[360/PS3] - Blitz: The League II Review

[AgtFox]

Blitz: The League II Review

Title: Blitz: The League II
Platform: 360/PS3
Developer: Midway
Publisher: Midway
ESRB: Mature
MSRP: $49.99 (360/PS3) - New Amazon Price (10/29)
Editor: Loren 'AgtFox' Halek

What's Hot: Literal bone crunching hits; Jay Mohr and Lawrence Taylor do good with what they’re given; Campaign mode is interesting

What's Not: Still the same old Blitz gameplay with new tweaks; after a while games become much of the same; why do I need to press buttons to have powerful kicks?; what is up with you not being able to PAT or 2-point convert after scoring at the end of the game still?

Back when the Blitz games first came out in the arcade and home consoles, I dropped quarters in the arcade version (it is probably the game that brought me back to arcades) and went so far as to buy multiple versions of the game for the different consoles. I remember reading magazines back then saying there were slight tweaks to each version, so I had to have each one. Ah, the naivety of youth (even though I was 21 when the first one came out)! Back then I thought this series was the best thing since sliced bread, but as the years and versions have passed, I started to see it was basically a yearly update much like Madden except there were never really any special new modes or tweaks to the gameplay that came before.

In 2004, with Electronic Arts having secured the NFL and NFLPA license, Midway came out with the original Blitz: The League. Lawrence Taylor was the lone notable ex-NFL player on the roster with Bill Romanowski coming later on in the 360 version. That game was a lot different in that freed from the NFL license, Midway allowed you to injure people on the field by doing dirty tackles. Add to this all the hookers, blow, steroids and other illegal drugs that were given out like candy that you could handle. Midway had obviously gone to the extreme with creating the game, hoping for a jump in sales. They even brought on Peter Egan, who had written the ESPN show called Playmakers, a show the NFL forced to be taken off the air since it had the same kind of ideas in it that would later show up in the Midway games.

Now we start off a new year of destruction with Blitz: The League II on the 360 and PS3. Lawrence Taylor is back as Quentin Sands, although this time he is pulled out of New York team and put on the new Franchise’s team by the Commissioner in order to screw with the Franchise after he pretty much spat in the Commish’s face by saying he would not play in Los Angeles and wanted to play for his hometown team. The Franchise is a player you create in Campaign mode, unfortunately all you can do is name him and there is no actual create player feature for the campaign mode. You answer nine questions from the press with Jay Mohr voicing your agent. The first two questions are tied directly to which positions you will play on offense and defense. The rest of the questions increase different skill bars to make yourself a good player at your positions. With that out of the way you can create your own team. I created the Minnesota Vikings and had the Viking purple all over their uniforms, so even though the real teams aren’t in the game you can at least create them if you want.

From there you do much like you did in the first game where you set up training for your team or have the computer automatically do it and try to win 5 out of 7 games in order to go through each of the three divisions in the league and win the overall championship. Along the way your smarmy agent, the Commissioner and others try to bring you into the underbelly of the world. You’ll get to bang a number of women and take a number of drugs, nothing is off limits in The League!

The graphics and sound in this game are pretty good. It certainly won’t win any graphical award or anything, but the uniforms can get awfully muddy in the rain and the lighting goes a little overboard when this happens. Outside of that the game does what it needs to: keeping the game going at a steady pace with no slowdown that I noticed. The sounds, especially the bone crunching hits, sound great and the soundtrack actually isn’t half bad even though I’m not big into hip-hop or rap.

The gameplay itself is the standard Blitz type of game with some tweaks that mirror the last game. You can do dirty hits by holding the left trigger and tackling. This will usually affect the other player by tweaking or breaking something in their body that will take them out for a number of plays or games. Watching the bones crack and blood spurt in a short movie is certainly not for the squeamish. If the player is on your team you often go into a mini-game where you try to aim a syringe into the right area or you use the two sticks to twist and snap a dislocated bone. The mini-games are actually quite fun and depending on how well you do them you can increase or decrease the player’s stamina.

One thing I cannot forgive this game for are the kicking mini-games. Each time you kickoff or try a field goal/PAT you have to hit buttons in succession like Simon. Kickoffs are the most annoying since it is a number of them to hit in order to have a powerful kick. Most of the time while playing I was missing some buttons and only kicked it about 10 yards ahead instead of a deep kick. This doesn’t help you when you’re in a close game because you give the computer or human opponent less of a field to score in.

Along with this you also get a bar where you can pull off special moves called Clash and Unleash. These are also done via the left trigger. While running you can press the button and go into a slow motion mode where you can hit or evade the oncoming defensive player and make them miss, giving you some good yardage. While being the quarterback you can use the button to evade oncoming players by pressing the left stick in the direction shown and you can also use it to throw a Clash ball. This then allows your receiver to move toward the target and hit Y to do an awesome catch and evade tacklers for a large gain. You can also use turbo for a little bit via the right trigger. Same thing goes on defense with the left trigger being used for both dirty tackles via the A or X button to injure a player. Just like on offense you can use the right trigger to use some turbo.

There is the campaign mode as explained above and there are also game specific situations and online play presented here. There are also four button combinations that you can use to do touchdown jigs. There are many codes to be learned and right off the bat you know a few. This is much like the special power codes you used to use before games in the old Blizt games. Online play is pretty fun just because it is honestly more challenging than playing against the computer and given how fast the game of Blitz is you can have a lot of enjoyable games.

Blitz: The League II is an engaging game from the start through a good chunk of early games. After a while it may start to get stale, but there are game situations and online play to choose from as well. The only question is whether the game is worth its $59.99 price or not. That’s a tough one and I think this game is an excellent example of one that could see higher sales had it come out at the $39.99 or even $49.99 price point. At the price of a regular 360/PS3 game it is tough to recommend, but is a good renter once you actually find time to play another game in this avalanche of games coming out.

Score: 3 out of 5 CoGs


Loren says, "Renting is your best bet at the $59.99 price point, the game should keep your interest for a while"

- Review this title yourself over at Play It Review It, part of the CoG Network

*Note - Review based upon 360 version of game

[Xerxes]

What's that? Midway is going under? Absurd.

[Superman's Dead]

I loved everything about the last Blitz game and played through it repeatedly with an old college roommate (even with that crazy difficulty), and it sounds like this is more of the same. Which is great.

Was there a big range in the different injuries or movies for each injury? I played defense just so I could hurt people and was a little disappointed at how few different animations there were.

[jpublic]

I strongly disagree with your claim that this series is like the original NFL Blitz games. Those were fast paced, fun, simple ARCADE games. B:TL is drug use, violence, and GTA grafted onto a J.Average football game.

If it had been like the NFL Blitz games, I would have loved it. As it is, if I'm going to play a game with the standard over-complex football game controls, I'll grab Madden, thanks.

[AgtFox]

Originally Posted by jpublic

I strongly disagree with your claim that this series is like the original NFL Blitz games. Those were fast paced, fun, simple ARCADE games. B:TL is drug use, violence, and GTA grafted onto a J.Average football game.

If it had been like the NFL Blitz games, I would have loved it. As it is, if I'm going to play a game with the standard over-complex football game controls, I'll grab Madden, thanks.

I'm trying to convey that the base gameplay is still very much like the old Blitz games. The additions of injuries, the drug giving mini-game, the story, etc. are all side things, the core Blitz gameplay is still very much there.

[AgtFox]

Originally Posted by Superman's Dead

I loved everything about the last Blitz game and played through it repeatedly with an old college roommate (even with that crazy difficulty), and it sounds like this is more of the same. Which is great.

Was there a big range in the different injuries or movies for each injury? I played defense just so I could hurt people and was a little disappointed at how few different animations there were.

There weren't a whole lot of injuries I saw, a lot of dislocations and stingers mostly. Then there is the total breaking of bones which is nasty. The movies eventually repeat themselves obviously. Listening to the bone crack as you try to twist the two analog sticks and then snap them together just sounds painful.

[jpublic]

Originally Posted by AgtFox

I'm trying to convey that the base gameplay is still very much like the old Blitz games. The additions of injuries, the drug giving mini-game, the story, etc. are all side things, the core Blitz gameplay is still very much there.

It's *nothing* like the old Blitz games. Look, NFL Blitz ran on 2-5 minute quarters, with 30-yard downs, and was a complete arcade game.

B:TL is, in its core FOOTBALL gameplay, remarkably similar to Madden.


The first can be picked up by anyone in about 60 seconds. The latter is relatively simple if you know football games, but has a steep learning curve if you do not.

[AgtFox]

Originally Posted by jpublic

It's *nothing* like the old Blitz games. Look, NFL Blitz ran on 2-5 minute quarters, with 30-yard downs, and was a complete arcade game.

B:TL is, in its core FOOTBALL gameplay, remarkably similar to Madden.

The first can be picked up by anyone in about 60 seconds. The latter is relatively simple if you know football games, but has a steep learning curve if you do not.

We'll agree to disagree. The 30 yard first downs are here, the 2 minute quarters are here and it is basically an arcade football game. To say it is similar to Madden is way off, you don't have near the options at quarterback or really any other position as you would in Madden.

[Johan]

I've never played the Blitz games, but I was going to say it sounded a lot like GTA - The Football Version, which jpublic alluded to.

Not sure if that interests me or not. I know I'm not interested in Madden much, that's for sure.

[Shjinta]

I only played the crap out of the other X360 one because I got it at Walmart for like 10$ and i loved to watch the x-ray view of me fucking up someone. Now with these new injuries I see hours of squirming as I break someone.

[AgtFox]

For those that care, EB/Gamestop currently has the game for $39.99 and Best Buy/Amazon have it for $49.99. At the EB/Gamestop price I would ponder buying it, but maybe wait for it to go a bit lower. No idea if this is a permanent reduction in any of the cases or not.

[Stmfuller]

$40 makes it better. but I think I'll wait for bargin bin.