I know a lot of people are defending this game because of its low budget, but the same company made Melbourne Cup Challenge on PS2 which is probably the best horse racing game of all time. This game lacks many gameplay elements. I have played every footy game to hit a console. The best ones include: footy on the NES and AFL 99 on ps1. This game is worse than those two, but slightly better than some of the PS2 versions. (except AFL 2004). The presentaton and menus in this are one of the strong points and the player detail is very impressive. Commentary is appalling. I have now played this game for around 10 hours and at times have found it entertaining. Ive played online which is a strong point in the game and Im up to round 7 in season mode playing on legend difficulty. I have won every game on the hardest difficulty setting meaning its a bit easy. Also im playing as Footscray. Although the game can be fun there is huge gameplay issues: Players often run past the ball without picking it up - Players marking the ball on the chest from behind - Players arent pinned for holding the ball with prior oppurtunity - There is barely an evade system, the right analogue stick should be used to evade/sidestep. The game also becomes a tackle fest as you can never tell who is going to take possession of the ball, so the safe option is to hold down tackle button while chasing the ball/ball carrier. - You cant keep the ball in when on the out of bounds line. With all of these issues you have a lot less control, and it can be a bit of a finger breaker with its backward controls method. I hear there may be a patch coming out to fix these problems, but it would have to make a big improvement as im thinking about returning this to the shop
The game is by no means perfect, but considering its a game made by a small company in Brisbane, for a very small market, its extremely good. Some may be disappointed by the old school graphics and annoying crowd noise,... Read Full Review
Upon loading up the game and being treated to some Hunters and Collectors I had a warm feeling inside sensing Big Ant really wanted this to feel like a true AFL game. Of course I dived straight into a match and it was... Read Full Review
