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While I am/was a huge fan of APF2K8 -- having logged 1000+ games online easily in 2+ years -- I will have to disagree with some points made in this article. While M10 may still not be the end-all SIM-god of all football, it's very tough to say that APF was even near flawless itself. Some of the points you make are excellent in terms of M10’s faults, especially in terms of line-play & route mechanics, but APF has many faults of it’s own in some areas in which you touched upon it being superior.
While M10 has issues with pass & run blocking, APF had those as well. When the APF blocking mechanics were on, oh man is it simply a thing of absolute beauty in terms of replicating real line-play, but when it’s off, it is the most frustrating & aggravating thing to behold. I can’t recall how many times I would shift my line, leave in HBs & TEs to block and still have a DT tackle through the center without being touched as a Guard starred as he ran by. Also, on run plays with pulling OL there are countless times when my blocker would pull, have a perfect angle at a defender to seal off the trench only to have that same blocker completely pass him up & head up-field – same goes for FBs completely whiffing on blocks. These missed blocks weren’t rare, they were common place, and what was worse, it was completely random; from Generic to Gold-level OL, players would simply have brain farts that made absolutely no sense.
As far as momentum & such in both, I would have loved to see a blend of the two games, but there were times in APF where defensive controls were downright brutal or players had far too much momentum. There are countless times when I simply could not control defenders due to over-momentum. For example, when at the line before the snap, when trying to attempt to creep a defender towards the line, said defender will make a 5-yard jump, even with a slight push forward on the sticks, thus forcing you to pull back hard on the line and putting you out of position. This happens on nearly every play. The physics of the defense was simply too heavy while the offense had it just right, thus it made manually covering & pursuit downright impossible unless you either had a Silver+ tiered Legend or a player with Quick Feet. Generics? Forget about it, their momentum would take them out of plays more than help.
Now, in terms of the passing game, yes I will agree, APF has things held down when it comes to replicating real football, but even then the game has warts in itself. Route-based patterns are non-existent in M10, which makes running any WCO very difficult, but in the same regard, APF had it’s share of money routes. Anything that involved the hot-route up & out was an instant catch (well documented by Valdarez), the fade is nearly unstoppable even with elite CBs, and any route that incorporated the fade’s hitch & go was hard to stop thanks to the offensive speed boost & the secondary AI’s stupidity. Speaking of secondary AI, it was downright horrible. The Willie Brown’s, Night Train Lane’s & Rod Woodson’s of the game still get beat and beat often due to the AI. Defenders simply just stand there as the plays begin, whether they were in zone or man coverage. The only time to ever get consistent play out of the secondary was to run all press coverage all game, which turned most games into vanilla games of defensive gameplanning. God forbid you didn’t have a Bump Buster on your team or it would be a long day.
As far as special teams go, I will have to disagree with Kicker accuracy. In APF, Generic kickers were always money for me from the 35 yard line and closer (unless I had 7mph+ winds against me), M10 is not so much the case. I see players (CPU & Human) miss chip shots & such, there is no gimme kick in this game. I will agree that the holding calls are a little bizarre and very frustrating as they always seem to happen at least one kick per game. I will say though that on kick-offs & punting, APF did put a premium on having Legend kickers/punters over Generics. In that sense, they did a great job because a Legend could coffin corner a punt or boom a touchback, but a Generic would have accuracy issues and not enough leg power, thus giving up precious yardage.
In all, yes, M10 is not an APF killer, but for me, it did a great job in helping supplant my need for APF-based football for the time being. Who’s to say when my fix of Madden will subside but until then I’m enjoying playing a game of football where the bugs & glitches haven’t been dissected & exploited to death (as of yet). In terms of gameplay, yeah, I will openly admit I enjoyed playing APF more than I currently do M10 but at the same times there have been many games in APF where I felt I lost due to game-exploits, shotty AI, team builds over stick skills & gameplanning, that hasn’t been the case in M10 for me as of yet.
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09-08-2009, 11:54 AM
