Madden NFL 2000
- January 01, 2000 00:00 AM PST
Back-to-back brilliance - EA Sports once again shows its mastery of all things sporting with Madden NFL 2000.
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This year's Madden doesn't make the quantum leap that last year's made over its predecessor-but it didn't need to make one. Developer Tiburon Entertainment created a solid foundation last year, and now it's a matter of tuning and tweaking the features, graphics, and gameplay.
The refinements are immediately noticeable. There's actually a running game this year! Now you control whether you juke left or right and can bust one the distance. Runs of four, five, eight, or nine yards are common.
Of course, if your opponent calls the right defense or plays it well, you can also lose four or five yards. Madden's forte has always been great, realistic gameplay, and this year is no different. It's an incredibly well-balanced football game, one that feels true-to-life in that, for every great offensive play, there's a defensive play that will shut it down and change the game's momentum.
Almost nothing is as momentum-changing as an interception, and this year's version rewards good defense. Unlike previous versions, if you're all over the receiver like a blanket and make a play on the ball, you will be rewarded with the pick.
Other cosmetic improvements include better player models so that huge linemen dwarf small defensive backs and wide receivers; faster gameplay that feels about a half-step ahead of last year's version; and a bevy of new motion-captured animations of Terrell Owens and Jamal Anderson.
A lot of those new animations are celebrations - Jamal's dirty bird dance, boxing with the goalpost after a score, high-fives, and the repetitive "incomplete" sign when a pass is knocked down.
But others really add to the realism, such as the way quarterbacks throw off their back foot if they're backpedalling when you hit the pass button. The new catch animations are also excellent, and EA is now factoring in the size of the running backs and their tacklers to judge how far a ballcarrier struggles forward before dropping. If the halfback is big enough, he'll even run right over some players, as I was able to do with Jerome Bettis.
Strategic improvements include the ability to not only call "audibles" at the line of scrimmage, but also designate a "hot receiver," which lets you change his pass pattern if you see something before the snap. Route-based passing lets you throw to a spot so you can zing the down-and-out pass before the receiver makes his break.
The play editor and franchise modes are also a bit more robust, and a new "Madden Challenge" feature tasks you with meeting certain goals (complete a 30-yard pass, have a run longer than 20 yards, beat the Packers in the snow at Lambeau) to gain points so that you can unlock extra teams and situations.
It's a nice extra in a game that doesn't really need gimmicks. Madden NFL 2000's excellent strategy and beautiful graphics alone will take it to the Super Bowl.
