New NFL Fever Impressions!!!!!!!!!

NFL Fever:

Microsoft stopped by today and gave us a chance to play a near final version of NFL Fever, which will be shipping as an Xbox launch title this November 15.
The game includes several standard modes of play, such as practice, single game, and season. You can play up to 25 consecutive seasons within the game. One of the more interesting features we took a look at today that actually can affect the gameplay is the create-a-player feature. NFL Fever includes an interesting and fairly robust create-a-player feature. You can set your created player\'s ability to what you\'d like it to be in several different categories, such as acceleration, strength, agility, speed, and endurance.

Increasing your created player\'s abilities also increases the amount of money it\'ll take to sign him. A first-year star quarterback can go for two million, so you\'ll have to be smart about the team you create and how you spend your money since the salary cap is in effect. On top of that, your created player\'s abilities fluctuate from game to game based on his performance. So if you create a mediocre running back that you use effectively throughout the season, his performance ratings will be higher at the end of the season than when he started. Of course if the player has some tough games and simply doesn\'t perform all that well, his ratings will actually degrade. This fluctuating performance-rating system also directly affects the player\'s salary, so if your all-star quarterback has a great season, it\'s going to cost you even more money to resign him to a new contract than it did initially. If you can\'t juggle the money and resign him to a new contract, he\'ll go back into the free-agent pool and will most likely get picked up by one of the AI teams in the game.

The gameplay of NFL Fever 2002 feels like a mix of Madden 2002 and NFL 2K2. The controls are quite responsive and feature a slight touch of the Madden-style momentum-based physics system. Getting used to the game\'s default control setup took us about a game, but once we did, it felt pretty solid. Holding the A button gives you a turbo boost that runs out quickly. When you press the button, a little lighting-bolt symbol appears above your player, indicating that you\'re using the speed boost. To switch players you can either press the X button after the snap or press the shoulder buttons prior to the snap. In addition to the standard actions of tackling, spinning, and hurdling, you can even put your hands up in the air with the shoulder buttons. This comes in extremely handy when you\'re rushing the quarterback and it looks like he\'s about to throw the ball. One supercool thing you can do in NFL Fever is change a receiver\'s route on the fly. When your offense steps up to the line, you can simply press a button and select the receiver and the new route you want him to run. The running game in NFL Fever feels very solid, which is also tied into the impressive offensive and defensive line AI. Players on the field in general seem to react to the ball and to the play as it unfolds instead of following preset routines. The passing game however felt a bit awkward during the time we spent with it. It seems the ability to throw a lob pass or a bullet pass is dependant on the distance the quarterback has to throw. For instance, on short passes when you hold the button down, the quarterback will throw a bullet pass to the receiver. If you simply tap the button at that same distance, the quarterback will throw a softer lob pass through the air. At a great distance, however, whether you hold or tap the button, the quarterback will throw a high lob that\'s up for grabs. Pulling down a pass as a receiver seems fairly easy to do, especially when hitting a receiver who\'s running an out pattern.

Graphically NFL Fever looks very good. The detail of the player models and animation is amazing. You can actually see the player\'s eyeballs track the football and other players on the field when you look closely during a replay. During the actual game, the players look quite good. You can see their uniforms getting noticeably dirtier and soaked through with moisture. Their animations and facial features look more realistic than in any of the other football games we\'ve seen so far. The reflections and shadows are very impressive looking as they realistically change, and they actually look different depending on the lighting conditions. Some of the subtle touches that you can\'t help but notice include footprints left in the snow, dramatic field deterioration, teeth, facial animations, and a very animated and impressive-looking crowd.
The title-screen music of NFL Fever 2002 is a remix of a popular song titled "Rockstar Poser" by N.E.R.D. The only other licensed music we heard in the game was from the NFL. The sound effects, play-by-play, and color commentary announcing were also very impressive. One especially cool fact we found out today is that the designers recorded extra common names for cities and people so that when you create a player with your name or a team from the US city you choose, you\'ll hear the announcer call out that name. Plus the commentary is reactive to your overall performance over the season, so it knows whether or not it should say a certain player has been doing particularly well or not.

While we were certainly impressed with what we got a chance to play today, we\'ll have to wait and see how the final version of the game turns out. We\'ll hopefully be bringing you more as we get closer to the game\'s release date.



Whoa, it actually sounds awesome.  Even compareably to nfk 2k2 and madden 2k2.  M$ may have a hit on there hands.
:thepimp: :thepimp: :thepimp: