NFL GameDay 2000 Review

For PlayStation

Rating: Average
   NFL GameDay 2000 is a lot better than NFL GameDay '99, but that's not 
saying much.  My first impression of the game was not good, as there were 
four interceptions in the first quarter of the first game I played.  The 
frequency of interceptions went down after that, but they still took place 
much more often than they do in real life.  
   One of the biggest reasons for the annoyingly frequent interceptions is 
the stupidity of your wide receivers.  In any normal football game with 
decent Artificial Intelligence, you press the button to make the pass as 
the computer-controlled receiver runs towards the target, and then you 
quickly switch control to the receiver and try to make the catch.  In 
GameDay 2000, it is very common for the receiver to stop dead in his tracks 
when you press the button to make the pass, and sometimes they actually run 
in the opposite direction of where the ball is headed.  Thus, by the time 
you're able to switch control to the receiver, the ball is often un-
catchable, and there's nothing to stop the opposing team's secondary from 
making an easy interception.
   Another example of the game's lack of common sense comes in the crunch-
time AI.  When the clock is winding down and the game is on the line, the 
computer is even more stupid than usual.  For example, it usually uses up 
all its time-outs with over a minute to go in the game, leaving it with no 
time-outs to finish the drive for a touchdown or stop the clock to attempt 
a game-winning field goal.
   It's nice to be able to shake off tackles on offense, but it's a 
different story when you're the one who's on defense.  It's the norm rather 
than the exception that what should be an easy tackle is not an easy tackle 
if the person on offense can mash the buttons faster than you can.  In 
addition, the players have energy bars that dwindle away as they become
fatigued, but it has almost no effect on the gameplay.  As a result, 
there's nothing to stop you from passing the ball (or running the ball) 
almost every single play for the whole game.
  The penalties are also out of whack.  They're not called as often as they 
should be, and whether a penalty is called or ignored seems to be 
determined randomly.  For example, you're much less likely to get called 
for a penalty if you're blatantly committing pass interference than if you 
try to sack a quarterback and he gets the ball off just before you hit him 
(resulting in an unwarranted call of roughing the quarterback).
   The game's many celebrations are both inappropriate and unrealistic.  
It's not appropriate that you're given the option to celebrate after just 
about any play (even when you miss a field goal), and it's not realistic a 
300-pound lineman would be break-dancing or spinning around on the ground 
like a moron.  Many of the celebrations in the game are a joke because 
nobody would ever do them in a real NFL game. 
   GameDay 2000's General Manager Mode is one of the most shameless rip-
offs I have ever seen.  It's just like the Franchise Mode in last year's 
Madden, only nowhere near as involving or in-depth.  First of all, each GM 
Mode save takes up an entire memory card (just in case there are any 
confused retailers reading, that's 15 blocks).  Also, each time you want to 
save your game, you better be ready for a good, solid minute of sitting 
there waiting for it to save.
   Re-signing players to new contracts is about as un-involving as it gets.  
Basically, the player says, "I want X amount of money over X amount of 
years," and you either say "yes" and sign them to their terms, or say "no" 
and release them.  There are no actual negotiations in the so-called 
"player negotiations."  Also, the developers of the game at Red Zone 
Interactive must have run out of ideas for the names of incoming rookies, 
as lots of players have the same last names, and many even have the same 
full names.  For example, in my first NFL Draft, there were six players 
with the last name Irwin, and three of them were named Steve.  I wonder if 
any of them are Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter...
   The list of the GM Mode's flaws goes on and on.  There is no time-based 
free agent signing period; instead, you get your choice of every free agent
in the league before any other team does (now that's realistic).  When you 
get "fired" in the GM Mode, you are usually re-signed to another team 
immediately.  In the real life, when's the last time you saw a general 
manager get fired in the middle of the season and then hired by another 
team the very next week?  The game lets you play one pre-season game to 
determine which players make the team.  It sounds nice until you realize 
that the computer decides who makes the team, not you.  Also, the only 
players who ever get cut from the team after a pre-season game are rookies, 
which is very realistic because God knows veterans never have to fight for 
their jobs in the real NFL...
   The graphics are actually worse than GameDay '99's graphics due to the 
mis-shapen players and the more zoomed-out view that doesn't allow you to 
see as much detail in the players.  Sound-wise, the classic GameDay menu 
music has once again been butchered.  Red Zone decided to take the least 
appealing section of the original GameDay tune and play it over and over in 
GameDay 2000's menu music.
   The commentary is both repetitive and robotic.  There are times when the 
commentary seems only slightly less robotic than the original NFL Sports 
Talk for the Sega Genesis.  For example, on more than one occasion, Dick 
Enberg said (after the ball had been on the ground for several seconds), 
"The ball is picked off!  No!  Incomplete!"  Whenever Tim Biakabutuka runs 
the ball, there's a good chance that Phil Simms' entire commentary on the 
play will be, "Biakabutuka!  Biakabutuka!" (maybe he just likes saying 
"Biakabutuka").  There was no 4-3 offense in my team's playbook, so I went 
with the 3-4 formation instead.  Despite the fact that I used the 3-4 
formation on every single defensive play in the game, Dick Enberg 
constantly repeated throughout the game, "They're going with a three-man 
front!" as if it was a new development.
  Despite all of its crippling flaws, there are times when NFL GameDay 2000 
shows the flashes of brilliance than were commonplace in GameDay '96, '97, 
and '98.  However, it's still only slightly better than GameDay '99 overall, 
and it's nowhere near as good as Madden.

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