I am just going to put this out there now and get it done with: I didn’t like Tecmo Bowl and as a Brit, not that that matters, I’m not a fan of American football either.
Sure, it’s a big deal for the USA, but the endless stoppages, strategies and pace just don’t do anything for me. That wouldn’t stop me from playing a game, but having played this on the NES Online, it’s headed straight to that pile of ‘never to be played again’.
Tecmo Bowl is realistic to real American football in that the game stops quite frequently and then you need to put in your play. The Waterboy made this more palatable as did The Blind Side, but that’s because they didn’t show much of the actual game. The only thing I like about American football is the half time show, the cheerleading and the annual Bad Lip Reading. Sorry, Tecmo Bowl fans.
It’s not the first American football game I’ve played – I’ve played a few of the Madden games – the last one probably being Madden 08 which I have to say, at the time was stunning. EA does produce some good-looking games. I was playing some American friends at the time so to say that they had the advantage (I still don’t get the rules) was an understatement.
In my collections, I’ve often been able to pick up cheap variations as most people in the UK don’t play these games (that I know of), so I’ve had things like Joe Montana Football, Blitz: The League II and Mutant League Football which was fun and much like one of my favourite sports games growing up – Brutal Sports Football. Who doesn’t like running around punching players’ heads off and then throwing them in the goal? Exactly.
American Football is like rugby. A little. While I could say I get rugby and prefer that to American Football (I do), video games just don’t cut it, and I’ll always opt for a good football (soccer) game. I used to say that I prefer watching some sports and with some of the sports games out there, I’d prefer to play the video game than the real thing. In the case of Tecmo Bowl, I neither want to play it nor watch it. Sorry folks. Not for me. Check out some of the other sports I’ve looked at instead.
