Sega Sports NFL 2K1 Hands-On

NFL2K fans that are wondering how much better NFL2K1 is over the original may want to sit down before reading this. Here's the short of it, aside from Internet play that lets up to eight players play simultaneously, and a franchise mode that lets you sign, release, and draft players, NFL2K1 isn't that much different than the original. It is important to note however that the game isn't scheduled for release until this fall, so in all fairness the game being shown at E3 still has a long way to go in its development cycle.

Nevertheless, the graphics, sound, and overall presentation of the game look to be about on par with last years NFL2K. The control is about the same; with the one exception being that it is noticeably easier for beginners to catch the ball, mostly due to the fact that computer controlled teammates have better hands on the field.

The Internet play feature was being shown and seemed to work surprisingly well. The only difference seemed that the control wasn't as tight, there was a noticeable lag between the time when you executed a controller command and when the player performed the move. It wasn't a great deal of lag and it actually seemed as though it was something you could get used to.

Overall, NFL2K1 in its current state looks pretty much the same as the original. Hopefully Sega and Visual Concepts will use the time they have before releasing the game to beef it up with a lot more additions and won't take the EA route of just introducing incremental roster and feature upgrades.