Of course, Tecmo Bowl couldn't hope to deliver NFL action with all its bells and whistles, what with the technology limitations of the time. As a result only 12 teams of the NFL's then 28 are represented in any fashion here. Additionally, the game consists entirely of 9 on 9 play, which I guess meant there were some unhappy starters in the NFL who saw themselves get axed for Tecmo Bowl. Ouch. It was like complaining about your Madden score before such a thing even existed, really. The other major fundamental drawback was the play selection, or lack thereof. Every team got four plays and four plays only. Usually this is broken evenly with two runs and two passes, but a couple teams have three pass plays instead (and only the one run). And defense doesn't have plays - in fact, defense in Tecmo Bowl largely consists of just guessing which play the offense is going to run next. If you guess right, your team gets a huge speed and strength boost for the play as though they were the 1970s Steelers on steroids marching their way towards another Super Bowl and eventual medical complications.Yet the lack of plays is as much a charm as it is a drawback. The simplicity of the game makes it immediately accessible (of course, mastery of its various quirks takes more time). As a player, you only get control of one player on the field at any given time. On offense it's the quarterback to start, and then the ball-carrier after you hand it off or throw it. On defense though, you choose your player before the snap, and you're stuck with him through the entirety of the play. Such a choice might require some deliberation, which is why it's nice that the game has no play clock. As such, the offense can happily use an infinite snap count, complete with sounds, at will. Of course, the game clock stops after every play as well, rendering this unusable as an exploit (and also incidentally rendering timeouts unnecessary - they aren't in the game).
Choosing your defensive player can be a nice crutch in case you guessed the wrong play, because at that point it's all you. Your teammates will even just stand around idle on many plays for little to no reason. And when you're up against guys like Joe Montana and Jerry Rice, even Lawrence Taylor is going to need a little help once in a while. The game is pretty stacked for the offense, after all. Fumbles don't exist in Tecmo Bowl, so ball security is never an issue. Incomplete passes are even rare, thanks to how the game handles every toss. See, when you throw to a receiver, instead of leading them in stride, the ball launches toward their current position. This means that except in the rare instance the random number generator deems your pass to be errant, the ball is heading directly at a receiver at all times, and receivers don't drop passes. Passes also can't be deflected by defenders, so the scoreboard is likely to light up every contest.So it's worth noting that the game gives the defense some advantages. For one, interceptions occur all the freaking time. If a guy is even lightly covered with a defender a step or two away, there's about an 80% chance of an interception. You might see a guy break free of the defense and streak ahead, and launch that deep ball - but once you do your receiver will simply stop and wait for the ball, giving guys ample time to catch up and get the easy pick. So it stands to reason that you'll want to run more than you pass in most cases, or at least toss short routes that are tougher to defend. But even if you do get deep and beat your guy, the defenders have a trick up the old sleeve: cheat speed. Cheat speed occurs only when a defender is chasing down a breakaway, and is exactly as it sounds - for no good reason, the defender accelerates at an alarming rate until he is faster than should be possible and can make the tackle to save a touchdown. You'll love it when you're the beneficiary, but otherwise, well...it's called cheat speed for a reason.
Thankfully Tecmo Bowl also recognized the importance of halftime ceremony. After the second quarter, some cheery music plays while still images of various kinds of awesomeness cycle. They've got balloons, a marching band, and all kinds of burning hot cheerleaders. But as you can see, sometimes they go overboard. Too far, guys. Too far. Halftime can also be skipped if you want to get right back to the bone crunching action. And if you think "bone crunching" is extreme, you've never seen the kinds of blocks guys level in this game. It's pretty common to watch a dude get launched 15 yards before hitting the ground. There's just no real reason for it, but it's great. When it gets annoying is when your opponent figures out that there are no penalties in the game, and therefore blocks in the back are perfectly legal. You'll get blindsided so often you'll feel like a redshirt on Star Trek.On that note, tackling can be a tricky affair in Tecmo Bowl. You can tackle a player just by running into him and mashing buttons (and he can break tackles by mashing buttons more quickly), but you can also press a button to dive toward the ball carrier. If you make contact, the tackle is instant and can't be broken. Should you miss though, you'll take a few seconds to pull yourself back up, and run noticeably slower when you are on your feet again. It's total risk-reward, which puts a bit of strategy into it - do you give up 4 yards to ensure contact (and risk getting blocked in the back) or dive for the quick stop but risk getting juked?
I admit I use the term "juke" pretty lightly here. Really it consists of zig-zagging, which is the be-all and end-all of Tecmo Bowl open field moves. When running against a computer defense, they will dive at your ankles every chance they get. By zig-zagging constantly up and down, you ensure that these diving tackles miss, and so can run the length of the field, barring a cheat-speeder who refuses to dive. Occasionally a dive can extend for 10 yards (ten yards) which is hard to deal with, but it doesn't happen often. Trust in the zig-zag and victory shall be yours.
Special teams in Tecmo Bowl are straight crazy. First off, every kick for a field goal or extra point is always 100% accurate. That doesn't mean you'll always make it though, since you do have a power meter to determine your kick distance. Just know that if it's long enough, it will always go in. There's just one little catch. See the dude marked with a number 2 in that picture? HE IS THE BANE OF YOUR KICKING EXISTENCE. That guy will always, and I mean always get free run to the kicker on every attempt. The reason is that the six blockers flanking the long snapper will automatically engage the guys right across from them, and nobody can block two guys at once in Tecmo Bowl. The long snapper himself just stands idle after he snaps it. Unless you run straight into him, you can blast between the other blockers with ease and tackle the holder before the kick is taken. On extra points you don't really have enough time unless the kicker is dilly-dallying, but otherwise it's a gimme. Especially on a team like New York, which puts Taylor in that position. It's evil.Even punts get way up there on the "Okay, this is really nuts" scale. They use the same basic power meter, and at higher ends of the spectrum we're talking 80 yards...in the air. 80 yards of hangtime on a punt? I'm not sure that's even remotely possible. If you get stopped at your own 10 and punt it, you can very well expect to pin the opponent inside his own 20. Football announcers always say a good punter is a weapon, and Tecmo Bowl will make you believe it. Also, try your best not to be down multiple scores with under a minute left, as there are no onside kicks in Tecmo Bowl. You can do a short kickoff, but the other team still gets it 100% of the time, again with no chance of fumbling. If you're down, you're done. One last oddity here: during kicks and even throws from the QB, the players doing the kicking or throwing are invincible. You may have John Elway lined up and about to take a sack only to dive straight through him because his arm was moving. On the one hand it ensures there's never going to be a Tuck Rule fiasco in Tecmo Bowl as there was in real life...but on the other....come on.
And "come on" is the mantra you're going to hear yourself violently screaming the second you find yourself up against this guy. Bo Jackson is Tecmo God. He's the fastest player in the game, and in Tecmo Bowl where speed is everything, that's a huge deal. Let me give an example: Once, as Bo Jackson, I found that the defense had correctly predicted my play, and so had double speed and strength for the play. I ran 20 yards back behind the line of scrimmage to draw the entire defense to me, then swept around them and ran back upfield for 25 yards before the cheat speed (which had brought them up to quad speed) finally caught me. Folks, that's a 5 yard gain on a play the game specifically programmed to lose 2. Bo Jackson is so unfair that most people have to ban the use of his team when buddies are playing. San Francisco is occasionally banned too because Joe Montana to Jerry Rice is relatively unstoppable as well, but, well, Bo knows Tecmo. A typical "Tecmo Bo" stat sheet in a single six minute game: 7 carries for 485 yards and 7 TDs. No, I'm not kidding. He's so good that when people meet the real Bo Jackson they spend less time talking about what a fantastic athlete he was in real life, and more time regaling him with stories about how they used him in Tecmo Bowl to dominate. No, I'm still not kidding.Should we be surprised though? I mean, we're talking about a guy who, when he got a career-ending hip dislocation, popped it back into its socket on his own, without assistance, while lying on the football field. If you're going to make anyone the king of Tecmo kings, I guess he's your guy. The Raiders aren't even the best team in the game, but because of Bo's one play they're magically elite. But oops, I probably shouldn't say "Raiders" here. You see, while Tecmo was able to get the player names for their game and therefore the cooperation of the NFL Players Association, the NFL itself refused to let them use actual team names and franchises. So instead of the Minnesota Vikings, you just get "Minnesota," a team clad in purple and white with the 1989 Vikings roster. Wink wink, right Tecmo Bowl?
There are things about this game that don't really have bearing directly on the gameplay yet are funny in themselves. For instance, after a QB throws an interception he doesn't move. At all. He stands there with his arm forward in ball-release position, stupefied that his inability to lead a receiver resulted in a turnover. The intercepting player can even run right at the QB and elicit no reaction. Less funny though and more "Oh my gosh don't make me look at that" is the stadium crowd. They only appear behind the endzones, but that's MORE than enough. They turn their heads back and forth in unison, wearing creepy blank smiles on their creepy blank faces, undoubtedly longing to massacre everything you hold near and dear to your heart. You'll be so terrified of them that you'll be thanking Captain Field-Goal-Death-Man for annihilating your holder before you can get the kick off; it saves you from watching them in their creepy evil head turning ritual. On a lighter note, you can actually "magic eye" them and they'll turn 3D. Really! Go ahead and enlarge that picture and try it out. I like to think that was the intent all along; "Oh, they're not trying to murder me, they just want to turn into a penguin* when I go cross-eyed!"Tecmo Bowl is, frankly, awesome. It's at its best, as many games of this ilk are, when played against a human opponent of similar skill. It's even got a nifty "coach mode" for people who don't want to take full control or just want something to make bets on. In coach mode you just choose the play you want to run (or defend) and the results are simulated. It takes away a lot of the nuance and removes skill, but at the same time better emphasizes mind-games. A good option, whether you use it or not. The game isn't scored as high as it could be still, thanks to the many exploitable things to be found therein. A friendly game between two skilled Tecmo Bowlers can quickly degenerate into a zig-zagging, cheat-speeding, kick-murdering fest of unfairness on both sides.
Actually, I guess that actually makes it fair in the end, doesn't it? Hum.
Bottom Line: 14/20
*crowd does not actually turn into penguin when viewed as a "magic eye"
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