[reverend_heat]

I've been as critical of what was shown before release as anyone, and maybe my expectations were so low anyway, but I played 2 games last night and really liked it. First off, a note about presentation that almost brought a tear to my eye. My first game I played as GB in Lambeau, I purposefully started the game at 4:15 to see if the sky changed color by the end of the game. Sadly, though the shadows moved, the sky never changed. I was bummed, my next game I played as the Redskins at home, and noticed you could have a 6:30 start time, this time, by mid second quarter the lights came on, and the lighting changed pretty dramatically, and by the end of the game, the fricken sky was almost black! The lighting toward the end of the game was simply the best I have ever seen in a football game, it was insane actually! It had that golden hue to it, you guys that love football know exactly what I'm talking about, A small thing yes, but one I have been waiting for for a long time and am so glad is finally present now.

Gameplay wise, line play is absolutely improved, I felt like I could move around and step up in the pocket when needed. Best of all, much like real life, the pocket doesn't form perfectly every play, it's kinda like a box of chocolates if ya know what I mean, it is fluid, and I like that.
It seems to me that when rushing the Qb, momentum plays a factor, if you jump the snap you have an advantage over the tackle, I have beaten the T to the Qb without being touched a few times with Matthews and Orakpo, and when you do engage with them, moving the sticks feels meaningful, not just like you are imprisoned in an animation. Also I have seen a bunch of different pass rush animations, I bull rushed one time and got the tackle on his heels and walked him right back into the pocket and collapsed it. Another time with Nick Perry, he rushed upfield and did a kind of shimmy left and right 3 or 4 times before taking the outside angle to the Qb, and engaged perfectly to the outside shoulder of the right tackle. Rushing outside is more fun than inside, but u can collapse from inside as well.

Secondary wise, playing all-pro I seemed to be in position to pick off passes a little more than I would like, but overall I see marked improvement in CPU pass completion %, I.e. a normal amount of errant and incomplete passes by the computer. I pressured Bree's once and he threw over the middle and absolutely nobody was there, Simms even commented on it. Another nice thing I saw, Garcon went into the one arm catch animation, and as he brought it into his body he just lost the ball and dropped it, it was nice to see actually, looked very real.

True-step is going to take me awhile to get used to, you do need to slow a bit to juke better. Need more games to comment fully on it. One thing I do like, when you run the ball past the line of scrimmage, the camera zooms in on you, I personally like it.

Again, need more time to analyze, but I think punt returns are improved. Might be even better if I play on slow, I'll have to try later today.

Lets see, graphics wise it isn't even a comparison, next gen blows cg out of the water, I was worried a bit after the twitch streams, don't be, anybody that says these games are identical is either lying or blind, play an outside game, clear, with a 6:30 start time and tell me it looks like cg after the game ends.

Replays are 100x better in ng, it's not even close, good angles, good playback speed, nice to have back.

Cons:

Cutscenes suck, still. Too many head coach shots, too many panning crowd shots. I'm sure the devs realize this, but real time is the only way to go. I had a pick six with Rambo, hit x button at the ten and show boated with the arms out flying like a jet left and right into the endzone, and in real time, he spiked the ball! It looked great, but then, after spiking the ball and having it go flying away, they show the cutscene of my guy standing on the ball with his arms folded, it just kinda kills the immersion.

I had a few weird bugs, A cool aspect to me is if a player really gets smashed, they get hurt. Rodgers went down after trying to throw a pass as he went out of bounds. He got hurt, so Graham Harrell (old rosters) came in. Then Harrell got hurt, so B.J. Coleman came in (third stringer, art imitating life I guess) after a bit, we get the option to bring back or keep out the injured player as we all know. I opted to leave Coleman in and keep Harrell out. A few plays later, as Simms is commenting about how Harrell wont be back, Harrell is magically in at Qb again. Weird

One more, on a screen to M Lynch, he got a first down running alongside the sidelines, and McCarthy threw a challenge flag, without me opting to do so, I don't know if the touchpad accidentally did something or what, but it seemed random and a mistake, there was nothing to challenge and I didn't call for it

Can't find an option to save replays like cg, think it has been removed in ng.

Commentary is a small improvement, think I heard a few more players called by name, but not by much, we've heard most of it

Again, this is only 2 full games, didn't mess with cfm, simmed stats, didn't even check to see if assisted tackles have been fixed, just talking about how it looks and feels basically, but to me, it passes the initial smell test. The game looks better and plays better, enough to satisfy everybody, probably not. I'm glad I got it, and would encourage anybody able to upgrade for $10 that can, to do so. This all makes me even more angry that EA put an embargo on the review, they didn't need to and they pissed a lot of people off by doing it. If this team stays together, we could have the exact game we want in 2 years. Looking forward to reading others impressions, and getting more of my own.