Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  **Update - 10/10/14** After starting a new league with the new patch and playing the 2 preseason games, I still feel that this game falls extremely short of the mark. Contrary to the patch notes, there is still no initial draft. Kick/punt return yardage is still incorrect. The game still doesn't feel like football, but more importantly, it's simply not fun. Getting through 2 preseason games felt like a chore (I might add that I've played through many, many seasons in FOF7 and PFS and loved every second of it). On the plus side, the new 3D camera angles are nice, but not nearly enough to make this game playable. Overall, I didn't really see anything changed in the patch to keep me interested. I really wanted to like this, but due to the fact that this game is still extremely tedious and non-immersive, my (non)recommendation has not changed. Currently 1.5 / 10 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am a huge fan of both sport management games and football and there hasn't been a good football management/coaching game made in some time. Needless to say, I was very excited when I heard that this franchise was being revived... Unfortunately I have been very disappointed so far. So far I've only played 2 preseason games and these are a few of the issues I've found: *No initial draft - You're given a team to start with and have no control over who's on it. *No 4th down conversions as far as I can tell. There is a category for it in the game recap screen but every time I've had a 4th and short the AI decided to punt automatically. *No 2 point conversions... Very frustrating. *No onside kicks... Again, this is a necessity if you're trailing late in a game. None to be found here. *Quarterbacks like to throw to receivers who are well covered even if another is wide open. *On the flipside, defensive backs have a tendancy to either stay a few yards away from the receiver they're supposed to cover or just not cover him at all. This is probably my biggest annoyance at the moment. *No forward progress - If the ball carrier picks up yardage and then gets pushed back, the ball is spotted where the play ended. *Incorrect yardage for kick/punt returns - On several occasions I've seen a kick returner tackled before he gets to the 20 yet is still awarded a return of ~35 yards. *Blitzing doesn't seem to be effective in the slightest. I'll have to do some more experimentation on that, though. *You are limited to 16 plays from your playbook on each play meaning that sometimes the play that you really want to call may not be available. *There are all sorts of grammatical errors and typos. *The only penalties I've encountered thus far are offensive offside and illegal contact. *No play clock. *No audibles. *3D view is simply useless. The 2D overhead is much better for diagnosing what's going on on the field. *There appears to be no multiplayer whatsoever, not even local. These are just the issues I've noticed right off the bat. I haven't even really messed with the managerial side of things yet. As it stands, this game feels like a very early alpha and in its current state I couldn't recommend it to anybody. Hopefully it will improve with time, but for now I'd advise you to stay away.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  I will come back and edit this review if the game improves, since I'm writing this on the first day of release. First of all, kudos to any developer and publisher who attempts to create an American football manager game - We are starving for such a game!!!!!!!!!! Sadly, the first impression of Front Page Sports Football is not good. Keep mind I'm writing this after only 10 minutes of gameplay. It's a "first impression" review. It's definitely an "Early Access" version with lots of work to be done. It needs about 6 months of work in my opinion before it's a 4 out of 5 star game. Currently, I give it 1 out of 5 stars. My first impression is that there's no obvious way to edit player names or team names other than your own team name. Many of the player names are odd and unusual names. I'm not hearing any sound. The simulated game is displayed in a tiny small window and has no camera angles to choose, it quickly goes to the next play without giving the ability to rewind or re-watch the play, nor any control of the camera for that matter. It definitely needs the ability to replay the play, the flow is too fast. You can pause the play, however, but you can't go to previous play or skip to the next play. With no sound and no camera controls it doesn't give a good first impression. It's zoomed so far out that I can't really see anything, are my linemen doing any good? My receivers on the far side of the field, can barely see them at all. My cornerback is setup backwards pointing his butt towards the receiver before the snap. I do like the training schedule to improve your team players. I don't like that it starts me out on Day #4 after the draft. I would prefer to begin on Day #1 starting with the draft. There seems to be a lot of players suspended for illegal drugs. I will lose interest in this very quickly in its current state.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  I still have the Front page football 98. One reason that I loved that game was that you can customize players and ratings and everything in between. Thats what this game needs, is the ability to customize your players. Whats the point of creating a custom league if you can't change the players names and ratings. I only played game for a few minutes because my pc kept freezing up. Game needs more updates. when I finally got to the game (match) that I was to play. it froze. I am one who would like you to stick to the old game with much improved graphics. If it aint broke. I will continue to try to play game because I am a fan but opening for some updates real soon. want to recommend game very badly, but I don't think that it would be fare with the way the game stands today. update it fast, please!!! PS Game not freezing because I have a old computer I actually have a very good computer should have any problems.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  I really want to like this game and I hope it gets fixed but as it stands now it is unplayable. My teams games aren't actually played or simulated. It just says 'Planned' and is never played. The pre-season and first week every game played, the second week my game was the only one this way. The second week about 6 other games had the same problem and week three 4 other games were not played. So some teams have now played 4 games and I've only played one. Inability to play aside, this game needs work. It seems like a soccer fans version of a football sim. The free agent market has enough high quality rookies to build a team around (as best I can tell) including available red circle players who are suposed to be the best players in the game. Quality rookies are almost never available as free agents in the NFL, as they would all be drafted. There might be a few that slip through the draft, but it usually isn't easy to see who they might be until a clever team takes a flyer on them. There are certainly no NFL starter caliber QBs as rookie free agents. There were three very good to star type rookies just waiting to be signed in this game. And in general an available rookie star or more at each position in the free agent market. It's much more like the soccer transfer market. The 3D view looks nice but isn't very useful, you are stuck at about a first row of the stands view with no ability to adjust the view. Since it is 3D why can't you change the view? Isn't the the point of 3D? Anyway it is almost impossible to tell what linemen or anyone on the other side of the field is doing in this view. Playcalling is just a big list, it should be broken down by formation and play type. The whole thing feels unwieldy with a lot of information overload and no real way to feel like you know what is going on.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  I was super excited when i saw this coming was coming, now I wish I had wanted to read reviews. - No explanation - Poor user interface - no sound? at least not for me. - game stopped simulating for me afte a couple weeks. - FAQs are in general not useful - and the list goes on. I really hope this gets more work, the original was so well done that this is just nothing be disappointing at this point. I will change my review if the game is improved.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  As an avid Football Manager player and unlike other reviews, I find the game quite good for what it costs and the fact that there's no US Football game around. Sure, it needs some more polishment, some bug fixes, etc. But I find it really enjoyable for those tiny 15€. The game engine is decent (doesn't seem worse than Football Manager for example), the UI isn't that bad honestly. There's only 3 big problems that annoy me for the moment : - No way to speed up a match - Poor filter options when you're looking for new players - The window size... Kinda silly for a fullscreen mode. Even worst when you want to watch a game in 3D (I don't) I just hope that Cyanide plans on patching the annoying bugs somehow (some UI elements are poorly presented, I can't see the game in 3D because it's freezing like crazy, etc) and improve some little things that doesn't have to wait for a new iteration of the game (no way to control the 4th down.. Poor kick-off options, somes American Football rules are just wrong). PS : Sorry, my english sucks.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2014

  For all the money Steam brings in, can you please hire 1 person to test submitted games ? This thing is utter PooDoo.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 4, 2014

  I usually wait to review a game until I've played it at least to it's designed completion, whatever that may entail, but with this game it is so offensively unreadable that you shouldn't buy it. It is the most unusable game of this type I have ever played and I've played a lot of games of this type. This game shouldn't be on Steam, it's as simple as that. Don't buy this.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 5, 2014

  This thing's so bad that I really don't know where to start. Forget the glaring technical problems (fixed size UI in 2014... are you serious?), the football side of it is just plain bizarre. Go for it on fourth down? Nope. Have zone coverage schemes where the dbacks and linebackers actually attempt to cover receivers? Nope. Kicking options besides belting it straight down the middle? Nope. Have access to your whole playbook? Nope. Okay, so the latter has an element of realism to it, but not when you're facing third and long and most of the plays offered are runs. Take starters out the game once the result looks nailed on? Nope. Audibles? Not unless you count the player swearing at the game. Visible play clock whilst calling plays? Nah... that'd be far to sensible. Have play action plays somehow described as such? Nope. Okay, again, that might be somehow realistic, but draws are denoted as such, so why not the opposite? Forward progress? Nope. Challenge flags? Nope. Fumbles? Well, there's a stat for them, but clearly the players all have outstanding ball protection skills because I'm yet to see one in 4-5 matches. Just don't buy this. Please, don't. I'd love a decent NFL head coach + O/D co-ordinator + the interesting bits of GM sim, but this really isn't it. Even slightly. At all.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 21, 2014

  So many basic things wrong here, both from an AI perspective and a basic gameplay perspective. Echo the comment about draftable free agents being too strong... why even have a draft? No ability to stop the clock outside of using timeouts. No "half the distance to the goal line" penalties. no ability to adjust your teams pace by not running time off the 35 second clock. It looks good but so much of what's happening doesn't make sense (also too easy to pick up yards with a decent running back.) Game could use a pause button too, unless I missed it.