Do Yourself a Favor and Stay the Hell Away from 989!

For the love of god will someone please stop me next time I try to purchase a 989 Sports game! You'd think I would've learned my lesson 3 years ago. Let me set the situation for you. The year was 1998, I was a junior in college at the University of Iowa and my entire household of college buddies were pumped up for the football season. We, like every college guy across the country, spent more time with a playstation controller in hand than with any books from class. It was early in the fall and we decided we were all going to pitch in and buy the newest Madden 99 football game. After checking every possible place that could have carried video games we came to the realization that Madden 99 wasn't shipping for another 2 weeks or so. You know damn well we couldn't wait 2 weeks so after staring at GameDay by 989 Sports for about half an hour we decided to go out on a limb and purchase a new football game by a manufacturer that none of us had ever had any experience with. Just for the record I divide my life into two sections now: Pre-989 Sports days and Post-Exposure to the biggest crapload of garbage ever referred to as a "video game". In fact, I think my life would be better if I would have never contaminated my brain with their scat. Those of you who have had the unlucky chance to play these games know exactly what I'm spouting about.

First of all, they refuse to conform to the sports game standards of controller commands. If you've ever picked up a controller and tried to play a 989 Sports game they are completely backwards of any similar games out there and require about 4 hours of complete concentration just keep from f'ing up. Second of all 989 Sports games seem to take a jump backwards in the evolution of sports games. Athlete's movements are never realistic or fluid. There are always glitches, which leads me to believe that marketing plan over at 989 is to actually rush through the making of their games just to beat Electronic Arts(the god shamgod of making sports games) to the punch line. Which in turn results in the dumping of elephant husk. by the truck load, over the entire general public.

The first glitch I noticed in Gameday was that when got out in the open field via the run or pass an unidentified player would come flying of the sidelines and tackle me. WHAT THE HELL IS THAT! This wasn't a once in a while occurrence either it was every time you broke away. As if that alone wasn't reason enough to perform random acts of violence on the game itself in front of Best Buy, there's definitely more! One of my college roommates and myself were engaging in a diehard, trash talking, 989 Gameday exhibition game(you know, the kind you can lose friends over). The score was tied, and I was forced to punt the ball with about 4 seconds left in the game. I punted the ball as time expired on the clock and I'm thinking all I have to do is tackle him and we're going to overtime. As soon as his returnman fields that ball and starts up field I notice I have no control over any of my players, in fact they are completely frozen. My roommate just ran around all my frozen players and end to the end zone for a game winning 80 yd punt return. Once again, DOES ANYONE OVER AT 989 PLAY THEIR DAMN GAMES BEFORE THEY DECIDE TO SHIP THEM. Needles to say I vowed never to purchase another 989 Sports game ever again.

Fast forward to the present, the biggest travesty of all happened over the past week, which was the spark under my arse to write this article. After fighting of the urge to purchase a playstation 2 since its release, my fiancé decided to get me one. Of course I couldn't have just the playstation 2, I needed a game. You see, I've had the urge for a college basketball game for about a month and now I have a reason to buy one. So I walked into the Mecca(Best Buy) and looked at several games. Not big on role playing games, already own Madden on PC and NFL2k1 on dreamcast, so I couldn't justify buying another football game this year. And there it was, NCAA FINAL FOUR 2001. As I recall the little 989 Sports logo was in the upper right hand corner almost taunting me to buy it. I had a quick flashback to Gameday 99, but then thought to myself, how bad can it be. Its been 3 years since I bought that piece of ass Gameday 99. They've had to get all their glitches and problems worked out. WRONG!!!!!!!! Before when I told you I thought Gameday 99 was most worthless game ever invented. NCAA final four takes the cake in the category of suckiest games to ever suck.

Let me tell you about some of the problems I have with this game. Where do I begin? Here you go! The players facial features are detailed, too bad they don't resemble anyone I've ever seen on any team. 4 player's jersey numbers might be correct on the entire team. Every basketball arena is exactly the same, just with a different logo, and different colors on the court. Every time you bring the ball down the court someone is getting called for a foul. The half lengths are either 5,10 or 20 minutes, when 15 minute halves would produce the most realistic stats. In my current season with a Big Ten team after 8 games, my point guard is leading the nation in scoring but is not even on the first or second all Big Ten team as of now. The players movements resemble....well......not much, maybe howdy doody or Pinocchio on the basketball court. Even after all of this you try to tell yourself that as long as I can create players I can at least get the correct players out on the court and try to take them to a championship. What a crock of ish! When you create a player you can't select any physical attributes, that's right, whatever figure 989 decided to throw on the screen for you to see will be on the screen until you throw the game out 10th floor of your dorm or apartment complex. Oh it'll change the jersey number in the stat lines and keep stats for your new player but when you go to play a game that player with the double zero number, the one you wondered who the hell that was, will still be on the court with his same old double zero on his jersey. The only difference is when you switch to control double zero he'll have a little circle below him on the court with the new # you wanted to assign him.

CHRIST, Sony should revoke 989's license to create video games for the playstation. I will never buy their garbage again! You can quote me this time! I would rather listen to the Backdoor Boys and N-Stink do your christmas favorites cd over and over again in a room with no windows or doors......OK, maybe not, but don't buy 989.

-Now that you've read something, he's written. Wouldn't you like to find out more about Skizzow? Here you go.