The big man plays small ball. Review

The big man plays small ball.

There’s nothing worse than running into an ex, especially when you only see the

back of their head. This happened to me recently at a restaurant; before

she turned around, I figured it was possibly someone to hit on. Then when she

turned to take my order, she became all too familiar. She still looked okay,

but my excitement quickly turned to apathy, which then turned into an uncontrollable

urge to run screaming in the opposite direction.

Madden NFL 2005 for the Nintendo DS faces the same issue. While

it manages to find a couple interesting uses for the new touch-screen functionality,

it’s

missing a slew of features that have been in Madden games since

the original Playstation was still a force. The series has

come a long way since then and it’s

difficult to look back with anything other than disinterest. It might be the

best football game currently available for the DS, but that’s because it’s

the

only one.

The

modes offer less than what we’ve come to expect. The

ubiquitous Exhibition, Season, and Multiplayer (which requires one copy of the

game for every DS) are here alongside icing like the Two-minute drill

and Situation mode.

Completely missing is any sort of Franchise mode, which

has always been the meat of Madden.

A Franchise mode would have suited Madden DS exceptionally

well, since it would have allowed gamers to take their dynasty with them wherever

they went and tweak their team to their heart’s content at home, in the office,

or in study-hall. The failure to include a Franchise is a major

oversight that drastically reduces the value and playability of the game.

The gameplay itself is classic Madden with a couple touch-screen

twists. You can still sprint, spin, dive, juke and stiff-arm while running with

the ball, and you can swat, dive, sprint and change players on defense; none

of that has changed. But now, you can watch the top-screen

for the typical Madden 3D view or you can watch a 2D overhead

display on the bottom screen where offensive and defensive players are denoted

by Os and Xs, respectively.

This latter view works well during passing plays because you get a better picture

of the open spaces on the field. You can even pass to receivers by tapping

their icons with the stylus. It doesn’t matter

how hard you tap the touch-screen, though, because the input is completely

digital. In turn, you don’t have

any control over what kind of passes you throw with the stylus and there’s

usually a moment of lag between tapping and throwing…assuming you manage

to tap your receiver on the first try.

If

you miss your receiver and tap the turf, your quarterback won’t send the ball

there, and that’s a good thing. On the flip-side, you can’t throw to a given

spot on the field even if you want to. Since you can clearly see your receivers’ routes

and the open spaces on the field, the ability to pick a choice spot and send

the ball there would have been sweet. Too bad EA didn’t make the play.

You can also use the touch-pad to call audibles and assign hot routes, even though

it’s faster to simply use the buttons. If you decide that you want to take

your tight-end or tail-back off their route to block, you’re out of luck, because

there is no block option in the hot-routes menu.

The kicking game has been modified for the worse. Instead of the trajectory arrow,

kickers now must stop two markers as they slide along two meters; one signifies

power, while the other aims left to right. Vertical trajectory is a foregone

conclusion, making squib kicks impossible and precision punting an imprecise

pain in the ass.

Like a player with a bad attitude, Madden DS‘s weak graphics

hurt the whole game. The top and bottom screens are like different sides of

the same ugly coin. The top screen, with its traditional 3D look and rendered

players, attempts way too much. The players all use the same model and the framerate

is not very smooth. It even lacks hand-off and toss animations; instead of watching

the quarterback give the ball to the running-back, the darn thing teleports in.

You don’t even see the ball fly through the air, making it almost impossible

to figure out who you’re supposed to be controlling

until he gets tackled.

The bottom screen, meanwhile,

is just a flat, green field. It’s simple and useful, but lacks

flair. Both screens should have at least shared the same graphical quality while

providing two distinct points of view.

Madden DS doesn’t sound very good, either. John Madden and

Al Michaels don’t have a lot to say, which is good, but there’s only one grunt

effect in the game, which is bad. This lone grunt is played loud and clear

every time two players collide for any reason. So, for example, every running

play sounds a lot like “Hurk! Hurk! Hurk…Hurk, Hurk…Hurk! Hurk!” More

like “Blech.”

Madden cards and tokens are back, so you can unlock new modes and cheats if you’re

up to playing through the season multiple times. You can also play head-to-head

with a friend wirelessly if he’s nearby and equipped with a copy of the game

and a DS as well. The game runs just as well when played with a friend as it

does when played alone. For some

reason, the stylus doesn’t work in head-to-head mode, but that’s

no big loss.

Madden NFL 2005 for the DS is, at the very least, a functional

football game. You can do many of the things you could do in normal Madden games,

just not quite as well. Unfortunately, the lack of any sort of Franchise mode

cripples the replayability, making this little more than a decent romp on the

gridiron in between rest stops.