 hardware. Don’t get me wrong, I’m the kind of guy who generally chooses PS2 titles over Xbox titles, but this line of thinking just make so much more sense sometimes. When developing specifically for the Xbox, designers will get to take advantage of all of the neat little goodies that the PS2 lacks. What you get here is some amazing texture work, fluid animation, gorgeous lighting and players that behave and look strikingly realistic. They’re not the best looking players to ever appear in a sports title (that title belongs to Midway’s
NBA Ballers) but they’re downright amazing to look at. Take into account that the game often renders 22 players on the field without the slightest bit of slowdown and you can begin to understand why developers need to start taking more advantage of the Xbox hardware. As a carryover from their excellent work in the
World Series franchise, the stadiums here all look absolutely gorgeous and feature exquisite amounts of detail.
Most of the game’s beauty doesn’t come from the neat lighting effects or sharp textures though, far from it actually. NFL2K5’s visuals shine because the designers did so much to engulf the player in the NFL atmosphere. Foremost are the fully rendered crowds which react and behave according to the action on the field. EA does something like this with its
NHL franchise but it looks absolutely crude in comparison. What’s most amazing about the crowds are just how entertaining they are to watch. When scoring a huge touchdown with LaDanian Tomlinson the game showed a fan wearing an LT jersey as he turned around and pointed to the back of it. In the waning seconds of a blowout the game cuts to the few stragglers left in the stands, most of which have dozed off. And they’re not even the main attraction here. Visual Concepts beefed up the between-play cutscenes from 40 to a couple of hundred for this year’s game. This includes little things like celebrations, to trash talking to players getting frustrated. Since the sidelines are fully rendered you’ll see tons of interaction between the players that take place off of the playing field. There’s this amazing one where a frustrated player will walk up and kick a cooler of Gatorade (nice licensing) as the other players look on. What’s even more amazing is that the people on the sidelines are the actual players on the team, not just generic stand-ins. We could go on for hours about just how amazing this game looks, but then that means we can’t get to the presentation.
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