Tecmo Bowl Kickoff (DS) Review
Posted by Ramon Aranda on 02.24.2009
Ready down, hut, hut, hut!!
Title: Tecmo Bowl Kickoff
Publisher: Tecmo
Type: Sports
Players: 1-2
Rated: E for Everyone
Ahh Tecmo Bowl! One of the earlier childhood videogame-related memories was sitting on the floor with my cousins, playing endless hours of Tecmo Bowl tournaments and full seasons. T’was probably the most enjoyable football game for me and when Tecmo released the ‘Final Edition’ in 1994, I sadly put the franchise to rest. Enter Tecmo Bowl Kickoff for the Nintendo DS. When Tecmo teased us last year of a new Tecmo Bowl, I nearly crapped myself with joy. My beloved football franchise was making a comeback and it was time to celebrate. Tecmo finally released the game on the Nintendo DS giving its first handheld (not counting mobile) platform and I was stoked to give it a try. Did it live up to the old school feel or does it feel over the hill?
Let’s find out.
Gameplay
Tecmo Bowl Kickoff doesn’t try to overwhelm you with content as it’s essentially a redefined version of the original. That doesn’t mean however that you can’t customize anything – in fact, it’s fully customizable. Players can edit team names, cities, logos, uniforms and player names (even their jersey numbers). In case you didn’t know, the game doesn’t feature real teams or players but luckily Tecmo gives us the option to change it to our liking. With most of the teams already corresponding to the real life cities, I just edited the remaining teams, added their real team colors and used the predefined logos to try to at least make the helmets look somewhat similar to what they should be. Editing the players is a piece of cake too – just change their names, skin color and even positions all with the keyboard located on the bottom screen. As with the original, each team has eight plays to choose from but you can also customize the playbook as well as which player enters the game with particular plays.
To start a game, you’ll have the option of playing an exhibition, a full season, and the playoffs or against another player – either locally or online through the Nintendo Wi-Fi connection. The season starts off as you’d expect which includes preseason games. After selecting your team, it’s just good ol’ fashioned Tecmo Bowl goodness. Though you can control some of the game’s in-game functions with the stylus such as kickoffs, play calling and selecting receivers, I found that using the stylus-touch screen combo was just too clumsy and slow. Fortunately you can play it the way it should be played – with the A and B buttons and the D-pad. Unlike the original but similar to its sequels, you’ll find that the game has fumbles, fair catches, jumps and dives. Choosing a play is as easy as touching the play with the bottom screen or by using the D-pad to select up, down, left or right and then using the A button for a running play or the B button for a passing play. Breaking tackles comes down to pressing the B button frantically as we’ve all been accustomed to while jumping and diving is done by pressing A while the ball is near you and in the air. On the defensive side, you pre-select your player and then attack, attack! Sadly you can’t change your player after the play has started which sucks when your guy is on his ass and a running back has just broken free but you couldn’t do that before either so it gets a pass. What doesn’t get a pass though is how easy it is to sack the QB. I played through an entire season and I have two of my lineman with over 100 sacks each. If you pick one of the two linemen closest to the center, more often than not they can breeze right through the line and put the QB on his derrière. This little problem generally caused the opposing team to have less than 50 yards per game sometimes since I sacked the hell out of them over and over. Really, it was a no-contest and I usually steamrolled through my foe. The problem isn’t as bad in multiplayer luckily.
The game also features plenty of stat keeping so it was cool to see that return to this game as it records most offensive and defensive statistics including those for the entire team. Here’s a problem though: even though I would use plenty of other players to sack a QB, it was usually all being recorded to the same guy. Not cool. I want other players to have good stats too but the game seemed to have a problem assigning them to the proper players. This seemed prevalent sometimes during a game too when I would intercept a ball and it would show a different player on screen (usually the one with all the superman stats). Another issue I had with numbers was that when you’re letting the rest of the schedule auto play, the scores were usually the same. Literally there were about 4 different scores in the game and they would rotate, including the game’s final stats. They were practically the same every 3 or 4 games. Yeah they didn’t affect my team per se but it was kind of annoying to see that happen. Not much variety or randomness which bugged me.
Also a new aspect to the game is gaining points after each game depending on how well you did. If you build up enough points over the course of a season you can upgrade your players’ stats which include giving them special abilities. On offense and defense, players can have abilities such as making diving saves, breaking last minute tackles for a couple of extra yards, bullet passes and huge tackles. Each player can have at most two special abilities but you’ll want to make sure you assign the ones you do collect to the most important players first.
Multiplayer was fun and easy to set up. I would say I definitely enjoyed the experience a lot more when I was playing against another live opponent. Games were usually quite competitive, frantic and enjoyable. As with single player, you can also adjust the length of each quarter. Online was easy to do as well. All you really had to do was connect online and search for a game. Unfortunately most of the time, the place looked like a ghost town. I had trouble on most days finding someone to play against but when I did, I experienced a pretty smooth game without lag.
Graphics
The look of the game resembles that of Super Tecmo Bowl for the Super NES. It’s quite colorful and not overly detailed. I liked that Tecmo maintained the cutscenes that we see after touchdowns, halftimes and big plays such as sacks and diving catches. There is only one universal stadium though so you won’t see any difference regardless of which teams are playing. During the game, you don’t see jersey numbers or anything like that except skin tone and the jersey’s colors. End zones also don’t have any team names aside from the colors that you chose. Honestly I didn’t expect too much on the graphical front as I was looking forward to an old school feel and this is exactly what Tecmo gave us so I can’t complain.
Sound
“Ready down, hut, hut, hut….” - Really that’s all I wanted from the game and it’s there! But seriously, there’s no overabundance of sounds although the catchy tunes are in full effect. You’ll also be glad to know that you can unlock other music such as the SNES version of the game; remixed of course. The game also has voice overs for the referee to call for first downs and such, as well as touchdowns, and extra points. Everything else is as you’d expect: whistle blows, sounds of the ball ricocheting, tackles and the ball hitting the post.
Fun Factor
I managed to play through about three different seasons with three teams and the experience was always the same – I kicked major ass. Due to some defensive holes, I pretty much dominated and in 48 games, I only lost twice. Playing with a friend though is pure unadulterated fun. Nothing beats a little Tecmo Bowl competition between two friends, especially if they happen to have played you in older versions of the game.
Lasting Appeal
Well the fact that I still play the original Tecmo Bowl (thanks to the Wii’s Virtual Console and my own NES copy), the Tecmo Bowl franchise seems to have some legs. This newest entry give you some good multiplayer options to keep you playing though I really wish there’d be more people online to play against. Maybe I just picked wrong times to connect but c’mon, who doesn’t get online in the evening or mid-afternoon? Playing through a season might get a little old after a while, especially if you’re unbeatable so the A.I. quality really suffers here and it makes you want to put the game away if there’s no one around.
The 411
Tecmo Bowl Kickoff is a decent addition to the franchise and a welcomed one at that. The game does however have some gameplay and statistical flaws that hamper the experience. If you’re going solo most of the time, you’ll probably get bored after a while but if you have people to play with to renew some old rivalries (friends or family be damned) then you’ll have a blast.
Graphics
7.0
Bright, colorful and just what I expected to see from this game
Gameplay
6.5
Easy to pick up and play but the stat and defensive issues are annoying.
Sound
7.0
It is what it is.
Lasting Appeal
7.0
As long as you have someone to play with, this one should last you a while. It needs more online players though.
Fun Factor
6.5
It's fun with other people though single player gets old after two seasons or so.
Tecmo Bowl Kickoff doesn’t try to overwhelm you with content as it’s essentially a redefined version of the original. That doesn’t mean however that you can’t customize anything – in fact, it’s fully customizable. Players can edit team names, cities, logos, uniforms and player names (even their jersey numbers). In case you didn’t know, the game doesn’t feature real teams or players but luckily Tecmo gives us the option to change it to our liking. With most of the teams already corresponding to the real life cities, I just edited the remaining teams, added their real team colors and used the predefined logos to try to at least make the helmets look somewhat similar to what they should be. Editing the players is a piece of cake too – just change their names, skin color and even positions all with the keyboard located on the bottom screen. As with the original, each team has eight plays to choose from but you can also customize the playbook as well as which player enters the game with particular plays. 
The game also features plenty of stat keeping so it was cool to see that return to this game as it records most offensive and defensive statistics including those for the entire team. Here’s a problem though: even though I would use plenty of other players to sack a QB, it was usually all being recorded to the same guy. Not cool. I want other players to have good stats too but the game seemed to have a problem assigning them to the proper players. This seemed prevalent sometimes during a game too when I would intercept a ball and it would show a different player on screen (usually the one with all the superman stats). Another issue I had with numbers was that when you’re letting the rest of the schedule auto play, the scores were usually the same. Literally there were about 4 different scores in the game and they would rotate, including the game’s final stats. They were practically the same every 3 or 4 games. Yeah they didn’t affect my team per se but it was kind of annoying to see that happen. Not much variety or randomness which bugged me.
The look of the game resembles that of Super Tecmo Bowl for the Super NES. It’s quite colorful and not overly detailed. I liked that Tecmo maintained the cutscenes that we see after touchdowns, halftimes and big plays such as sacks and diving catches. There is only one universal stadium though so you won’t see any difference regardless of which teams are playing. During the game, you don’t see jersey numbers or anything like that except skin tone and the jersey’s colors. End zones also don’t have any team names aside from the colors that you chose. Honestly I didn’t expect too much on the graphical front as I was looking forward to an old school feel and this is exactly what Tecmo gave us so I can’t complain.
