AFL Premiership 2005 (Reviews)

Chris Stead, GamePro Australia

31/10/2005 14:09:15

When you think of a large group of men in short shorts and tank tops rolling around in the grass grappling for balls, you think of the gay mardigras. But add eight large polls and well, well actually you're probably still thinking of the gay mardigras but hey, we are talking AFL here. Not only are we talking about Australia's national sport but its virtual simulation under the new guidance of Sony (previously the game was published by Acclaim) and we're happy to say the gameplay has taken great leaps forward. However, the experience is still as messy as Wayne Carey's love life.

But that shouldn't dissuade AFL supporters looking for a gaming fix and they will enjoy four main game modes - Exhibition, Season, Career and Multiplayer (four players through LAN or internet). Gamers can take their team through an entire year from the pre-season Wizard Cup through to the finals (should you be good enough) while the Career mode allows you to manage a team and get involved with trading, the draft and player development - which is a nice addition. While this range of game modes is satisfactory, there are others we would have loved to see included, such as a Challenge Mode and a Training Mode.

In particular, the lack of Training Mode really hurts the game. The controls are quite complex and trying to master all their little subtleties in the heat of gameplay can not only be frustrating, but it can also mean that the casual gamer won't get the most out of their experience. Thankfully, your basic controls - handball, kick, mark and tackle - are intuitive enough that even casual gamers will be kicking goals in no time.

That's because the basic gameplay has been vastly improved. Where the previous games in the series suffered from poor camera angles that made it difficult to see where players were positioned around the field, AFL Premiership 2005 pans out and takes a more grandiose view of the action. This, in turn, allows you to easily identify free runners to kick to or handball towards. The side-effect of this is that the sprites look quite small and discerning the ball in busy traffic is a bit of an issue, but it's worth the cost given the improvement in gameplay. Now you can confidently move the ball downfield kicking long or short and handballing with ease and, should you get far enough, kicking for the sticks takes just about the right amount of skill.

And when the game is moving freely like this, it is a lot of fun. But you will often question how much of the on-screen movement is under your control. A quick glance through the options menu will reveal a couple of computer assists that collectively take the game away from you. You will find long kicks suddenly going short because the computer has determined a better option there or kicks to the right suddenly go left for the same reason. This can be infuriating after a while and gamers should be aware that a bit of fiddling in the options menu can reduce the effects somewhat. While you're are in there you can also toggle umpire strictness (you will get pinned for the likes of ball handling and illegal shepherding) and injuries (injured player do become quite a liability on field) and in a nice touch, players can face-up to, respectively, the judiciary and the doctor to determine their fates post match.

But as you grow into the game and get past the fun surface layer of gameplay, you will begin to find some limitations in the control structure and some annoying design flaws that begin to hamstring your enjoyment. Lead contender for irritation of the year is the 'player select' option. If you are following an opponent, for example, and you realise that you are not going to be able to tackle them before they make their kick, you'll want to switch straight away to a player downfield to give yourself the best chance of spoiling a potential mark - the game engine doesn't allow you to do this. Plus, the tackle function is unresponsive and you will often see opposing players run through each other like there a dodgy curry rather than a physical muscle-bound object trying to make a big hit. The inability of developer IR Gurus to polish off these finer elements of the gameplay limit the experience as the more you become in-tune with the gameplay, the more frustrated you get at the engine's inability to keep up.

At least the A.I. doesn't exploit these inadequacies too much and on normal difficulty it will offer just about the right challenge for the average gamer. It will throw the occasional intercept or kick to the wrong guy and it won't link passes together so rapidly that you are unable to unleash tackles or keep up with the play. If the A.I. is on the attack, you can counter it. Still, it does seem to have an unfair advantage at bounces and throw-ins so like always, playing a mate (or mates) is the preferred option.

Visually, the game is acceptable, but not brilliant. There are some nice touches, like cool weather effects (the rain is great), dynamic crowds and pitch deterioration and the motion-captured animations are quite good, but given the distant camera and the lack of any replays you never get an opportunity to truly appreciate it anyway. So you will begin to focus on the lack of sheen and polish which sport fans have become conditioned to EA and ESPN'S big-budget sport titles. We're are talking about the likes of jumpy commentary from Denis Cometti & Dermot Brereton, collision detections issues and fluidity glitches between shifts in gameplay (like a throw-in). There is room for improvement here.

And 'improvement' is the key word about AFL Premiership 2005 - although there are ultimately some frustrating gameplay issues, this is a far superior effort to the previous AFL games and the best title on offer for admirers of the sport. Indeed, fans will have plenty of fun dicing it out with their mates and we are sure the series can grow in exciting ways from this solid template. Now to go find some industrial sized tweezers: we need to retrieve out shorts.

Score = 8.0/10

[ Other stories about Sony, INS, Gameplay, PLUS ]

Graphics: 3.5

Sound: 3.5

Control: 4.0

Fun Factor:

Scoring scale: 1-5

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Publisher: SCEE / Developer: IR Gurus / Retail Price: $99.95 (PlayStation 2) / Genre: Sports / OFLC Rating: G (8+)