Developer: Point of View Software Publisher: Midway
Released: November 28, 2001 Rated: E 7/10
In lieu of a past-generation release of the new NFL Blitz 20-02, which debuted that same season for the PS2, Xbox, and GameCube, Midway opted for a quick and dirty update to the previous year’s NFL Blitz 2001. Though built on a strong foundation of fast-paced gameplay and over-the-top arcade excitement, the series was admittedly already seeing some diminishing returns through a lack of updates – a common complaint regarding Midway’s arcade sports titles of the era. It was only a few years prior that Olympic Hockey ‘98 had infamously received a 0/10 from IGN for being nearly identical to Wayne Gretzky’s 3D Hockey ‘98, which itself had only been out a few months.
So what do we do with NFL Blitz Special Edition, then? It’s a game that almost doesn’t want to admit what it is – a roster update, nothing more or less – but the circumstances of its release make it a little bit more understandable. As a Blockbuster exclusive, and one that doesn’t really try to sell itself as a “new game,” but a “new edition” of one, there isn’t really any trickery or lack of effort going on here. It kind of says what it is on the box, even though you probably didn’t get to look at the back of the box, and doesn’t expect you to be dropping full price on something that literally doesn’t play any differently from the year before. Rosters and uniforms have been updated. The season schedules are for the current NFL season. There are no other differences from a game you either already own, or skipped because you didn’t need another yearly Blitz release just yet.
I admit, I was considering not assigning this game a score at all. Trying to pretend a simple roster update or barely-updated sports release is a poor practice that we’ve all complained about, especially in the current gaming landscape. It’s so bad that when a game like EA Sports’ FIFA/FC or NHL releases a “legacy edition,” ie, using nearly the exact same naming convention as NFL Blitz did, but fully admitting that there are no changes besides the roster, it’s almost refreshing to have the transparency. But at least Midway had stopped pretending that an updated sports release had truly had any effort put in after the Olympic Hockey fiasco.
In the end, what we’re looking at with NFL Blitz Special Edition, in a vacuum, is NFL Blitz 2001, which is a very fun and enjoyable entry in the Blitz franchise. If you fired this one up looking to play some N64 Blitz, you’d be pretty happy, even if you might prefer the even simpler simplicity of the first title. In the landscape of the console nowadays, it’s strictly collectors’ fare, fetching well into triple digits for a physical copy due to its low print run as a rental exclusive. There’s no real reason to seek it out for a non-completionist, as NFL Blitz 2001 could very well already be your least favorite entry on the system, and another, exponentially more expensive version of the same game is simply unnecessary on multiple levels.
Continuing Legacy
As mentioned, the practice of yearly sports titles shaking out to be little more than roster updates is a well-known one that has only gotten more frustrating as the years have gone by, particularly due to the landscape of sports gaming whittling down competition in each sport to nonexistence. The EA Sports-spearheaded practice of printing past-gen versions of new titles as “legacy editions” is a double-edged sword that they very well may have taken from Midway’s gambit here. It’s a bit unsavory to try and sell a game that’s had literally zero work done aside from editing the stats, rosters, and a few graphic files, but given that the target audience for these entries are typically luddites who tend to openly express their desire to continue buying updated versions on the same hardware ad infinitum, you can’t completely blame the company for engaging in this practice.
Additional Information
Saves: Controller Pak
Compatible With: Expansion Pak, Rumble Pak
Players: 1-4
Print Guides: None
Aggregate Critical Reception: N/A (No Contemporary Reviews available via GameRankings)
Other Releases: NA Exclusive on N64
