Bill Walsh College Football

"The best football game on the genesis!!!"

Ok, the first thing to realize before reading this is that I am rating the game as opposed to other games from its time, obviously this game doesn’t quite stack up to NFL Fever or anything of the like.

Gampeplay (9/10)
This game plays surprisingly fluid considering the hardware limitations of its time. The controls are quite basic and easy to learn, but that’s one of the reasons the game is so fun. On offense there is one button to high step, one button to spin, and one button to dive; anything else that you want to do, like super tight cuts or make impossible catches possible, is completely up to the you. If you can find the right combinations of buttons, you can do just about anything in this game. For defense there is 1 button to put your arms up to try to swat down or intercept a pass, 1 button to tackle, and one button to switch players. Very simple, Very effective. The difficult passing, easy running (once you get your rhythm) and tough to get down defense all combine to make this one hell of an exciting game to play with your friends. The only reason the game doesn’t get a ten out of ten is that sometimes its kind of hard to get control of the defensive player that you want to control.

Graphics (8/10)
Once again, considering the timeframe here, the graphics are pretty damn good. But there is still a little too much pixelizing for this game, considering what we found out the Genesis could do about 3-5 years later. The animations for the running are great, but only because there IS an animation for running, instead of just having floating player that magically move, which is not unheard of even for some Playstation games.

Sound (9/10)
There’s no running commentary, but there is some simple descriptions like 1st and 10, 3rd and long, 4th and a foot. And every now and then you’ll get to hear an amusing crack about a big play. That’s not even mentioning that they actually say “FUMBLE” “INTERCEPTION” and “TOUCHDOWN”! This is one of the only Genesis games that I can still play with the volume on, and that is very rare.

Replayability
This is automatic. As long as you play against a human opponent, the game will never get boring.

Extras
The game has a plethora of college teams, and one “old school” version of every team. So when you come out with Texas ’83 against the regular Texas team, you know you’ve got that one in the bag!

Overall(9/10)
A very easy, fun, and enjoyable game for everyone who plays it. Also for all ages. You can’t beat that! A definite must buy, seeing as you can get it now for under fifty cents.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 02/10/02, Updated 02/10/02