Blitz: The League II continues the franchise legacy as the ultimate alternative to the watered-down, licensed competition. In addition to an all-new story mode penned by Peter Egan (ESPN's Playmakers), Blitz: The League II features include: Precision-Aim Tackles, player-controlled touchdown celebrations, an enhanced on-the-field Clash Mode, online multiplayer capabilities, expanded rosters with all-new personalities, and the return of a cornerstone of the Blitz franchise...Late Hits! Football legend Lawrence Taylor returns as the game's cover-athlete and star linebacker for the New York Nightmare, Quentin Sands, along with a star-studded supporting cast.
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This game did what most sports games fail to do: It made sports actually fun. There's no rules here, just damn violence. The injuries are brutal (especially the testicle one, ouch). I love this game. Played it a shit ton as a kid. I actually enjoyed playing a sports game, and I hate sports.
More broken bones, now with achievements!
Blitz II is a step sideways and barely an improvement for a game released 3 years after its predecessor.
Campaign mode is a lot better with a slightly better (but not by much) story and some improved customization. Your star player is Franchise, a prodigy who plays both offense and defense. This means that Franchise will play on both offense and defense during your campaign mode games. After an intro cutscene, you answer questions in a press conference question format that determines Franchise's offensive/defensive positions and starting stat boosts.
Training players works the same, but development cycles go by faster and it is a lot easier to train them up to a B or A+ rank. Cheerleader photos are gone, but you can hook up with girlfriends that give you boosts like lower drug costs and higher stamina. During campaign mode games, landing dirty hits, scoring touchdowns and causing injuries increases your "Rep," which at higher levels, gives better training bonuses and rewards.
As a whole, the gameplay is barely any better and feels worse. The clash system is mostly the same, but defensive players now earn clash as the same rate as defensive players, which helps level the playing field. Defensive players can also be injured, which can occur from a ballcarier stiff arming them or performing a juke/spin, or if a defender recovers a loose ball and gets an injury triggering dirty/unleashed hit.
Speaking of injuries, they are brutal. When an injury is triggered, the game slows down and allows you to target an opponents' body part before mashing a button to fill up a circle. These are shown via a bloody, gory CGI, Mortal Kombat style rendering of spinal cords snapping out of alignment, ribs and backs being bruised, brains rattling, blood spurting from a fractured wrist, tendons tearing and even scrotoms rupturing. It can be assumed that this is where Mortal Kombat got the idea for X-Ray moves. Treating injuries safely is now gone as juicing is the only option, now involving bone snapping and shot juicing minigames where accuracy determines how long the player is out for and how much stamina he regains.
Brawls are removed, but you can initiate late hits during a small after play window, where success awards you a clash icon.
Unleashed works the same, except the cutscenes are more violent with some over the top wrestling move tackles like a dropkick, double team back suplex and such. What's cool is if you use your Unleashed tackle on a ballcarrier if you are near another defender or two, you'll perform a double team tackle that mostly injures the ballcarrier.
Aside from that, there isn't much new. A.I. is just as bad as the previous game, maybe even a worse. Getting sacks is more challenging since the A.I. quarterbacks are afraid of blitzing and the pass rush game. More plays exist, but just like its predecessor, Blitz II's A.I. can read more than half the plays you choose. The strategy of long bombing the ball can still be easily exploited. Campaign mode does add some twists like a fun prison ball game mode, the option to trade a player from a very limited pool at a few points, but really not much else. There are a lot less games during Campaign, which is a plus since Blitz 1's Campaign really dragged on at times. A few extra game modes exist, but no cheats are available this go around. There are a few new teams like an Atlanta team and such. No roster viewer though. Online was fun to dive into at the time before it was shut down, but my experience remembers it being very laggy with games that often disconnected.
For what it's worth, Blitz The League II (a game released in 2008) had a patch update shortly after its release that was noted to have improved gameplay stability, but still has a tendency to crash. Nonfrequent, but annoying issues like the game freezing after selecting a play and even locking itself into an endless looping cutscene after an injury happened made playing through a number of games frustrating.
Blitz The League II doesn't do much to improve upon the first game with its lack of depth, poor A.I., and bugs. The injuries and Unleashed wrestling XFL style hits are cool, but not enough to make the game worth it for the whole game season.
Campaign mode is a lot better with a slightly better (but not by much) story and some improved customization. Your star player is Franchise, a prodigy who plays both offense and defense. This means that Franchise will play on both offense and defense during your campaign mode games. After an intro cutscene, you answer questions in a press conference question format that determines Franchise's offensive/defensive positions and starting stat boosts.
Training players works the same, but development cycles go by faster and it is a lot easier to train them up to a B or A+ rank. Cheerleader photos are gone, but you can hook up with girlfriends that give you boosts like lower drug costs and higher stamina. During campaign mode games, landing dirty hits, scoring touchdowns and causing injuries increases your "Rep," which at higher levels, gives better training bonuses and rewards.
As a whole, the gameplay is barely any better and feels worse. The clash system is mostly the same, but defensive players now earn clash as the same rate as defensive players, which helps level the playing field. Defensive players can also be injured, which can occur from a ballcarier stiff arming them or performing a juke/spin, or if a defender recovers a loose ball and gets an injury triggering dirty/unleashed hit.
Speaking of injuries, they are brutal. When an injury is triggered, the game slows down and allows you to target an opponents' body part before mashing a button to fill up a circle. These are shown via a bloody, gory CGI, Mortal Kombat style rendering of spinal cords snapping out of alignment, ribs and backs being bruised, brains rattling, blood spurting from a fractured wrist, tendons tearing and even scrotoms rupturing. It can be assumed that this is where Mortal Kombat got the idea for X-Ray moves. Treating injuries safely is now gone as juicing is the only option, now involving bone snapping and shot juicing minigames where accuracy determines how long the player is out for and how much stamina he regains.
Brawls are removed, but you can initiate late hits during a small after play window, where success awards you a clash icon.
Unleashed works the same, except the cutscenes are more violent with some over the top wrestling move tackles like a dropkick, double team back suplex and such. What's cool is if you use your Unleashed tackle on a ballcarrier if you are near another defender or two, you'll perform a double team tackle that mostly injures the ballcarrier.
Aside from that, there isn't much new. A.I. is just as bad as the previous game, maybe even a worse. Getting sacks is more challenging since the A.I. quarterbacks are afraid of blitzing and the pass rush game. More plays exist, but just like its predecessor, Blitz II's A.I. can read more than half the plays you choose. The strategy of long bombing the ball can still be easily exploited. Campaign mode does add some twists like a fun prison ball game mode, the option to trade a player from a very limited pool at a few points, but really not much else. There are a lot less games during Campaign, which is a plus since Blitz 1's Campaign really dragged on at times. A few extra game modes exist, but no cheats are available this go around. There are a few new teams like an Atlanta team and such. No roster viewer though. Online was fun to dive into at the time before it was shut down, but my experience remembers it being very laggy with games that often disconnected.
For what it's worth, Blitz The League II (a game released in 2008) had a patch update shortly after its release that was noted to have improved gameplay stability, but still has a tendency to crash. Nonfrequent, but annoying issues like the game freezing after selecting a play and even locking itself into an endless looping cutscene after an injury happened made playing through a number of games frustrating.
Blitz The League II doesn't do much to improve upon the first game with its lack of depth, poor A.I., and bugs. The injuries and Unleashed wrestling XFL style hits are cool, but not enough to make the game worth it for the whole game season.
The took nfl blitz and said how can we make this bad and here we are