Dissapointing... but still a fun game.
Now then, the shining point of glory in this game. Graphics. Wow. Just looking at Madden on the Xbox just makes me wanna stab my eyes out. This game features outstandingg lighting effects, character details, the little ruffles on their jerseys, the stadium. The crowd also looks a thousand times better now that each fan is actually 3-D. Mind you they aren't as detailed as the players on the field. But it is infinitely better from the little 2-D sprites you found in the older games. Oh and the players faces are beatifully done. Unfortunately the helmets don't pop off like they would in the Xbox version but you can still go into Instant replay and look at their faces and it's just amazing. I always play with Denver and players like Champ Bailey, Al Wilson, John Lynch, Tom Nalen, Trevor Pryce, Jake Plummer, and many many more, are easily recognizeable. And yes, I know Champ Bailey wears a visor, but just the bottom part of his face that you can see is just perfect to his real life counterpart. There is not one single flaw in the graphics for this game.
Ooh, another thing that was better in this game was that, well, they got rid of stupid John Madden. Man he got annoying. Now they have somebody else who is much easier on the ears. Unfortunately Mr. Madden does make it into the game in the new playcalling menu, which was one other good feature that they added to the game. You can either, Ask Coach, Ask Madden (Ew) Look through your standard formations, go through your Key Players if you want to get the ball specifically to say, Randy Moss or some big time player, or you can opt to look through the last five plays you've picked if you happen to have success with a certian formation. Back to the sound though. The crowd also yells and screams at the right times. Before they would yell and scream anytime something big would happen. And that means for either team. So before say you're the Kansas City Chiefs playing at home against the Raiders. Kansas City has some crazy fans, sea of red, all that, you really think they would jump up and holler and yell for joy when Trent Green throws an interception? Didn't think so. That was something that really bugged me before and I'm glad they changed it. Tackles also sound nice and cruncy as they always should.
Ah yes, now for the bad stuff. Why, oh why, no not why did they take out the option to Challenge a play, whyy oh whyyy did they not let you save instant replays?! AH! I always get these really awesome plays where I break a tackle, juke a safety, and bam, off to the endzone. And it's so much more rewarding when that actually happens on All-Madden, and I just wish I could save those moments. But nope. No save the replay option, which I guess won't anger everybody as much as it did me, but really. How hard would it be to put that in? And yeah, for the no challenging plays, who cares? Yeah I know it adds realism to the game, but when there's an iffy play, and then I go into instant replay and look at it, I always see that the official made the correct call. So who really cares if you can't challenge as long as the calls are ALWAYS right? And they are. So stop whining. And yes, removing the Mini-Camps was a huge mistake. I loved going through those with my new rookies to see if they were going to be up to snuff or if I should just be quick to trade them away. Also, all the incoming rookies have very blah faces. You think they could just take some of the other faces in the game, mix them up, and then stick them back in. Like rookie Linebackers would only have actual in game Linebackers faces mixed up, etc. So yeah, that could have been improved. And yeah, they could have kept the Super Star Mode in there, but I wasn't too much of a fan with that so I guess it didn't affect me much. But I know alot of people out there loved that option so they should have put that back in also.
Also something I noticed, this game, feels very non-Madden. I don't know what it is, but I feel like I'm playing a bad mix of Madden and NFL Fever or something. I dunno why, but I really hope they nail the normal Madden gameplay in 07, or I might just have to keep playing Oblivion. And this lack of Madden Gameplay really took away from the replay value in the game. The pricedrop made the game worth it's money now, but before this game was not worth the sixty bucks. Maybe you should rent the game first and see if it pushes some of your buttons. I know for some people it really didn't meet their expectations, but after I came in reading some pretty poor reviews I wasn't expecting that much and was pleasantly surprised with what there was. Just rent it, try it out, if you like it, well, even if you do I wouldn't recommend buying it. Madden 07 is just around the corner.
OH, on the side. The difficulty is now muchh more refined. Before on the Xbox I noticed even on All-Madden the games were never close. I may have only won by seven points in some of them, but that's because the computer did that stupid catch up thing where they bomb the ball six times and score on every play. Normally I would dominate the whole way through save for the closing minutes. Now the games are actually tight and I have only blown out two opponents, I think it was the Giants 43-12 and then the 49'ers like, 55-10 or something. And no not on rookie, All-Madden. But all the other bazillion games I've played were generally in the area of 24-17, 17-20, 24-30, etc. And yes, you actually do lose in this game, but generally I finish my seasons 14-2, or 13-3 as the Super Bowl winner.
Sorry, one more thing haha. I've noticed that the other teams do not ever post high yardage or anything. Like I can usually take the Rushing Title with 1,100 yards. The first season I played, my No.1 reciever Rod Smith had the most recieving yards with 947, my No.2, Ashley Lelie, followed him up with 880, and then my No.3 had third place in the league with 760. Don't know what happened... same thing with Passing. Peyton Manning had the most yards with something like 3,340 in my third or fourth season playing. I dunno. That just kinda bugged me cause I remember on Madden 05 I would get 2045 yards rushing only to have Clinton Portis beat me with 2180. I don't care if it's not realistic that three or four running backs get over 2,000 yards every year, heck, even one year I had over 3,000 rushing yards with Tatum Bell, but that's not the point. It's alot more fun to get tons of yards, then to have none. It's not like leading the league with 1,100 yards is very realistic either.