Sports games are a key component to most consoles. If there are enough high quality sports games on your console then you know you will succeed in some level. EA has one of the biggest market shares of sports games on all consoles currently available. The majority of their sports games fall under the “simulation/real life” sports games. Since the release of this generation of consoles they have been releasing more “arcade and over the top” sports games, under the brand “EA Big” which have really fleshed out all of the genres. Their latest game under the EA Big title is NFL Street, and it is one of the best football games I have played in a long time. Read on to find out more!

There are four game modes that NFL Street offers players to participate in: Quick Game, Pick up Game, NFL Challenge, and Online. Quick game is where players can choose any of the teams that are available and play a quick seven-on-seven game. A Pick up Game is where you and an opponent choose from 40 randomly selected NFL stars. The person who gets the first pick will be on defense first and vice versa, so you must choose wisely.

The NFL Challenge is the real meat of this game. In this players take on their own personalized team against the NFL teams to unlock rewards and other goodies. There are two different modes in here: the NFL Division Ladder and the NFL Challenge mode. In the divisional ladder players are put to the test by playing all the teams in the particular division, when you beat all the teams in one division you can unlock more teams in other divisions to play against and other fields become unlocked.

NFL Challenge mode put your skills to the test, as you have to complete various challenges against the NFL teams. The challenges can be very easy, such as scoring a touchdown in 4 plays, or hard like: score 36 points, you must have four touchdowns and two of them must be from passing and two must be rushing touchdowns. In the end, all of these challenges are rewarding because you can unlock new places to play, new people to recruit on your team, and developing your player’s skills.

The Playstation 2 version of NFL Street is the only one to feature online play. The online mode plays really smoothly, I have a broadband connection and play against someone who has a dialup and not once did we have any lag while playing. As with all the other online EA games there is an “EA Messenger”, which allows players to get buddies, store them, and see when they are online. Also included is “EA Sports Talk”, this means that if you have a headset you can talk smack with other players from around the US while playing a game.

The graphics for this game are outstanding! What makes this game better looking than almost all other football games is that this game allows you to see the player’s faces the entire game, there isn’t a huge helmet blocking the views. This makes the game feel more realistic as you not only can see the player’s stature but also the face, and all the accessories that they might wear. This means that all of the character models look really nice and are bursting with details.

The environments that the players will get their “game on” are nice and varied and makes the game more challenging at times. The fields have little details on them that make it very fun to play in and to see. Another neat effect is that the players will leave footprints in the ground (when there is soil) and that makes it feel even more realistic. My favorite is the beach level; there are so many things that are going on, the subtle interactions and graphical effects that make it so fun. The sand makes it harder to run and spin, the water is coming in over the sand, and the beach balls move when you hit them. All of this interaction makes this game so fun to play.

The music and sound effects to this game are also really good. Players are not burdened down with heavy commentary like Madden but you get “smack talk” from the players on either team about the previous play that just happened. The music features such artists as Korn, X-Ecutioners, Fuel, and many others that really fit well with this game. It also makes full use of Dolby Digital Pro Logic II, so if you have a setup that allows it, it is well worth it!

NFL Street is rated E for Everyone. It requires up to 58KB on your memory card and can play up to 1-4 players (via multitap). To play online you must have the Network card and broadband or dialup. It also is compatible with AOL Dial-Up.

Gameplay: 9.4
The gameplay is extremely tight and well done in this game! All of the players react to the slightest touch of the controller and that is the way it should be! You can play NFL Street for months on end and you will never get bored with it.

Graphics: 9.2
The game looks really good. The character models are really nice, and it is really good to see the player’s faces for a change on a football game.

Sound: 9.1
The trading commentary to “trash talking” on the field make this game sound really good. You will hear some things in this game that you might expected to hear when you or your friends are playing street football. The music and all the other sound effects heard are really well done.

Difficulty: Medium
The game slowly ramps up the difficulty in single player to easy to really hard. How hard the game is will depend on how fast you will be able to learn the ins and outs of how the game works.

Concept: 9.3
Arcade sports games have been around for a while, (NFL Blitz anyone?), but this was the first one that I have really enjoyed to this magnitude.

Multiplayer: 9.6
Playing with a friend makes this game even better. The only stupid thing about this is that the plays stay on the screen after you make a selection so the opposing player can see what play you choose, that is always bad. The multiplayer is fun online too, there is so much to do and you will have a blast!

Overall: 9.3
EA Sports surprises me again and again with each new game that they release. NFL Street is one of the best games that they have released this year. The game play is intense, fun, and you will have a blast playing it every second!