220 · NFL
Based on professional football as played in the National Football League, NFL was the first 8-bit console game to carry the official NFL license. There is no NFLPA license, though, which means the 28 real teams are included, but no player names or faces.
SHOW NOTES
NFL Longplay
Tecmo Bowl Episode
Intellivision NFL
Atlus made this for LJN in 1989, and the box brags that it is the only licensed NFL game on the NES. It is the fourth football game so far, after 10 Yard Fight, Tecmo Bowl and John Elway's quarterback game, which went rogue and wasn't the NFL. The license turned out to be mostly team names, and the football is a slog.
The license
- Names and not much else. There is no players association, so no players and no stats. The NFL shield sits at midfield and the end zones say NFL. There are no city names, no logos on the field and only loose team colors.
- Six team types. You pick one of six stat layouts instead of a real team, so the Bills and the Jets can be the same team. The handicap mode lets you raise a C to an A. We wanted point allocation, or those layouts assigned to real teams.
- Manual only. The AFC and NFC logos show up in the manual and never again. It also leans on Tom Bass, a consultant with 20 years of NFL coaching experience, as its authority.
The flow
- Five screens where one would do. Scoreboard, a blind play select from a separate playbook sheet, the lineups, then the hike. Football already starts and stops, and this adds more not happening. Tecmo Bowl goes from play select straight to the field.
- The strut. Nobody has moved this slowly since 10 Yard Fight. The players strut and the camera jerks along in time, comically like a dance.
- Long and easy to cheese. Quarters are 15 minutes on a slow clock, and a full game runs about an hour. Calling a run within four downs usually got the first down.
The pass close-up
On a throw, the game zooms in on your receiver and the defender. Joe, who only played two-player, went from annoyed to appreciating it: more agency, and a more satisfying interception.
It also adds one more stop to every play. And it doesn't match the field, so you cut back and run into a tackler who wasn't there.
Worth knowing
- Good information. The clock, downs and referee graphics feel like TV.
- Missing. No halftime show, no touchdown cutscene and no season mode.
- The manual. It says not to expect fun at first and not to pass until you've learned the running game, like telling Mario players they aren't ready for the fire flower.
The bottom line
Skip it. Nobody voted it onto the Essential Games List. Sean loves football, but we've come a long way with Tecmo Bowl, which is essential, and this isn't. Joe had fun two-player with his friend Eric figuring it out, but once they both did, nobody scored again.
Written from our conversation in this episode.
- Lead your team all the way to the Super Bowl
- NES Longplay
- Introductions
- Football is back already! Well no we’re in a bit of an offseason in real life, but let’s check in on those Bills
- Overview
- This is another NES football game, but this time with the NFL license.
- They are bragging about being able to say SUPER BOWL
- They put it in bold on the back of the box that this is the only licensed NFL NES game
- And obviously that’s gonna make it sell well
- AND YET, NO NFLPA
- Gameplay
- The appeal of an NFL game is having NFL teams, but they didn’t make the teams unique instead you choose from 6 potentially balanced types of teams.
- On the one hand, this is great if your team sucked that year, on the other hand it makes it feel more generic than an NFL game
- They do try to customize the 6 team types with handicaps as well
- The offensive playbook
- Seperate from the manual
- A unique way to create a lot of plays and take away the ability to screen loo
- So let’s not breakdown football for everyone again, instead let’s talk about the flow of the game. Football, to me, as a low informed watcher, is mostly a game that is very segmented between plays and playbooks.
- 3 stages - The scoreboard, the playbook, the 40 yard screen
- Speaking of the 40 yard screen what do you think about the then zoom in to the 15 yard screen. It feels empty?
- 3 stages - The scoreboard, the playbook, the 40 yard screen
- The slow mo during the play, effective or glitchy?
- The computer is practice mode. The real battle is with friends
- The appeal of an NFL game is having NFL teams, but they didn’t make the teams unique instead you choose from 6 potentially balanced types of teams.
- Sequels and Spinoffs
- This game was the first since NFL Football - released in 1979 for the Intellivision - to get an official National Football League license.
- EGL
- NEStalgia Byte - Dig Dug
Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.
NFL, lead your team all the way to the Super Bowl.
And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sean. And I'm Joe. Football is back already? Well, not really. We're in the off-season in real life. But let's check in on those bills. Sean, how are those bills? Those bills actually exist for real this time and are not just a red and blue BUF logo.
Right. So this is another NES football game, but this time with the NFL license. I mean, think about it. They are bragging on the back of the box about being able to say Super Bowl. Nobody else is allowed to say Super Bowl. The NFL owns that. They're letting you know that right away with the back of the box. However, you know, there's like no NFL PA.
So it's just NFL. There's no like players necessarily or any stats there. So it's not quite the complete package yet. But I could imagine a lot of people are the game is going to sell well because it has NFL on it. Yeah, this is I mean, the whole thing about the NFL PA might give you a better experience because, you know, that's your that's your team. Those are your guys. Whereas in this, like the NFL just sort of shows you like, OK, this is the product that the NFL thinks is good enough to sell me as the football simulation. So it's got to be good, right?
Yeah, I hear this is what the players in the NFL actually use to train. Yeah. Actually, what's his name? Tom Bass is shouted out in the manual as I don't know. He was probably an assistant coach in places. They said he has 20 years of NFL coaching experience. And he was he was like a supervisor, not a supervisor, a consultant. So that's their like appeal to authority to sell this game as a as the real football game.
Yeah. I mean, they put it in bold on the box that this is the only licensed NFL NES game. So they wanted you to know when you go to the toy store and it's put right next to the other football games that this is the legal one. You're doing something wrong if you buy. Strangely enough, though, only 10 yard fight and Tecmo Bowl, right? We haven't had any other football games to the best. Oh, that's it. No, that's not true. That that quarterback game.
What was that guy? Remember? John Elway. Yeah. John Elway's quarterback. So sorry. This is the fourth football game. But John Elway also not the NFL. He was just a lone man acting alone. That is just John Elway. He went rogue. Yeah.
So it kind of has the same like layout as Tecmo Bowl. I mean, it kind of sucks because like this game comes out not too far removed from like a classic football game. Like the probably the best you're going to get from a football game in this era. And it looks kind of similar.
Yeah. And I mean, the appeal of an NFL game is having the NFL teams. But in this one, they didn't make the teams unique. You just choose the team that you want to play as. So if you are a Bills fan, you would choose Buffalo. But then you're not greeted with like the stats and forget the players. You're not even greeted with the stats of the Bills for that season. And you are greeted with six potentially balanced types of teams that you choose from. And on the one hand, this is great if your team sucked that year because now they don't suck in this version of the game. Like you don't really think about that. But there were many years as a Mets fan that I would buy baseball games and they were terrible.
And it's like this isn't a fun experience unless you trade everybody that's on that team for, you know, you trade like three guys for one superstar or something. But Sean, since you are the de facto, you know, football fan here, I'm curious. Did you think just as like a time capsule, does this help or hurt the game that you just basically the Bills and the Jets can theoretically be the same exact team? And they go up against each other. And the only difference now is one's on offense and one's on defense, depending on who has the ball. And this is like the last I'll say on the whole licensing thing.
The only thing about this game that is affected by this is the fact that you are greeted by the NFL shield in the beginning of the game. You see the NFL shield in the middle of the field every time you play. Each of the end zones say NFL and you have the real team names in the select screen and on the scoreboard.
It doesn't say anything about the city name. It doesn't have the the team logos. It doesn't have even the city name or the team logo on the field of which you play. It has a very like loose version of team colors for the players on the field. Really, the only thing that this NFL license did was put the team names in the game. That's it. Like each and you're right, like each team is just this. It's the same team that you can you can tweak if you want.
Sorry. Go ahead, Joe. No, I was just going to say my, you know, my initial thought was like that. Okay, that was probably kind of touched on it. That was probably enough for them to just put the names in there. People are going to say, oh, my God, the NFL. I want it like they're like, we don't even need to go the extra mile and put like team stats or anything like that.
But then I realized that they did put team stats. They just instead of having them apply to a particular team, they just let you select any of those stat layouts, which I mean, I guess still brings back to the question for you, Sean, if you thought it was better having it that way. But, you know, I thought like, well, if they if they went through the trouble of putting I mean, I know it was only six, but putting these six different types of team stats in the game. Why didn't they just assign those to different teams to give the teams some sort of reason for being separate teams? Even in the college football games and there is no college. There's no NCAA Players Association to like sign off on likenesses and name rights.
Even then, like QB one for USC would still be like back in the day, like that that's still like close enough to Matt Leinert or something. Like it would be like this is what we think his stats would be, but we can't give him a name. But you can name a Matt Leinert if you want in the settings. And I would have expected like QB 12 on the Buffalo Bills to kind of have the same stats as Jim Kelly. But there is no number. There's just a character that is sort of lined up where a quarterback would be and he would throw the ball.
They do include a handicap mode, which at first I avoided because I didn't really understand. You know, I thought that was like to give a crutch if you're playing with one player and another to be like, all right, I'll downgrade myself. Or, you know, you start the game with like extra points or something. It's not that. Instead, it's a way to customize the six team types so that you can change a C all the way up to an A or two Cs to a B. It's pretty customizable in that regard. I thought that was like another neat feature.
But again, it seems like something where at that point, rather than just give the handicap to like specific point allotments or whatever, they should have just let you get like, you know, I'm thinking of Fallout or other games where you just basically start with all Fs and then you're given a certain amount of points where you build out your team. Point allocation, yeah. Exactly, exactly.
You know, I think that would have been better than this handicap system, which is still nice to have. Don't get me wrong. And if this is, is it bases loaded that has like sort of, you can create a team? Which baseball game was that we played recently? And like you could play a whole season. Was that bases loaded? I thought it was baseball stars.
Baseball stars. Yes. Okay. If I would have expected something like this to be in like an NFL analog to baseball stars where you're creating a football team and you're saying that, okay, this, this game, this, this quarterback's kind of, kind of shitty, but the offensive line and the running back are good. So that's, we're going to be a run first team. Like I would have expected this to be in a game like that, not in a game that has the NFL license. So it should reflect the NFL in some way.
That's, that's the last that I'll, I'll harp on the kind of meaninglessness of this license. Well, I, I have one more thing to harp on with the teams and it's actually a funny thing that you mentioned earlier that I never thought about until you brought it up, but you were saying that it's weird that they don't have, or not that it's weird, but just that they don't mention the location. So you are the bills. You're not the Buffalo bills. You sure are, but it doesn't say it anywhere.
Um, it doesn't even like list the city or anything that actually works in the favor of the Rams and the Raiders, you know, like now, now those teams take place in different cities and it doesn't feel dated. I don't know though, if you guys are like me, sports games on any console were always like cheaper if they were older. And it was fun to like go back and play that year's stats of things with that year's players or whatever. And just like, for me, that was another way because keep in mind, we didn't have YouTube and all that. It was another way to like learn about what happened or who was good those years in, uh, in those particular sports. And so that element is lost here. Absolutely. What did you guys think of the football itself?
Oh, I forgot about the football. So you bring up a good point, Sean, because we, I feel like let's not break down football again for everyone. Um, I'm sure by now any sport it's, it seems silly to do that. So what I wanted to talk about is the flow of the game, because that is the thing that changes from, um, developer to developer is yeah. They're going to follow the rules of, of the sport as closely as they choose to.
And they're going to, you know, try to make it look like a game of football. But the flow of NFL is arguably much different than tech mobile. And I think the biggest thing to notice is that they're, you know, as a, as a low informed watcher, just somebody who watches football casually doesn't really understand the strategy of anything.
It's mostly a game that is very segmented between plays and play book. You know, that time where like they're coming up with the plays and the, the clock's counting down, but there's no actual action going on. And then the actual play of the down, which is, you know, something that happens very quickly in this game. Both sections of that are, are almost like exaggeratedly long for a video game. Oh yeah. Both figuring out which play you want to do something you have to refer to in a separate sheet. And then also the experience of being within that down, uh, I don't know what we call those things, Sean. Uh, is it a play?
Um, each, I mean, each down, I guess is, okay. Cool. Yeah. So yeah, each play, like how long that takes to play out. I don't know. The flow felt very interrupted here. Go for it. Uh, I I'd say that, um, when, when you play tech mobile and I'm always going to compare it to that. Um, it's very streamlined. You get, you get like a play select and you pick your play and then you're immediately brought to the field to execute your play.
And then in, uh, in this game, you, you, you're looking at your scoreboard and then you sort of do this blind play select. Even if you're playing against the computer that you have to like, like Mike said, refer to your manual to know what play you're going to pick. And then it's going to show you like, um, like the, the, the defensive lineup. Like you're going to see how many defensive backs they got. And they're going to show like your, uh, your, your, uh, receivers and all that shit.
And then you're going to see your guys and then you're going to hike the ball and run or pass. It's, it's, it's even, there's even more steps like where, like exactly like football is a very start and stop sport, um, where everything happens all at once. And then nothing happens. Uh, this just sort of adds even more not happening to the game. And I never really, I don't, I don't really get it. Like a lot of this can be one screen, uh, but they choose to split it up between five.
Yeah. I think that, you know, my experience maybe wasn't quite as bad because I will confess that I almost never referred to, referred to the like plays for like what the inputs are the plays after like a couple of minutes of playing this game. I was like, you know what? I'm just going to pick random plays and hope that they work. Cause I do not feel like looking up these things every two seconds. Cause that just takes, it takes forever.
I'm granted like, I don't know what a good alternative is. If you really want to get into like having all these different plays and stuff, like I can see this being a positive, but for me, I was just like, I just kind of want to see how the play, how the game plays. So yeah, I ended up kind of abandoning that pretty quickly.
The one thing that I did like, and like any play can pretty much be a run or a pass play, um, which is fine. Um, but what I did like is when you do end up passing and there are several steps to actually throwing the ball, which I don't really want to get into, but there's more steps than there should be. Um, it will do, it'll zoom in to your receiver, uh, to, to sort of give you a bit more, uh, uh, uh, get more to work with in terms of, are you going to receive this ball? Is this ball going to get deflected? Is this ball going to be intercepted?
Um, I liked that it's, it's a bit more like cinematic than, uh, like a Tecmo. Uh, but again, it's, it's all in the execution and it's, it's sort of falls flat. It's adding more stops to the play now within the play, uh, which this game does not need.
Um, and then if you just zoom out to the game at large, like I have never seen it since 10 yard fight, I have not seen football players move this slowly. And it, it doesn't even like, it's not even just that the players aren't moving slowly. The, the, the screen is scrolling slowly and it looks like they're all doing this weird, like strut instead of running. They're like strutting down the field. And then the, the camera just jerks down the field in time with the strut. It's, it's comical. I really, I don't know how else to describe it other than movement in this game feeling comically like a dance.
And it feels bad from the moment you have the ball or, you know, like what in your, when you're in that 40 yard screen, but there is a moment during passing plays where it slows down even further as an intentional slow-mo so that you can focus on like who's right. Who's open and what you want to do and stuff like that. I, I just found it, it was all happening. Like those plays were happening way too long and everything, but also the breakup between the three stages of the scoreboard, the playbook, the 40 yard screen, the 15 yard zoom in to the 40 yard screen.
Like I can't even imagine how long an actual game of NFL would have taken me to play out, especially because I was trying to play this authentically with the offensive playbook, which is as far as I know, separate from the manual. It's its own separate instruction sheet, which kind of makes it like a neat relic. Obviously it was translated to game facts, but I just feel like it's, it's strange on one level. It's a unique way to create a lot of different plays, right?
It takes away the ability to screen look at all. You lock it. It has an NES controller and you lock in your picks and the offense doesn't know what the defense is doing and so on and so forth.
You have the ability to call out audibles in the, in the, before the balls hike too, which is like a really interesting extra mechanic, but it feels overly complicated for the product. I get that they were going for something more true to the NFL experience, being able to even have penalties like, um, face mask and stuff like that. Like these are all cool, neat touches. It just actually makes for a slower, boring experience when it actually like happens in practice. And especially because when you read the manual, um, it outright tells you that it, it, this gets modulated by if you use like handicaps or, uh, upgrade your stats at all. But the game outright says, and then two penalties per team will randomly be, uh, will be assorted.
And I'm like, wait a second. Don't tell me that. Like that, that has always been a complaint of football games is that penalties like face mask and penalties like, uh, unsportsmanlike have always been random. And now you're just telling me that like, even without the added simulation of, of the more recent games, now it's just going to happen whenever.
I don't know. That's funny. The manual even goes as far as to give you in the strategy section, just a, a talking to about like how you're not going to have fun at first. Like you don't, don't think about having fun. You have to learn how to play this game. The beginning player might be overwhelmed by all of the options and the complexity of the controls in this game. Don't be discouraged. In order to play like the pros, you have to put in some practice time.
That's only paragraph one of them. What is a second paragraph of a very long detailed explanation about why you shouldn't even attempt passing until you figured out the running game and stuff like it's just like, it's nonsense. It's like telling people in Super Mario Brothers, like, don't, you're not ready for the fire flower. Like just learn how to jump over the pitfalls first, buddy.
Yeah. But I mean, maybe they were, they realized like, oh, like this game is complicated for our young audience. Maybe we need to like get ahead of that right away before they just put the game down. And I could understand that if it was actually a challenging game, but the compute, you know, all the complexities they've put in, the computer can be very easily cheesed.
I'm not saying the computer's bad by any means, or it's not a difficult game, but I found that just picking the running play within four downs, I was probably going to gain enough yards to get the first down and just continue to repeat that kind of action. In some ways, the computer is just a practice mode in this game for the actual human versus human element that would probably be a lot more exciting.
Yeah. And I think just like, but we already complained about how like as a baseline presentation, there isn't much in terms of the differences between teams and how they use the license. But like even you don't even need to have anybody's face licensed, like have there be a little cut scene of, of a touchdown, like in Tecmo Bowl, like make it fun in some way. This because the simulation doesn't mean it doesn't have to be fun. No matter if Tom Bass wrote a strongly worded letter in the manual saying that you shouldn't have fun. Like you can still do stuff like that.
Yeah. Especially because they did have, they already have in this game like that close up for when you're receiving a pass, they could just do something similar. Spike the ball. Yeah. They already had like animations like that.
Can I back up a bit? I want to get your guys' like deeper thoughts on, on that animation when you're receiving the ball, because I had an interesting kind of process with that. Cause at first I was like, that's really annoying. And I did feel like that like interrupts the gameplay in a weird way that like, like, why am I going to a different view now? No, you know, no other football game has done it this way. But as I played it, I actually grew to really appreciate that part.
It actually made it feel like receiving a pass was a little more, I had a little more agency in it. It was a little more like, rather than it just being like, oh yeah, it was generally in the right area. So I caught the pass where it's like, oh no, it now zooms in and there'll be like, you know, the receiver is there. And also like whoever is defending you is there. And if you're playing two player, it feels a little more satisfying to get an interception because you feel like you did it. You have to jump and you have to grab the ball, you know, and, and, and it felt, you know, as much as it is a little bit of like a weird interruption that made it more fun. And full disclosure, I only played this game two player.
Um, and, and in that way it was fun, but I wonder if it was, uh, how the computer handled that. I mean, the computer, it, it, it, it can catch. And I had actually been intercepted. I've been intercepted in this game too. So it's not like it's a, it's a gimme, uh, every time. And I do like that you sort of will control your receiver after the fact. Um, I, I just think that the, the cons sort of outweigh the pros in terms of the, uh, because these games are so long, like you're actually going to play this game for an hour if you want to play the full game. Cause you don't, you can't play, uh, in a bridged game. It's like, I think they're all 15 minute quarters. Right. And it's a slow clock.
So when you add in all of these little things, it just becomes a slog. And I do agree that at its basis level, it's a cool idea. I just think that it's execution, uh, ends up harming the pace more than it helps like the engagement. And even that 15 yard screen that we're the zoom in screen, it doesn't that feel like a little empty? Isn't it weird that there's only ever like three characters maximum in that particular part of the field? I don't know football that well, but like when I see them on TV, it looks like they're, you know, it's either a really deep pass where it's just two guys or even just looking at the 40 yard screen here.
There's, it seems like there's a lot of action happening. And then they just microscopic down to just two players. You know, it's like, how zoomed in are we that we can't see the other guys on the field? I'll say that, um, just by virtue of the, the players in this game walking through molasses, um, you, you will very, you'll very rarely be able to get to a, like a one-on-one situation where it's just like a corner and a wide receiver. And that's all that's going to be in that 15 yard zoom in screen.
Um, because most of the time you're not gonna be able to get off a pass, uh, or, or you'll be surrounded by defenders as the quarterback and your receivers will still just be like 10 yards down the field, um, surrounded by defenders as well. So, so yeah, I, I do think that it, uh, maybe they're cutting some defenders, uh, to, to make that, like that secondary screen more manageable. I don't actually know, but you're right. It, it, now that I think about it, it does feel a little off.
Yeah. You know what? I forgot when I mentioned, uh, the positives about that, that I did also want to, uh, follow that up with one negative about that, uh, closeup screen. And that is that the, it appears to me and correct me if you guys felt that this was not true, but it appears to me that that closeup, you know, microscope view is not actually laid out. The players are not actually in the, in the same position that they are in the overall. That's sort of what I'm saying. Yeah. Okay. So when it, yeah, when it cuts back, I'm always like for a second, a little confused. Where am I? And, and who am I?
Who's, who's defending me? Like, like it'll cut back and I will run right into like a tackle because I didn't know that guy was there. Cause he wasn't. He wasn't there when you were zoomed in, but now he's there. Yeah. It's like, uh, in, uh, I forgot what, endless legend, like where, when you meet on the hex grid, then you start another like mini battle within that hex. And then you come back out of it and like, it's, it's all just different, uh, abstractions of, of football instead of football. It's like a random encounter. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
A thing I could appreciate though, about the presentation of the game is how much information is conveyed to you in a simple, effective manner, both on the 40 yard screen, where you have your time on the clock, uh, your downs and how much you have to go. But also in the scoreboard, there's a lot of information there in terms of, you know, both the players selecting their inputs, uh, that they're going to make for their play selection, but also the nice like referee graphics that change depending on the situation.
What, um, I feel like they didn't leave anything out, uh, that they could have, you know, like I know there's no, um, there's no challenging plays or anything like that. But, you know, for the most part, everything that you would expect to need to know as a coach of an NFL team in terms of the play selection and where you are in the game, it's all like laid out very nicely and almost, uh, like a TV experience.
Yeah. And as far as I can tell, like they did model the game out correctly. Like I did a couple of tests, like a safety ends up being a safety, um, the, uh, like it will sort of default you to a punt and then you'll actually get like a punt return. Turner in the back, uh, when, when it is, uh, when, when you actually are punting, like they, they do model out the game correctly and you do have all the information that you need to play it within the constraints that they've given you.
Um, and yeah, I do like some of the little graphics they show, but they could have done a lot more. Oh yeah. That's the personality. That's the only thing I like presentation wise, actually, because if you think about even just the field of the game, you were talking about how they have the NFL end zones. That would have been a perfect opportunity to get some team logos in there that are sorely missing in this game. But even in 15 minute quarters, the quarters that you must play through, there is no halftime show in the middle.
Something that would have been very easy to do and could have been fun with some, uh, nice sprite work. There could have been, um, information before the game about just like made up stats or something that you get to see some kind of opening ceremony or something. There's plenty that we've seen in other sports games that I'm just riffing on here. I'm not coming up with anything original. It just feels strange that the game is so straightforward that it wants you to just pretty much have like the coaching experience of, of a football game and not much else.
Yeah. I agree. I agree as well. Although I'll say I don't miss the halftime show type thing. Usually that's like funny to watch once. And then I'm kind of like, okay, let me just play this game. That's fair. You don't like the little ETs in soccer? Oh, I forgot about that.
So this game was the first NFL game since NFL football, which was released all the way back in 1979, 10 years prior for the Intellivision. And I took a look at that game and let's just say, you know, it is actually a nice improvement over, you know, like the NES did. When you think about everything that came before it, like we're talking about NES games in 2022 and occasionally we'll complain about the graphics. But I think we have a high tolerance. When I look at, when I look at in television games, they're unplayable.
Yeah. They're just like lines, right? It's like a line with like a, with like a, with a suggestion of a head on top of it. That's more Atari 2600, but yeah. No, Intellivision gets that way too, for the most part. So I think it's just, in a way, this is a good experience for people who, you know, at this day and age, like who just wanted the NFL like team of their choice. Right. Theoretically, Sean, if you were buying NES games in 1989, you would have likely have bought this one just to be able to play as the Bills. Right. Sure. That would have meant something to you. I definitely would have already owned Tecmo Bowl and I would have just continued to play Tecmo Bowl.
Got it. Okay. Fair enough. Oh, shit. Well. This isn't the essential games list. Right, right, right. You're going to have to probably say that again because we are about to do the one thing we must do every episode and that is decide whether NFL is an essential game on the essential games list. An essential organization. It just, yeah, it felt weird, right? It's like, are we, the game is just called NFL or is it called NFL football? On the box, it's just NFL. Well, so if it is called NFL football, tell me where because I don't see that anywhere. But also, that would be strange because that would mean that it would be called National Football League football.
Sean, your vote once more. Yeah, I already said what I said. Love football. I mean, any chance I get to play it in some digital way, I will. But, I mean, we've already come a long way with, I'll say it again, Tecmo Bowl. It is an essential game. And this NFL, NFL game is not. Back to you. Back to you, Joe. What do you think? I was going to just go, but he threw it back to you. So, I had to wait for you to call on me.
You know, like I said, I played this two-player and I always think that, well, I usually think that that is a recipe for having a little more fun than playing single-player anyways. And in that sense, we didn't not have fun. But still, even then, it was like, God, this game is so long. And it is a little tedious. It took a while. And I'll say that part of the fun was just like figuring out how the game worked on the fly. And I think like once we both figured out how the game worked, like nobody scored again. I was going to ask. I don't know what that means. Like if the game is too easy or too hard. But like. I was going to ask who won.
He won. My buddy Eric won. It was not friend of the show, Mark. But it was friend of the show, new friend of the show, Eric. Eric, old friend of mine. I don't know why I'm going on so much about this. This game is not essential. But it was like sort of fun to play two-player. You know, I'm not a football game guy. So, you know, take that for what you will. I just noticed that the only place where you can find any of the team logos on this product is in the manual. It's the very first thing they want you to know.
Who's in the AFC versus who's in the NFC. Before they even tell you to treat your interactive game carefully. Or give you an introduction on the lowdown of what it means to play this game. They give you those logos and then you never see them again. A weird touch again. Just like a lot of weird touches in this game.
We didn't mention that this is an LJN game. Not that it really matters. But it does seem like once again LJN has found a way to just convince another person. To let them like license their products. That they could make some half-baked game. Because yeah, we do have Tecmo Bowl. But I would argue forget about what we have. And just think about like if this was the only football game that we had access to on the NES. I don't. I think I wouldn't be satisfied at all. Like I think I would still have these same complaints about the flow of the game. And how long it takes.
It's nice that nine innings of baseball on any of the seven baseball games we've played. Hasn't felt like it would take me an hour plus to get through them. And yet this game, I never completed a full game just because I could feel the slog.
I was happy to play test other teams and see like if there was balance changes. But the actual like experience of playing a full game. I don't know. It never appealed to me. And so that's like a warning sign right there. If you can't even get through a full simulation of a sports game. Let alone you're probably supposed to play 16 of these right. Or 17. Or how many football games they play these days of the season. Now it's 17. But there's no season mode in this. Right. There's no season mode in this either. So that's why it's not on the essential game.
All right. That's been another episode of Nostalgia. Nostalgia. And we're going to do another one next week. P.O.W. Prisoners of War. I don't think it's a football game.
So that's good. But it's an SNK game. And we haven't heard from SNK in a long time. I think the last time we was. They were baseball stars. Believe it or not. Wow. So they are releasing their games around other sports games. Or they are releasing sports games.
Wild and crazy. Sorry. Mid-yawn. I'm sorry. Leave that in. I want everything lifted. I'm sure half the listeners are mid-yawn right now. I was going to say. Those wild and crazy kids. But anyway.
Yeah. P.O.W. Prisoners of War is next. Followed by Sesame Street. ABC. The acclaimed sequel to Sesame Street 1, 2, 3. A little interesting. They chose to go with ABC instead of 4, 5, 6. The natural progression of numbers. But I'm sure we'll learn a lesson or two there. Keep in mind we also have our Nostalgia Bites Dig Dug episode coming up for our Patreon members. And after that, you guessed it. More episodes of Nostalgia every single Friday. If you want even more than that, go to www.nostalgiacast.com. Or tweet at us at NostalgiaCast on Twitter. Or tweet me at Esposito Film on Twitter. Or reach out to Sean and Joe exclusively on our Discord. If you're a Patreon member, patreon.com slash nostalgia..
