Great board game conversion, exactly what I was looking for.

User Rating: 7.5 | Blood Bowl PC
So Blood Bowl, for some a form of religion, for some a time capsule to their past, for some an alternate sports game, for some a travesty upon their gaming past.

For me, this is exactly what I was hoping it would be.

Blood Bowl has one of the largest followings in alternative board game history. Either you played it yourself or know at least one person who has/does and is proud of that fact, because BB is a fine game with little or no bad points. It is as simple a sports board game as you could hope for with many many features to keep you occupied, many many tactics with which to hone and refine your game, and many many different ways to play (depending on your team).

The PC version of this translates all of the above very well indeed. You have your ability to name and convert each player on your team so they don't look the same, similar yes, but not the same. So there is your minature painting.
You have your many playable races, they are all nearly there with some obvious ones missing but they are upcoming FOR FREE in later patches. So there are your teams.
The Star players are all there, so there is your nostalgia and RolePlaying.
The comentators are there, so there is your dark typical BloodBowl humour.
All of your tournaments are there, so again, more roleplay and nostalgia AND variation on each competition.

What is not to like?

I mean the game itself is fine, the dice rolling is just your typical dice, IE random as hell. The pitch is the proper size and your teams are the correct size so your tactics are still viable, only this time you can't rely on your 'lucky' dice to save you.

The problems stem from the UI, its a bit...well lacking really. And everybody agrees that the strongest flaw in the game is the UI, nothing is wrong with the game itself, but the UI is certainly letting this title down.
It is 2009, somethings are just expected from a game developer such as the ability to adjust options while playing (volume control I am looking at you). The END TURN button while strikingly obvious at the top does exactly that even if you strike it by accident, there is no "ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO END YOUR TURN?" type of feature, which is again an obvious component to a game option that is just not there.

The online lobby system is terrible, it's far to ritualistic and far less obvious on what to do. Setting up your first league and having people play each other involves a bizzare series of clicking on various tabs, ensuring certain things are highlighted first and then finally when you can play, you are in the wrong league or didn't relise you had to leave the default league or whatever reason. It is a bit irratating.

And I will say that the player customisation options are not exactly obvious, you need to work that one out for yourself because it is not explained anywhere within game. Let alone the tutorial.

Oh the tutorial, how terrible you are. At least it explains the basic function of Blood Bowl, but it does not explain everything you could need to know about how to operate the game in the first place, it leaves you asking questions like "yes but I allready know how Blood Bowl works, but how does this game work??" and that to me, is a bit silly because most people who buy this game, allready know and love Blood Bowl, the ones that do not, do not need a tutorial explaining the aspects about it when the game mechanics are vital to any game play, and it just does not explain them very well at all...if at all.

For the ones that do remember Blood Bowl or who still play it around a table somewhere with other geeky types, this game offers you the same things only without the need for tidying up, or setting up or bickering over dice and all the other pleasant things that go on in a room full of geeks.

For sport game enthusiasts, this is a fantastic take on American football and deserves a look at. It is not "just Madden but with Orcs", it has different rules and no Downs or Yards, just mayhem and carnage on a football field where your cunning stratedgy still depends on the randomness of a dice roll. You have been warned :)