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DJ's Blog

Back to 6th-grade

Posted on November 19, 2008 at 05:23 PM.

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It sure felt like that today when I walked into my local Gamestop and purchased Tecmo Bowl: Kickoff for the Nintendo DS.

I have played a couple of quick games so far and here's my initial thoughts:

Classic Tecmo gameplay, so everyone that played the old games will have no trouble getting into this one. The stylus controls are pretty responsive but I think I'll stick to the classic button controls.

One neat twist is that you actually change sides of the field during the game; meaning you play L-to-R for two quarters and R-to-L the other two. It takes a bit to get used to going the "opposite" way but I like it, adds to the challenge.

Players are a little slower than the NES versions. I saw a couple of fumbles in my games and also saw a couple of open WR drop passes. Not too concerned with either of those things, although I will watch the fumble frequency.

I can't believe no one mentioned this: when you start the game up, you see a list of all the teams. In the division that mimmicks the NFC East, you'll see Dallas, Washington, Philly and LA?!? Oh wait, it gets better. LA's nickname? SUPERCOCKS!!!! I am dead serious. I laughed for a good minute at that one. I'm a big Giants fan, but man, I don't know if I can change that name. I thought Tecmo had the "no bad words" filter on? Cassel's name can't get in but this team name does? Hmm.

As mentioned above, the logo and uniform editor aren't expansive, but you can get close on the colors for the NFL teams. You can also edit player attributes, so that might help make some of the players run faster, etc. It's capped at certain numbers, so you can't max out your guys right away.

You can edit all the names and numbers. I'm thinking instead of doing all current rosters I'll do some current, some classic and like with the Giants one I've started, do an all-time great team, with a mix of past and present players.

I'll be playing a lot more but so far, really like what I'm seeing.