 When
the Dreamcast was released in 1999, the game that sold me on it was NFL
2K. Last year, NFL 2K1 was a huge improvement on an
already excellent game. The addition of more player animations,
online play and an improved running game made NFL 2K1 the best
football videogame ever made. I knew that NFL 2K2 had a
lot to live up to but I didn't expect to feel so disappointed by such
a quality game.
You see, there's
nothing wrong with NFL 2K2. That's because it's
essentially the same game as NFL 2K1. Yes, there are more
(and different) player animations. Yes, the rosters are
updated. Yes, online play now includes stats tracking that can
monitor your win/loss percentage as well as how many games other
people disconnected before finishing. However, the core of the game
remains very similar to last year's version. After playing NFL
2K2 for the last two weeks, I got the sneaking suspicion that
Visual Concepts' attention wasn't as focused on the Dreamcast this
year. That's understandable considering that this is the last
version for the Dreamcast. The Xbox and PlayStation 2 get
versions of NFL 2K2 this year and that had to have had some effect on
the Dreamcast version.
There are some
differences between NFL 2K1 and NFL 2K2 aside from the
ones I've already mentioned above. The running game has been
made even more effective than last year. Perhaps too
effective. Running backs can now gain between five and ten yards
on almost every attempt. It doesn't seem to matter whether
you're running with Jerome Bettis, Priest Holmes or Corey Dillon, you're going to
gain yardage up the middle. Not that that's a huge problem, it's
just that NFL 2K1 had a really nice balance between being
too easy (NFL 2K2) and too hard (NFL 2K). The
passing game is a mixed bag now, with receivers seeming to drop a lot
more passes than they did before. Is this more realistic?
Maybe, but there doesn't seem to be any correlation between Pro Bowl
receivers and rookies now. They all drop passes with about
the same frequency. Of course, the vastly improved defensive AI makes
even getting a pass to the receiver more difficult.
 NFL
2K2 does feature a revamped graphics engine. Many of the
same animations are present from last year, but the player models have
been redone. Unfortunately, that's not a good thing in most
instances. The NFL 2K series' players have always looked
a little odd -- never really deformed, but strangely skinny and wiry in
most instances. Now, with the new player models, everyone looks
like they've bulked up on steroids. Some of the defensive
linemen have what appear to be redwood trees for arms. However,
with the new animations, even these odd looking players move in a realistic
fashion. New quarterback animations make the longer passes more
realistic because the quarterback has to take a few steps to "set up"
before letting a
bomb fly. Also, rollout plays are improved with a new
quarterback scramble animation that makes those formations more
exciting to use.
The NFL 2K series has
always been known for its excellent sound and commentary and NFL 2K2
is no exception. "Dan Stevens" and "Peter
O'Keefe" are back and are as fun to listen to as ever. Just
like last year, there are occasional goof-ups with the play calling
but nothing catastrophic. It actually sounds like they're
calling the game as they see it rather than simply doling out canned
comments on a situational basis like EA's Madden series is
still doing. One minor quibble is that the volume drops on the
announcers from time-to-time, making some comments hard to hear.
The on-field taunts and crowd noises are pretty much the same ones
from NFL 2K1.
 The
franchise, create-a-player and fantasy modes from last year are
present in this version as well and haven't received any substantial
changes. The franchise mode, in particular, does not approach
the quality of the Madden series.
I hate to sound so
down on NFL 2K2 because it's really a great game. If
you're a die-hard Dreamcast fan and have no intentions of getting any
other systems this year, the Dreamcast version of NFL 2K2 is by
no means a bad football game. It's just not as big a leap in
quality over NFL 2K1 that NFL 2K1 was over NFL 2K.
Maybe it's just the reality of this being the last incarnation of the
series for the Dreamcast making me seem so sour. NFL 2K2
is a great game and makes a fine send-off for the series from its
Dreamcast origins.
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