 |
| Check out those weather and lighting effects... |
Madden NFL 06 eschews any play-by-play or commentary from Madden himself
during plays, instead opting for a “hometown” radio broadcaster. It is pretty
cool to hear the announcer get excited when you pull off a big play, but this is
tempered by the shortlist of phrases you’ll hear. There is such a shortage of
sound bites that things will begin sound repetitive within a single game. This
is a step back to the very first days when announcers were added to football
games and you’d think with all that space on an Xbox 360 disk that they could
have recorded more lines of dialog.
And now for the really strange thing about next-gen football – the game
features a leap forward in graphics, and changes to play-calling, kicking, and
the QB Vision cone, but inexplicably has fewer gameplay features over all than
versions of the game on other consoles. There are no practice modes, no game
situational plays, and no preseason mini-camps, just to mention a few of the
absent features. Granted, I am one of those players that rarely cares to play
any of the other modes outside of franchise games, but it’s kind of odd that
they’ve been removed. Now that they’re gone, I kind of miss them and wish I
could play them. I squandered my chance and now must live with quick games, a
basic franchise mode, and online play
Speaking of online play, Madden NFL 06 comes with Xbox Live support for both
ranked and unranked gameplay. You can challenge other gamers (or be challenged
yourself) to ranked gameplay and move your way up (or down) the leader boards).
Unranked play is available for those that just want to have fun and are looking
for a casual game. The game plays nicely online, without any noticeable hiccups
or lag. There aren’t a lot of bells and whistles in the online pay either, but
it performs just fine when you want to go up against a human opponent.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated:
80%. Next-gen football with great graphics that seem to have come at the
expense of gameplay options found in current-gen versions of the game.
« Page 1 of 2
