AFL Premiership 2005 : Games : Web Wombat

It's the game that every Australian loves - or should - and all young boys set out to play. It's the game that's stops a nation. It's the game that exhibits great goals, miraculous marks, scintillatingly athletic performances and of course the speccies.

I am speaking of the great game we Aussies call Australian Rules Football.

And now IR Gurus, the developers, have brought the reality of the Australian Football League (AFL) to the gaming world, in the next edition in the series called AFL Premiership 2005.

So now you can step on to the M.C.G on the final Sunday in September, when your team goes head to head with another in the fight for premiership glory - a dream shared by so many, but achieved by so few.

In the past there have been some pretty decent AFL games released, but poor controls and dodgy AI have been these games' undoing. These games held promise, but were certainly not as good as originally thought.

AFL 2005 sounded great, as though it had lots of potential - and it does; there are lot of great features that do make the game playable, but add in some flaws and glitches here and there and the game - yet again - fails to reach FIFA levels of addictiveness.

The game does have some great stats and the developers did a good job milking the AFL license to make the most of this.

All of the officially recognised players (about 692 of them) for season 2005 are included here, plus all the stadia, competitions, game rules and even the AFL Tribunal has been included to help gamers feel that they are down on the ground, part of the game.

Another great stat is that each player in the game has a screen detailing their biography, how many Brownlow votes they've ever achieved, draft history and more. This is very comprehensive statistics, and will appeal to the hard core sport buffs out there.

For those who don't know what AFL is or how the game works, shame on you. In the digital world of games, you'll be doing a lot of ball kicking, handpassing and running, and the game flows quite well for a football sport so complex. Takes a while to get used to the controls, but is quite playable when you get used to how the game flows.

While it's nice to have the Tribunal/Reporting feature, the problem is that often you get 4-7 players reported a game, most by the computer AI players on your team, and behind play. This means you can't really do much about it, except for coating your TV with kerosene and torching it to ease the pain. Then you get to the Tribunal page, where you can fight the charge (striking, rough play etc.) or take the given charge laid down.

So getting about 4 players suspended per game is a bit harsh, meaning they can be rubbed out for quite a few successive games in the season. I only hope IR Gurus get this feature corrected, because it was a great idea that was ruined by poor Q&A testing.

There is also an interesting EyeToy/DigiMask feature, in which gamers can take a snapshot of themselves and place their own face on a player. The idea is that anyone can play in a grand final and take their team to victory, which is quite a nice touch, adding a bit more involvement.

The Season Mode has a lot of new features included that are new to the AFL series, which is good to see. First off, this mode is a continuous season, so that you can keep building up your stats and not have start a new season all over again.

The M.C.G being upgraded, and oh, what a mark!!

The best feature of this mode though, is the new End of Season Trade and Draft Period, in which gamers can sell and buy players from and to different clubs, to build your team up with the best players.

Though it's good to have this system, it is flawed in a fairly (unfairly?) major way. When you try and trade players, you'll be able to trade a nobody for a player with plenty of skill and history.

I traded one of my players on the Rookie list and received Matthew Scarlett (he's pretty bloody good in the AFL), and also you could trade a draft pick for someone like Ben Cousins or Warren Tredrea, which would never happen in the real deal.

With the drafting players section, you can draft made-up players that can me made into the next big thing, which is somewhat of a consolation. The players in the draft look and sound like they are the siblings of current AFL players. I picked up a player named "Adam Braun" who would probably be the younger brother of West Coast Eagle gun Michael Braun.

Getting away from all the more positive aspects of the game and you come to the real disappointments. The graphics are a far cry from being "life like," that it almost looks like you are a watching a cartoon. The players all look the same, and a lot different than there real life selves. In the game Barry Hall has hair, Ben Cousins is black and a few others are bald, when they are really not like that.

Then there is the worst part of the game - the ratings. Now, St. Kilda has a rating of 63, which isn't the best because equal on a total of 63 is Hawthorn, which is illogical seeing as Hawthorn have finished on the bottom of ladder for the last few years, and St. Kilda have a pretty decent list.

West Coast also has a rating of 63, and they are all out-rated by the Bulldogs on 65, who themselves are not even the highest ranked team. This may shock a lot of readers, but leading the rankings on a total of 67 is - you guessed it - Collingwood!! This being a team that has finished 13th in 2004 and second last this year. Looks like Mr. Eddie McGuire may have some input here...

Things are somewhat brighter on the audio side, with the commentary from Denis Cometti, Dermott Breretton and boundary rider Christie Malthouse being quite entertaining, although you will hear the same phrases over and over again.

Sadly, AFL fans will have to chalk this one up as another missed goal -- AFL Premiership 2005 is a good game that sadly sports some serious failings, meaning fans will have to wait another year for a great Aussie Rules game to appear.

Game: AFL Premiership 2005
System: PS2
Players: 1-4
Online: Yes
Developer: IR Gurus
Distributor: Sony

Rating: 70%

(Ratings Key/Explanation)

AFL Premiership 2005 is on the shelves now.

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