Thursday, April 26, 2007

All-Pro Football 2K8 News

Here is some new information on All-Pro Football 2K8 (thanks Gamespot):
Today, the publisher not only confirmed that there will be past NFL legends in the game, but also that there will be more than 240 of them.

Among the retired players to be featured in the game are Joe Montana, Dick Butkus, Warren Moon, John Elway, Barry Sanders, Johnny Unitas, Archie Manning, Gale Sayers, Ickey Woods, Bart Starr, Mike Ditka, and Jerry Rice. A list of players that made the cut for the game is posted on the
All-Pro Football 2K8 Web site.

Ickey Woods?

I can certainly see why the article's author would mention Ickey in-between Gale Sayers and Bart Starr. After all, he rushed for over 1,500 yards--in his career.

So some of these guys might not actually qualify for "legend" status. That's okay.

I think the legends approach may wind up not working as well as 2K Sports had hoped, though. For instance, when I think about Dick Butkus, I see him in my mind.

In a Bears jersey.

It's the same thing with Bart Starr, or Johnny Unitas, or Gale Sayers--all those guys are inextricably linked to their teams and their cities. I'm not sure I really care about Bart Starr if he's taken out of the context of Green Bay. And since we only get to play single seasons, we aren't going to get a chance to get used to them in another team's jersey.

More to the point, the fifteen-year old kids who need to buy this game have probably never heard of Bart Starr or Johnny Unitas. That's another problem.

This may just be a hangover for me from finding out that playing multiple seasons in a Franchise isn't included. With what we've come to expect today from sports games, All-Pro Football 2K8 has a feature set that's basically a mode, not a game.

Yet they're still going to be charging $59.95.

At that price point, I think they're going to have a very, very tough sell on their hands. I'll still pre-order a copy and hope that the game's great (note to Visual Concepts: shitty two-minute A.I. will not be tolerated this year), but it's looking a little sketchy right now.

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