The Time Is Near!

"Welcome to Madden NFL 2000. The New Millennium of Football." says John Madden
 as he appears on the side of a building at the end of a hip-hop, NFL
Films inspired opening intro. WE, of The FIRM $F$, have been fortunate enough to
be able to see advanced copies of JMF for the past couple of years now. This
preview is based on a 85% complete copy of the game, but after spending sometime
with the latest Madden game I can tell you that this is the DEEPEST, most
complete and CUSTOMIZABLE, Madden game any football fan will be able to get
their hands on for ANY home or PC system. Everything from the AI to the weather
can be set to your liking. It features a revamped FRANCHISE mode, a faster frame
rate, smoother gameplay, smarter Offensive and Defensive AI, a revamped PLAY
EDITOR and a new PLAYER EDITOR. Madden 2K will be able to boast a whopping 200
teams (after you ulock them all!), including ALL 31 NFL teams, Classic Teams of
the Past and special "Fantasy" teams, some of which will have to be "unlocked"
to gain access to them. This is NOT the John Madden Football were all used to
seeing, this is a whole NEW species! Madden 2000 looks like it's ready to blow
the rest of the competition away!


The A.I. and Gameplay


   The A.I. in Madden 2K has clearly been "beefed-up" so it will take brains (as
well as skill) to beat the CPU in even ALL-PRO mode. Their are four levels of
difficulty in Madden 2K (ROOKIE, PRO, ALL-PRO and ALL-MADDEN) which to test your
ability on. The AI in Madden can be CUSTOMIZED to your liking as well by using
the CUSTOM AI feature. With this feature you can adjust the play-calling
tendencies of the CPU. If you want the CPU to RUN the ball more or if you want
it to PASS more is entirely up to you now. Even Offensive and DEFENSIVE
strategies can be adjusted from CONSERVATIVE, NORMAL (Default) and AGGRESSIVE.
You can even adjust and customize your teams offensive and defensive
capabilities. For example, you can increase or decrease your QB Accy's, the
entire teams PASS & RUN blocking abilities or your receiver's Pass Catching
attributes. On the DEFENSIVE end of the ball, you can raise or lower, your
defender's TACKLING, INTERCEPTION & AWARENESS.
   This year's Madden will force you to RUN the ball more now because of the
great defensive AI that has been juiced up from last year's version. The
blocking schemes are done much better and you will find it easier to RUN the
ball (even on All-Madden level) though this does not mean you will be simply
RUNNING the ball on the CPU on every down. It seems the emphasis was put on
making Madden 2K a more RUN oriented game than a passing game. You will find
that to open up the PASSING game you'll have to get the CPU to "think" RUN and
catch the CPU when it's napping.
WE (The FIRM $F$) have not found any "Money Plays" in the game as of yet, and WE
don't believe there are any in the game. In this game, there are no "Crutch"
plays. The defense plays a tight game and with the inclusion of six Offensive
and Defensive audibles that you can choose from and set in your User Profile
(No, you still can't use your Custom Plays as an audible) all you arm-chair QB's
should be quite happy. The controls play well and are quite responsive, and are
very precise.Their is a TUTORIAL in the game now that will pop-up and give you
play hints during the game. Especially good for those of you who just jump into
the game without going over the instruction booklet. The DIRECTIONAL passing is
back and sharper than ever. The NB's and "Dime"- backs have been tweaked and
cover their on field assignments much better than last year. There are some
other surprises in the game concerning Gameplay but I'll leave some of that
stuff for you to discover on your own!


GRAPHICS


   The graphics are more detailed than last year's and the frame rate can be
adjusted from NORMAL (30 fps) to FASTEST (60 fps) for smoother Gameplay. In
fact, in the pre-game options, you can even adjust the size of ALL player's to
either SMALL, NORMAL or LARGE which doesn't affect their attributes at all. In
some cases, if you like to use the DEFAULT view setting you can set the player's
size to small or if you like the "Classic" view switch your player's to HUGE.
Lot's of details have been included in the game and the animations of the
player's. You'll notice player's moving their heads to where ever the ball is or
the REF is as he spots the ball. Helmets will fly off player's heads with hard,
bone-crunching tackles! Player's are scaled to size, where DT and LE's are big
and burly while DB's and WR's are tall and lean. The QB seems like a midget when
compared to some of the guy's on the feild. Referee's will even occasionally
gather and discuss calls in the middle of the game. All New TD, SACK and FIRST
DOWN celebrations have been added as well as Player's, coaches and film crews on
the sidelines. Though the player's who populate the sidelines look somewhat
better than those from NCAA 2K, it's the "cut scenes" where you see the sideline
player's in 3-D who are cheering and applauding for their respective team mates
that more than makes up for the slightly cheesy way they look during regular
gameplay. For the first time in any Madden game, Trash-Talking will be included
in the game. You'll hear player's making comments after big plays. Stadium
noises have also been included, for example, in the Meadowlands as the Jets I
could hear the Upperdeck crowd chanting: "J-E-T-S, JETS, JETS, JETS!". In the
Metrodome, the Viking Horn can clearly be hear as well. Some of the other
stadiums have their own special stadium noises as well.


FRANCHISE MODE


   Probably the most attractive feature on last year's Madden, the FRANCHISE
mode, is back and better than ever! This year you'll be able to play
multi-player franchise season's with your friends (or fellow League member's!).
Up to eight player's can compete on the PSX and up to 31 on the PC! The Drafts
in FRANCHISE Mode will not be flooded with talent as in last year's game. Also,
a new attribute has been added to every player's rating called POTENTIAL. The
higher the number the greater chance this player will become a All-Star player
on your team. A Franchise season will be broken down in this matter after the
Pro Bowl:

1) PLAYER PROGRESSION - Here you'll be able to check on any player in the league
to see in what attributes he went up or down in.

2) RETIREMENT - Say goodbye to old player's.

3) RE-SIGNING - Sign'em before they take off.

4) TRADES - Try and make trades with the CPU.

5) PROPOSED TRADES - The CPU now makes you an offer.

6) FREE AGENT SIGNING - Any STAR player's available?

7) DRAFT PREVIEW - You'll now be able to see who will be available in the
upcoming draft.

8) NFL DRAFT - Sign those draft picks that you were drooling over.

9) SIGN DRAFT PICKS - Sign'em up

10) NEW SEASON - Kick off the new season.

You'll also be able to switch Coaching jobs in the middle of your FRANCHISE and
begin coaching an building a new team!


SITUATION


   Another great feature in this year's Madden is the "Game Situation Editor" or
SITUATION Mode. With this feature you can create ANY type of Football situation.
The score, the spot of the ball, time on the clock, timeouts left...etc can be
set up and then executed by you. You can also relive 10 Classic NFL games. In
this mode, you be placed at a crucial moment in time in that particular game,
then you'll be asked to either repeat or change NFL history. By accomplishing
these task, you will "unlock" 20 Classic teams, including the '85 Bears, the '76
Raiders to name a few. You'll have to complete each game in order to advance to
the next one. You'll start off with the Classic '81 Miami - Charger game. You'll
be asked to play as the CHARGERS in the OT period with less than two minutes
left and lead the CHARGERS to victory! This is a great new feature!!!


PLAYBOOKS & USER PROFILES


   The TEAM SPECIFIC PLAYBOOKS are back, and you'll notice right away that half
of the plays from last year were carried over and revamped for Madden 2K. One
positive note I did pick up on is that when you switch a teams playbook with
another you'll not only get the Offensive plays but the Defensive plays as well!
This year's Madden will also allow you to make SUBS on ALL your Defensive sets
as well as Offensive sets. For example, the 4-3 defense is broken down into SIX
different sets which are NORMAL, EAGLE, HAWK, 8 MAN UNDER, 8 MAN OVER, 8 MAN
FRONT. The other defensive sets are basically broken down into NORMAL, UNDER &
OVER sets. That means no more of those SUB glitch problems that plagued
Madden'99. USER PROFILES will also allow you to play the "MADDEN CHALLENGE"
which will require you to accomplish certain task that you'll be rewarded with a
certain amount of points. Some of these task include throwing a 30+ yard pass or
running for 20+ yards on one carry and so on. These points, once you've acquired
enough of them will "unlock" secret codes for hidden stadiums, fantasy teams and
attribute codes. These codes are saved on your USER PROFILE. Also, for the first
time, as you play a game you'll be given a trivia question at the beginning of
the second quarter and you'll have till the third quarter to think about. If you
answer it corretly points will go towards your "Madden Challenge" total score.
The CUSTOM PLAYBOOK feature has also been redone for the better. Though you
won't be able to gather plays from various playbooks and put them together to
make another. Yet, you'll be able to store more plays than last years in a
CUSTOM PLAYBOOK. Last year's Madden only allowed you to store eight plays per
formation/set. Madden 2000 allows the USER to store 12 out of 15 plays!


THE PLAY EDITOR


   The PLAY EDITOR in Madden 2K has been over-hauled to give the user more
"freedom" to create plays that they couldn't create last year. I was able to
recreate most of the plays that we used on last year's game, though the plays
that were considered "money" last year you shouldn't bank on them this year.
They'll work, if you use them in the right situation and they'll bust if used in
the wrong situation. Plays such as the "SILKY SCREEN", the "DBL. SCREEN" and the
"DBL. LATERAL" are no longer the "money" plays they use to be because the
defensive AI now attacks the ball much better! The QB, WR's,'Backs and TE's have
more routes to run and the QB can now perform Play-Action. We'll also be able to
design GOOD run plays that we couldn't do in last year's Madden'99. The one
fault I can find is that the NB Glitch is still present in the Play Editor.
Hopefully, this will be taken care of before the release of the final product.


OTHER FEATURES & IMPROVEMENTS


   Other notable improvements, which I believe ALL you Maddenholics will
appreciate, is the "INSTANT REPLAY" has been revamped. EA has adjusted the
Instant Replay buffer so now you'll b able too see almost the entire play (or in
some cases THE entire play) from the snap of the ball to the last tackle.
Unfortunately, you won't be able to SAVE your favorite replays to memory card
like in NCAA 2K. :-(
   When you go into your ROSTERS, you can now not only reorder or get rid of
unwanted players, but by using the PLAYER EDITOR you can completely change every
detail of the player, including his size, skin color, weight and attributes.
You'll be limited to the number of player's you can edit because by even
changing their name will put them in the category of a Created Player. To access
the PLAYER EDITOR, go to your ROSTERS, highlight the player you wish to change,
then press the "X" button.
   Now even the WEATHER conditions during the game are CUSTOMIZABLE and can be
set to your liking. Weather conditions can vary from LITTLE to NORMAL to
RIDICULOUS. The most impressive of all the conditions has got to be the RAIN
conditions. No longer is RAIN just falling on you but you can set it to either
drizzle (LITTLE) or play in a Typhoon (RIDICULOUS), plus the booming sound of
thunder will roll across the heavens and flashes of lighting will light up the
field (during a night game). It just a sight you have to see to believe.
   Besides the preset CAMERA ANGLES that are in the game, you can use and set
your OWN camera angles for the game. By using the USER CAMERA feature you can
set up your PREPLAY camera angles, your NORMAL camera angles and your PASS & RUN
camera angles to use for the entire game. Once you've have it set up, save it in
your SETTING file on your memory card and you'll have it for every game. There
is also a "Coaches" cam, that allows you to view the routes on Offense and
Defense before the snap of the ball and a "Coaches Mode" that allows you to pick
the plays and lets the CPU run the play. All these features can be turned on or
off depending on your taste.



   All in all, Madden 2000 is every Madden lover's dream come true. I can't
remember ANY sports title giving the player this much freedom in a game. Madden
2000 is the most complete package ANYONE can expect from a football sim. From
the AI to the GAMEPLAY to the GRAPHICS and ALL the features, Madden has it all!
Sony and SEGA will be hard pressed to top this year's Madden. I don't know what
NFL GAMEDAY 2000 or NFL 2000 are offering but I'll be surprised if they are as
deep and challenging as Madden 2000!



The Grid-Iron Ghost $F$