My mom wants me to pick up a PS2 football game for my stepdad’s birthday. I’m not at all interested in sports games, so I have no idea what’s out there, or what’s good. Any recommendations?
Do you mean football = soccer, or football = American fottball.
For American Football, Madden seems to be the king, if you want to pay full whack get Madden 2004, overwise look for Madden 2003 at a big disscount (about $49 for Madden 2004, I wouldn’t pay more than $25 for Madden 2003)
For Soccer, get Winning Eleven 6 International. It beats any of the FIFA versions I have played and I doubt FIFA 2004 could beat it.
Madden is the way to go - as Bippy says, 03 can be had for around for cheap, 04 full price. I have 03 and love to play it - in my opinion, its better than 2k3 or Gameday or the others I’ve played.
04 gives you the advantage of up-to-date rosters and, from what I understand, more personalization early on (you can set it up where your fave team is ready to go right away, from what I understand). Madden also gives you all-time and historical teams. This is nice if your stepdad is, for instance, a Vince Ferragamo fan and wants to play a game with the 1979 Rams.
Madden in general provides relatively simple-to-use controller set-ups and has very good graphics and gameplay. I love it.
If your stepdad is a big college football fan, EA Sports NCAA 04 is supposed to be very good, as well.
Nice opening sentence, English major - please read as
Madden is the way to go - as Bippy says, 03 is pretty cheap these days, 04 is going for around 50 bucks.
Nice opening sentence, English major - please read as:
Madden is the way to go - as Bippy says, 03 is pretty cheap these days, 04 is going for around 50 bucks.
Sorry, I meant American football. I keep forgetting that words mean different things in different countries.
Yeah, go with Madden 2004 unless you know he’s a huge college fan, in that case get NCAA Football 2004, which is equally excellent.
Absolutely go with Madden 2004. '03 is frustratingly out of date, what with the era of free agency in full swing.
There’s a hundred reasons Madden is better than the other pro games out there. I know nothing about college games, but I would get an EA one if I were interested.
The only real strike against Madden (and all EA games) is that you can’t play online on XBox. But obviously, this is not a concern for the PS2 crowd.
Crap, I forgot one thing. The historical teams feature in Madden sucks ass. Most games have it, and none of them (including Madden) use player names. So instead of playing with Ferragamo, he’d be playing with “#11” or whatever the guy’s number was.
If anyone is reading this thread and wondering what Soccer game they should buy, then Winning Eleven 7 (called Pro Evolution Soccer 2 in some countries) will be out soon and is indisputably the best thing since sliced bread.
If you’re into that yankee sport then, as others have said, Madden 2004 is definitely the way to go. 
I ended up grabbing NCAA 2004 cause I know he’s a bigger college fan than NFL. Thanks for the advice!
Thanks FP@work Winning Eleven 7 out soon, droool…
Not having the names hasn’t been a big deal since (1) it would be nearly impossible to track down all the old players and sign them to licensing deals and (2) you could just put in the real names yourself with the player editor.
But for whatever stupid reason, this year even the NUMBERS are fake. So, for example, the QBs for the 1989 49ers aren’t even #16 and #8. The only way you can tell who they really are is by height, weight, and years pro.
good choice. A lot of people actually prefer NCAA 2004 to Madden 04 just as a football game(rather than because they prefer college to pro). I haven’t played NCAA(I do have Madden and love it), but supposedly the Computer Cheat* isn’t as bad on the college one.
*There is a phenomenon in Madden(and other EA sports games) in which increasingly bizarre and unlikely things start happening near the end of the game when your winning against the computer. For instance, you have a 21 point lead with two minutes left in the game. Suddenly everytime the computer touches the ball, they score and everytime you do, you fumble.
I’m a big fan of NFL Blitz, which adds a bit of (but not too much)humor and fantasy to the genre.
I’ve never been a big fan of NFL Blitz(though it is fun to play in the arcade), but I read somewhere that they are trying to make the latest edition more simulation-like and realistic. If true, I’m not sure if that’s a good move since that niche is pretty crowded already. Do you know if it’s true?
5-HT, they are doing that with the hockey game, so it would follow that they are indeed doing it with football too.
Tried PE2, preferred FIFA 2003. Personal choice.
Sorry for the interruption.