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July 18, 2006 | 11:20 PM PST
by: John Thomas Perkowski
EA Games spent a lot of money on getting exclusive rights to the NFL franchises. Not one to let a liscense go to waste, EA decided to branch out from he football field to the coaches office. NFL Head Coach takes you off the field and into the coach's seat for a chance to play as the guy in charge. But is it for everyone? Can the casual gamer, or even the casual football fan get into this? Well, the simple answer would be: No, this isn't a game for the casual fan. Unless you are fond of stat tracking, number crunching, and strategizeing, this game isn't for you. But the real truth is, the game is a complex and deep coach simulation that hardcore fans of football will get hours out of.
The game sports a decent, though by no means in depth, character creation tool. Think of it as a lite version of Tiger Wood's PGA Tour Golf's gameface mode. Though it does have myriad of choices, its not the in depth tool it should have been. Outfit options are lacking, facial details don't vary enough. Even so, you'll still make a close approximation to anything you want. You start out as the defensive coach for the newly crowned superbowl champions, The Pittsburgh Steelers. Now one of the hottest commodities of the coaching market, your custom designed create-a-coach has his pick for the head coach job at any major football franchise. Will you go for the sure thing and stick with the Steelers? Or will you try to build up a dead franchise, like the Oiler's. The choice is yours, as are, unfortunately, the problems.
The biggest issue with the game is the lack of control over your own avatar's life. It's not so much that you can't decided whom to fire and whom to hire. Its you can't do those tasks until the game allows you to do them. This means you only negotiate when the game lets you, you only send out scouts when he game lets you, and you can only receive calls from agents at specific times of day. If this is an accurate look at a real head coach's life, they must have one of the most planned out and boring lives you ever encountered.
Still, there is a lot to do in this game. Before you even get to play the first pre-season practice game, you will spend upwards of ten hours scouting players, setting up plays in your playbook, adjusting lines and formations, and mulling over your draft picks. The sheer volume of detail is intimidating. Gradually, you'll begin to figure things out, and things will become second nature. Unfortunately, its also boring and time consuming. As an example, lets take scouting a new player.
You scout up to eight players at once. Now lets consider the number of players up for grabs at any one time. The numerous free agents, draft picks, and people you can lure away pre-season. The sheer number of picks is staggering, and you can only scout eight at a time. This wouldn't be so bad if you could increase this number by devoting a day, instead of a few hours in a day, to it. But that lack of free will kicks in, and your forced to write down your picks and choices on a notepad as you progress through the day. When you need a separate space to write something down that should be easily accessible in the game, you have design issues. Things will get more tedious as time goes on. The time will come when you have a meeting, and your just rapidly pressing the A button just to get through the conversation as quickly as possible. You stop caring about the salary cap or their demands; You just want to get it over with so you can get to the good stuff.
The good stuff is watching your decisions and choices unfold as the actual team starts practicing. You actually get a real sense of accomplishment as time unfolds. If you worried, for example, that spending the extra million on that rookie was a bad idea. You can see how he plays, how he works with his fellow team members, and how good a scrambler he is when being chased down by the defensive line. If you take the time to do all those annoying and tedious tasks pre-season, the actual football games become enjoyable. You all the plays the team runs, while giving motivation to those that need it. Of course, you only have two motivation choices. Yell at them or give them encouragement. The only problem with this is if one person ont he team is screwing up, you can't single that person out... You can only address the whole team. Mind you, you can still substitute players at will, but often you'll be wishing for a bit more options to motivate people.
The graphics are passable, at best. Its basically Madden 2k6 without any of the upgrades that are coming this year. Considering the up close and personal nature of the game, they could have done a lot better. Sound is equally average, with a special note on the music. Instead of the lisensced soundtracks you have to suffer through on the Madden games, you get real NFL style music. This adds a lot of atmosphere to the game, and is one of the few bright spots you can find in the game.
However, this isn't a casual gamer's type of game. This isn't even for most fans of EA's Madden series. This is truly a game for Football fans interested in experiencing the complexity of the life of an NFL Head Coach.
The game sports a decent, though by no means in depth, character creation tool. Think of it as a lite version of Tiger Wood's PGA Tour Golf's gameface mode. Though it does have myriad of choices, its not the in depth tool it should have been. Outfit options are lacking, facial details don't vary enough. Even so, you'll still make a close approximation to anything you want. You start out as the defensive coach for the newly crowned superbowl champions, The Pittsburgh Steelers. Now one of the hottest commodities of the coaching market, your custom designed create-a-coach has his pick for the head coach job at any major football franchise. Will you go for the sure thing and stick with the Steelers? Or will you try to build up a dead franchise, like the Oiler's. The choice is yours, as are, unfortunately, the problems.
The biggest issue with the game is the lack of control over your own avatar's life. It's not so much that you can't decided whom to fire and whom to hire. Its you can't do those tasks until the game allows you to do them. This means you only negotiate when the game lets you, you only send out scouts when he game lets you, and you can only receive calls from agents at specific times of day. If this is an accurate look at a real head coach's life, they must have one of the most planned out and boring lives you ever encountered.
Still, there is a lot to do in this game. Before you even get to play the first pre-season practice game, you will spend upwards of ten hours scouting players, setting up plays in your playbook, adjusting lines and formations, and mulling over your draft picks. The sheer volume of detail is intimidating. Gradually, you'll begin to figure things out, and things will become second nature. Unfortunately, its also boring and time consuming. As an example, lets take scouting a new player.
You scout up to eight players at once. Now lets consider the number of players up for grabs at any one time. The numerous free agents, draft picks, and people you can lure away pre-season. The sheer number of picks is staggering, and you can only scout eight at a time. This wouldn't be so bad if you could increase this number by devoting a day, instead of a few hours in a day, to it. But that lack of free will kicks in, and your forced to write down your picks and choices on a notepad as you progress through the day. When you need a separate space to write something down that should be easily accessible in the game, you have design issues. Things will get more tedious as time goes on. The time will come when you have a meeting, and your just rapidly pressing the A button just to get through the conversation as quickly as possible. You stop caring about the salary cap or their demands; You just want to get it over with so you can get to the good stuff.
The good stuff is watching your decisions and choices unfold as the actual team starts practicing. You actually get a real sense of accomplishment as time unfolds. If you worried, for example, that spending the extra million on that rookie was a bad idea. You can see how he plays, how he works with his fellow team members, and how good a scrambler he is when being chased down by the defensive line. If you take the time to do all those annoying and tedious tasks pre-season, the actual football games become enjoyable. You all the plays the team runs, while giving motivation to those that need it. Of course, you only have two motivation choices. Yell at them or give them encouragement. The only problem with this is if one person ont he team is screwing up, you can't single that person out... You can only address the whole team. Mind you, you can still substitute players at will, but often you'll be wishing for a bit more options to motivate people.
The graphics are passable, at best. Its basically Madden 2k6 without any of the upgrades that are coming this year. Considering the up close and personal nature of the game, they could have done a lot better. Sound is equally average, with a special note on the music. Instead of the lisensced soundtracks you have to suffer through on the Madden games, you get real NFL style music. This adds a lot of atmosphere to the game, and is one of the few bright spots you can find in the game.
However, this isn't a casual gamer's type of game. This isn't even for most fans of EA's Madden series. This is truly a game for Football fans interested in experiencing the complexity of the life of an NFL Head Coach.
February 8, 2010
