Where better to start my reviews than my latest completed game and platinum trophy. This game was released to coincide with the tournament that is taking place right now in New Zealand. It is the first rugby game on the PS3 and the first since 2008 (I think).
Initially I was excited as being a fan of rugby the sport is really left in the dark with the lack of video games compared to other sports so I was much looking forward to this one. I must say it did disappoint me before it was released. There was a wrangle over licenses and due to that the game only features half of the licensed teams. Some like New Zealand and Australia are unlicensed so feature unofficial kits and made up players. This is because they have signed agreements with Sidhe, a New Zealand company who released All Blacks Rugby Challenge at the same time as RWC2011.
That was a dampener but alas nothing major for me. The demo was okay and I wasn’t going to buy the game but I relented out of boredom and the game isn’t all that bad really. It is more or less a copy of the previous rugby game with slightly better graphics and updated international squads but to fill time until the Jonah Lomu Rugby Challenge game is released (same as All Blacks but using the International title).
It is simple enough to play and rather easy, even on hard provided you pick teams that don’t have a large discrepancy with the skills. The game features four main modes of play; World Cup Tournament, International Test, Warm Up Tour and Spot Kick Challenge. Each are fun to play, the World Cup is the tournament and you can either play it with a random schedule or authentic one. It’s not bad and enjoyable. International tests is basically a quick game mode, I used it mainly to get achievements and trophies. Warm Up Tour is a fun series of matches where you can tour the Northern Hemisphere with a Southern team and vice versa. Each Hemisphere has three tours to complete.
My main disappointment is that the game is repetitive, not much variation in the gameplay. It’s basically ruck, run tackle, ruck, run, tackle, score. A bit more variation would be nice, the AI is pretty easy to beat and you can easily time their moves and second guess their selected actions.
In terms of achievements the game is pretty straight forward, you have the usual ones for score a try, kick etc and win the WC with a team under a 58 rating. The trickiest ones I found was the score a try from a direct pick up, that one was very annoying because the pickups are rare and to score a try is luck. Took me ages to get it and when I had the opportunity I was cheering my player on like a horse in the Grand National. The cheer was loud when I scored and the trophy baling’d! The final trophy I had to obtain was the play 100 matches one, by the time I was grinding for it, I had gone off the game and basically started a game and read for the duration and stopping to start the second half. The game got boring and VERY repetitive. A good addition would have been a stats centre to keep track of points, tries and games played throughout the game. To get the 100 games trophy it was guesswork as to how many games I had played and how many left to play.
Overall, this isn’t the greatest of rugby games but for a bit of filler until the Jonah Lomu rugby game is released it is a good buy. It is entertaining and a bit of fun. The game would have been much better had it held all the licenses, you have the official game but half of the teams are made up including the host nation. For an official product it isn’t good. It would be like FIFA without the players. All in all a fun game and one to buy when the price drops. Not the best but for it’s short shelf life it is decent.
6/10
