NFL QB Club 2002: A Club That You Don't Want To Join
Written: Jan 20 '02 (Updated Jan 23 '02)
Product Rating:
Pros: QB Challenge Mode, Decent Controls, Player Animations
Cons: Glitches All Over, Easy AI, No Franchise, Not At All Madden
The Bottom Line: I'm not a big fan of QB Club 2002. While it has a nice Challenge mode, good controls, and nice player animations, it doesn't stack up with the competition.
pavona21's Full Review: NFL QB Club 2002 for GameCube
Background: Behind The Disappointment
Just for starters, I would like to mention that it has been one entire week since I last reviewed a game. What did I do on my vacation you ask? Munched down some ham sandwiches, played video games, and of course read and rated your reviews. In case you wanted to know, the addiction has yet to die down. I was just saving this review for a special occasion in which I would be in a bad enough mood to speak my mind about this game. If you work for Acclaim and or helped develop this game, than I would highly recommend that you press the back button now. For all you that don't work for Acclaim, sit back, get a beverage, put on your reading glasses, and enjoy.
If I'll say it once, I'll say it 1000 times; I don't like Acclaim at all, not one bit. I don't enjoy their game play, their titles, or even their name. When it comes to the video game sports industry, acclaim has always been seen as a floor mat compared to EA sports and even midway. But, the one thing that always was intriguing about their games was the top of the line graphics that they showed off. I can now recall the times of QB club 2000. I looked, watched, and played that game and I was amazed by the excellent graphics. The game play was just a few miles from fun, but the graphics were wonderful. So, once I realized that QB club 2002 was going to be a "Next Generation" video game, I knew that I had to play it. It first came out for ps2, and later came out for GC. Even though I have both in my house, I decided to do exactly what I usually do. (Eat a ham sandwich? Nope.) I easily made the decision to sit it out, and wait for it to be released for Gamecube. So, it was release towards the end of last year, but wasn't a top priority on my "games to play" list. But, last week, I finally got around to it, and rented this game. This review is a testament to how in almost all cases; games that were bad will be bad again, sometimes even worse.
Game Modes: Where Is Franchise, And Where Did You Come From?
If you look too quickly, you may just mistake this game for a very, very basic football game. At first glance, you will see all the usuals here. You got your practice, your exhibition, your simulation (situation), your season, and your playoffs. I'm sure that you're sitting on your computer in total awe thinking: What, did you just forget to say that this game has a franchise mode, or does it really not have a franchise mode? Well, the later is true; there is no franchise mode in this game. To me, a football game without a franchise mode is like refrigerated hot chocolate, it’s just not great. Ever since the dawning of the franchise in Madden 98, it's almost been a necessity to have a franchise mode in a football game. Without it, this game clearly lacks the replay value of games such as madden 2002. But, these modes aren't all bad. Acclaim decided to bring back the "Qb Challenge" mode, which was, is, and always will be a great mode.
QB Challenge: Nostalgia Heads The List
The best, if not only thing that this game has going for it is it's exclusive license to the NFL QB Club. I can remember the days of QB club for the SNES like yesterday. My former next door neighbor and I would sit for hours enjoying the QB Challenge mode on my QB Club 96 for SNES. So, when I noticed that this game had brought back the Challenge mode, I couldn't have been happier. The QB challenge mode is a competition full of mini games if you will. There are 4 modes inside of the challenge mode. You have speed and mobility, accuracy, read and recognition, and distance throw challenges. Here you will test how fast and agile your Qb is, how accurate he can throw, how well he can read coverage and routes, and how far he can throw. In this mode, you can either play alone, or with friends. (Imaginary ones don't count) Another good feature of this mode is that not only can you pick from one of many current QB's, but you can also make some older QB's walk out of the old folk’s home, and play with you. All the currents+former greats like Marino=good. Sadly though, this is by far the best part of the game, and it alone does not make up for what the game lacks.
Gameplay: Controls And Feel
For a football simulation, QB club plays quite awkward, even on paper. For some reason or another, Acclaim created this game as a mix between a realistic football simulation, and an arcade football game like Blitz. While QB club stays true to the core football rules and basics, you can do a lot of things in this game that you can't do in real life. You can turn on a dime, dive very far, and spin around and around so quickly that you'll want to hurl. While the concept of half-real, half fake may sound good, it just doesn't seem to come together here. The controls themselves are nothing that you haven't seen before. As a matter of fact, they’re almost exactly like Madden. For example, when passing you just snap the ball, bring up the passing screen, and throw a button based pass.(A+A+button) When you're are running the ball, you can also do various jukes, jives, and stiff arms, but they aren't all too effective. You'll have much better luck just trying to run around the defender and burn him with some blazing speed, than to try to finesse around, in or through him. The controls are also very responsive, and very rarely will you feel like your player did something that you didn't want him to. If you've ever played a football game before, the controls will be easy to learn, and will please your hands.
Here, I'd also like to note the problems in play calling. While there is a cool new advanced defensive play calling style where you pick the formation of the both the play and the coverage, the rest of the play calling is quite poor. First off, when accessing your playbook, you can only view one play at a time. Yes, there are 3 plays on the screen, but only one comes up with an illustration at a time. I know it doesn't sound like much, but it limits your options slightly, and seems like a change for the worse. Once you learn your playbook though, you'll be just fine. You'll know what the FL Post does, and whether or not it works all in time. As for the playbooks as a whole, from team to team they all seem pretty much the same to me. While teams do differ in formations sometimes, their plays are essentially the same.
Gameplay: Computer AI
I must bring up the fact that this game is WAY too easy. For starters, you can not go wrong with the passing game. You run a fly with a receiver, the QB throws a 40 yard pass, the receiver catches the pass, and the receiver runs for a touchdown. You'll see play after play after play just like this. Even when adjusting the difficulty level to the most difficult setting, this still will work way too often. Running the ball is no more a challenge than was passing the ball. Even on the hardest skill level, if you can't rush for 6-7 yards a rush, than you should no longer live. Often times, the D line will be dominated by your O-line, and you'll spring out for a big play. While adjusting the skill level does change the game from very easy, to easy, any hard core football gamer will both be disappointed, and win every game.
Graphics: What Happened?
The graphics in this game are defiantly not eye popping, especially when compared to those of Madden. This game seems to take on a blurry, dark, and gloomy look most times. You just won't see the vibrant colors that you have come to know and love on Madden. The textures in this game are also quite embarrassing. Not only do they lack good color depth, but also if you're seizure prone than you better not play this game. At times while playing the textures the will flicker so badly that you'll wish that there was a mute button for the picture. The entire game seems to look very choppy, even in the animation department. While some animations move clearly and smoothly, they seem to be generally followed by very choppy animations. Say you're running a route with a wide receiver. While you move fluently, and quickly while running, when you jump up to catch the ball, everything changes. There will be many moments while playing this game where you'll get a little taste of skipping slow motion, even when don't want it. What's even worse is the crowd animation. While you may be used to the cardboard stand-up looking crowd, this will amaze you. The crowd is a sea of 2D blurry brown and green figures that nearly resemble vomit. It's flat out sickening that Acclaim could pick such ugly people to model the crowd after. The only saving grace for the graphics may be in the player animation. Any player that you know of and are a fan of will look almost exactly perfect in this game. The player's faces are well animated, and there are various expressions that the players will sport from time to time. While these graphics may stack up as average, if you've ever played Madden before, this game will look pretty ugly. I came in with high exceptions, and was disappointed to no end.
Sound: SNES Is Reborn
This game is commentation by the famous duo of Kevin Harlin and Bill Maas. The best word to describe their work is average. While they will show some emotion here and there, and make a witty remark from time to time, they do get redundant fast. The other thing that you have to love about both this football game, and all the other football games, are the stupid remarks that commentators make sometimes. You'll hear remarks about how bad a pass you just threw when your pass was actually right to a receiver, but he dropped it. I don't know why, but I find minor sound glitches such as that to be humorous in moderation. As for the sound effects, they are very primitive. They almost bring back the sheer nostalgia of Madden 97 for SNES, where all the sound effects you heard you could mimic. The booms, pops, pows, and bams do give the game an arcade like feel, but in terms of realism, they don't help at all. As for the crowd noises, they are quite average. The crowd will roar at times, and they will silence themselves at times, depending on what is happening in the game. Nothing bad, nothing great, the story of football video game sounds. Again, I've yet to play a football game with great sound and I bet I never will.
Overall: This Is Not Good
Overall, I didn't enjoy this game all too much. While the QB challenge mode is fun for a while, it can't cover the fact that the rest of the game is terrible. I rented and played this game for 5 days, and I had plenty enough of it. But you must remember, I am a hard-core football gamer, who has been playing madden since 1993. To me, after playing madden 2002 for so long, this game just didn't seem to stack up at all. If you want a football game geared towards beginners, than this game wouldn't be a bad rent. But if you enjoy football games like I do, and have played Madden 2001 or 2002, I would just avoid this game altogether. I could have spend my 5 dollars buying a quality ham sandwich, but no, I had to rent this game. At least I didn't buy it right?
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.