Blitz The League II Xbox 360 Review

Blitz The League II

Xbox 360 Review
Publisher: Midway
Developer: Midway Entertainment
Released: 10/13/2008

It is very bold for Midway to release a football game despite the fact that EA Sports holds the exclusive NFL license.  Midway has taken advantage of this in a sense though with what they have managed to accomplish in Blitz The League II, as their risks have certainly paid off in the long run.

Midway has taken a very interesting approach with their football game, as they have decided to basically take the sport of football and the NFL, and break all the rules, making it a more enjoyable experience in the process.

The developer went with former NFL players, and then brings in over-the-top gameplay and tactics that could never be included in a game that has the NFL license.

Some of the most interesting aspects of Blitz The League II is the fact that the game pretty much promotes the use of performance enhancing drugs.  You are encouraged to basically “juice” until the cows come home, using every NFL banned substance out there.

The same goes for the hits and such, as you will not be restricted to what you can do to opponents.  If you want to take out your opponent at any time, you can do that and the game will love you that much for it.  You have the ability with the control scheme to actually target certain areas of the player’s body so that you can basically go after the QB’s legs, head, etc. if you wish.

A lot of this is done on the firm of well-thought-out mini-games which include rapid button-pressing, along with all of the “juicing” and other stuff added in here.

If you have played the original game, you pretty much know what to expect here, only that it has been amplified and cranked up about 10 times over the original game.

You get all of the familiar Blitz stuff with 7-on-7 game play, 30-yards to a first down, and all of those fun high-scoring games that Blitz fans have come to know well.

There is some single player stuff included here that is fun, such as the Campaign feature which has you going through a pretty fun story mode, adding new equipment to your arsenal, among other things.

The real fun in this game though comes in the form of the multi-player action.  You will likely have a blast with the addition of Xbox Live support so that you can go toe-to-toe with an opponent online.

The game has some very unique features to it such as the Clash meter, which will fill with the dirtier you get on the field.  Anything you do that is considered dirty will fill the meter.  If you injure someone, throw a late hit, etc. it will go up.

Once the meter is full, you will be able to go into Unleashed mode and absolutely tear up anything that moves in front of you.  Once you get into the movies, the slow-motion effect is quite awesome.

When I mentioned the mini-games as being part of Blitz, I meant it as they play a major role.  While the game is going on, you can wear down the stamina of a player and the on-the-fly target their body parts.  Once an injury occurs, you then get to play the role of the doctor and try to fix up the injury.

Blitz The League II is a great release from Midway on so many levels, as it stays true to that classic arcade football formula and amplifies it many times over.  If you are a fan of over-the-top arcade sports games you really can’t go wrong here, it is a blast to play!

Graphics: 7.0 Visually the game fails in regards to some lacking detail and animations.  Particle effects and such though are very impressive.

Audio: 8.0 The audio is well done but very over-the-top, almost to the point where some of the sound effects are not believable.

Gameplay: 8.0 Much more fun than the first Blitz The League game, great pick-up-and-play style.

Replay Value: 8.0 The online play is very addictive, single player could be a bit better.

Final Score: 7.9

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