Blitz: The League (Sony PlayStation 2, 2005)

What a fresh perspective on football, just like the old NFL Blitz series. The campaign mode is awesome, once you get a hang of how to play the game. You develop your own players from the QB, RB, DE, K, create the Stars of the Team and bring them up the ranks of elitedom using training, equipment, and of course, cheating with juice. This game is not supposed to be tied to the NFL and is totally unrealistic. Bone cracking injuries happen quite often, and in fact, you WANT to unleash season-ending injuries while preventing your own players from getting smacked. The point is to win at all cost.

The game won't teach your 7-8 year olds good social values and hence should be avoided at all cost for younger audiences. The language in this game is like an R movie, and I'm going to say even worse than Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Add to that scantily dressed cheerleaders and the such, and you've got an extremely controversial game.

However, the fun factor of this game was enough to give a big 5/5 rating. It is reminiscence of the older Madden games when the ambulance would drive on to the field and the endzone celebrations were fun and taunting.

Ilike that it is a no holds barred game of football.The gameplay is for ages 18 and up due to the content.The visuals of the injuries are really indepth to the real life.Things that i love about the game are the 30 yard challenge to get a first down,the training at the start of the game,unlockables items,and the build your 3 core players for the team.Cut scenes are good and the training room is helpful with player attributes.The tier system is a new change of place from the old blitz games.The players cussing is a little over done in the game.The slight dislike is how they start you in division 3 and make you win to get in to division 2 and division 1.Old blitz games had the teams listed so you could see who you beat and who was left.Kicking field goals,punts,and kickoffs are a learning procedure you have to know your keypad on your controller to be sucessful.Otherwise it is a good game to have if you are a fan of pro football and like to break rules and things to win and with the motto of the game win at any cost is true.

When the NFL took the sponsorship of the NFL from Midway what they didn't know was that Midway would create a video game that would in many ways shed some life on the darker side of the Football Feild. With Blitz: The League there is no penalties, no ref's, basically no rules. The things i like the most about this game is the fact that the more sack's, yard losage, or injuries you put on the opposing team the better off you are. There are injuries abound, extra's to unlock, and a original campaign mode. Reason i bought this was because i had rented it previously and was impressed with the way they took things with the game. The fact that you can juice players, train them by buying equipment upgrades, buying training upgrades, or just by having them do two exorcise options.

The fictional League has a valued history that dates back to the late 1800's. You can customize your Campaign team as much as possible including saying where they're from, their color's, their logo's, and the stadium you'll be playing in during Home games. For me it was a must buy, will i say it's better then NFL Madden? No i will not. Reason for that is that Madden and Blitz: The League are great in their own right. Both title's have great qualities. Will i say that Blitz: The League is innovative? Yes i will. Again reason for that is because Midway could've scrapped the project and decided to not release a football game. However they didn't and we were given a great football game. This is a rent before you buy but i strongly suggest buying this title....

Okay so you looked at the game on the shelf and said "Is it really worth the money?" I said the same thing. And to be honest with you I only played this game for about 3 days before it got a little boring. But let me tell you a little about the game first.

1. If you like football a lot, you will like it, and dislike it...why? Well Blitz doesn't use real life teams and say pretty much goodbye to a balanced team. You pretty much have a playmaker on each team that can do all the work and if he gets injured, it's pretty hard to beat anyone.

2. You will love the hits that send the other player about 10 ft, and the WWF body slams that you can smuther your opponent with. Injuries are the best on this game, killing the opposing teams QB with bone-crushing injuries that can take him out of the game indefinately.

3. Online this game is quit alright. Although it's hard to find that many people that are online. But when you do find an opponent online action kicks tail.

Overall on a scale of 1 to 10...I'd give this game an 8 or 9. It's a good game to buy.

I expected this game to be the like ESPN show, "Playmakers". That's exactly what I got. But I'm a serious football fan, someone who enjoys playing by the rules and getting the true on field feeling. I was used to playing Madden, and it's a very hard transition. The running game is very unrealistic, the players look like their moving slow, they have limited "turbo", and some running backs are impossible to tackle making defense a bore. Not to mention it's almost impossible to sack the QB because of the slow mo feature. Defense is somewhat fun, being able to unleash big hits on unsuspected recievers and backs, but is hard to get the hang of. The controls are somewhat similar to madden, but much more basic. There are no swim moves on the defensive line, no pass rush, just a full out sprint. The passing game is fairly easy. Almost every pass is completed and most of the time the defense tips the ball 30 yards down field(since when does that happen?). Fumbles occur very often and in very crucial moments. I mean yea, cheating and juicing up is cool andall, but it gets old very quick. And don't let me forget, the teams are not real...this game is in no way related to the NFL. So your probably saying okay okay, so you hate it, give me the bottom line(and believe me,I could continue to go on). So here it is...heres the basic statement. If your used to playing the madden, espn, or any other realistic football series, rent this game first to see if it is to your liking.