Scatter
Club Cricketer
Below is an email I have just fired off to HB. The contents of which, are an accurate reflection of my evening spent playing this game.
Having just been to a cricket fans website that gave the game a really good review, I thought I must be missing something. So I thought I would load it up and give the game one last chance.
I check that the difficulty is on hard, and then away I go...
I decided to play in a World Cup tourney in the West Indies. First up opponents were Sri Lanka. I kept in mind the line up bug (you know, that rather stupid bug where if I decide to save the game, and by some minor miracle it actually loads again, my team is for some unknown reason reverted to the default starting line up)and just went with a default squad. I was going to do the same with my team, until I saw what it was, and made some changes.
I lost the toss, and SL decided to bat. First ball of the day, and McGrath gets Jayasuriya to edge what would have been a sitter for second slip, but instead goes for four runs. Why don't I have a second slip? I think to myself. Oh yeah, because I didn't set the field, the dodgy AI did it. Then I remembered why I hate this bloody game...
So I press escape and try to change my field...
How the fup do you set a custom field when playing with a Microsoft Sidewinder Joypad??? (answers please on the back of a A$90 cheque - the amount I paid for this god awful game) No matter what combinations of button I press, I cannot edit my field, and all of the standard fields are very, very ordinary. God I hate this game.
Fearless I decide to push on with the absolute joke of a field I have been set. Next ball up and McGrath beats the outside edge, but the ball passes through the middle of Gilchrists body and goes for four byes. Oh. My. God. I hate this game!
Third ball up and Jaysuriya pushes the ball to a straight-ish mid-wicket, and then calls for a single. Waaaaaaa heeeeeeeeee... great move Sanith... back to the pavilion you go in one of the most ridiculous run outs ever witnessed. Sweet baby Jesus spare me. I hate this fuppin game.
To save myself the agony and expense of putting my fist through my brand new 21" monitor, I decide to autoplay the remainder of the innings. And besides, I didn't want to say to myself how much I hated the game around 200 times over the course of the innings. So for the sake of my sanity, autoplay was the best bet. Too bad that, because I always thought that bowling and fielding were vital aspects of our sport, but then, any resemblance this game has to our beloved sport is purely coincidental. Oh well. I really, really, really do hate this game you know.
Time for me to have a bat. Out walk my openers - somewhat humourously, Richie gets the names wrong - to the middle for a potentially difficult run chase. The autoplay having set the reasonable target of 9/269. So 270 to win it is. Hayden is on strike, and the ball pitches just outside the offstump from the left armer Vaas. Playing it safe I decide to shoulder arms. Thankfully, for the sake of fairness, Gilchrist isn't the only wicketkeeper in the game with a hollow abdomen, and the ball passes through for four byes. Time to console myself in a simple fact - dear God, I hate this game!!!
The score moves along rather smoothly to a very realistic 0/78 off of seven overs - including 24 byes. Did I mention how much I really, really hate this game?
Into the eigth over, and Gilchrist plays a nice leg glance into the deep. But then something weird happened. In a moment of David Blaine inspired magic, the fielding team all dissappeared. All of them bar the guy fielding the ball, who picked it up and threw it back to a keeper who wasn't there. Sweet!!! Invisible players or not - I hate this bloody game.
And then came the piece d'resistance. The rain. Oh joy. With my innings cruising along at an unbelievably realistic 1/134 after 14 overs, it started to rain. And then it rained some more. And then some more. And then some more. And then I realised, that I couldn't press resume - or do anything except watch it rain. The only thing that would have been funnier than a bug that stopped me from playing this god-awful game, would have been if animals had of started streaming into the ground as part of the bug, and started boarding the ark. It just wouldn't stop raining!!! And the only thing I hate more than this game, is the fact that I spent $90 bloody dollars like a completely gullible twat to buy it!
In over twenty years of gaming, I cannot remember ever seeing a computer game released with lower comparative production values than Cricket 2004.
I may have wasted $90 on it now, but I am sure that is $90 well spent to keep me away from any software your company develops in the future.
Regards
John Caulfield
Having just been to a cricket fans website that gave the game a really good review, I thought I must be missing something. So I thought I would load it up and give the game one last chance.
I check that the difficulty is on hard, and then away I go...
I decided to play in a World Cup tourney in the West Indies. First up opponents were Sri Lanka. I kept in mind the line up bug (you know, that rather stupid bug where if I decide to save the game, and by some minor miracle it actually loads again, my team is for some unknown reason reverted to the default starting line up)and just went with a default squad. I was going to do the same with my team, until I saw what it was, and made some changes.
I lost the toss, and SL decided to bat. First ball of the day, and McGrath gets Jayasuriya to edge what would have been a sitter for second slip, but instead goes for four runs. Why don't I have a second slip? I think to myself. Oh yeah, because I didn't set the field, the dodgy AI did it. Then I remembered why I hate this bloody game...
So I press escape and try to change my field...
How the fup do you set a custom field when playing with a Microsoft Sidewinder Joypad??? (answers please on the back of a A$90 cheque - the amount I paid for this god awful game) No matter what combinations of button I press, I cannot edit my field, and all of the standard fields are very, very ordinary. God I hate this game.
Fearless I decide to push on with the absolute joke of a field I have been set. Next ball up and McGrath beats the outside edge, but the ball passes through the middle of Gilchrists body and goes for four byes. Oh. My. God. I hate this game!
Third ball up and Jaysuriya pushes the ball to a straight-ish mid-wicket, and then calls for a single. Waaaaaaa heeeeeeeeee... great move Sanith... back to the pavilion you go in one of the most ridiculous run outs ever witnessed. Sweet baby Jesus spare me. I hate this fuppin game.
To save myself the agony and expense of putting my fist through my brand new 21" monitor, I decide to autoplay the remainder of the innings. And besides, I didn't want to say to myself how much I hated the game around 200 times over the course of the innings. So for the sake of my sanity, autoplay was the best bet. Too bad that, because I always thought that bowling and fielding were vital aspects of our sport, but then, any resemblance this game has to our beloved sport is purely coincidental. Oh well. I really, really, really do hate this game you know.
Time for me to have a bat. Out walk my openers - somewhat humourously, Richie gets the names wrong - to the middle for a potentially difficult run chase. The autoplay having set the reasonable target of 9/269. So 270 to win it is. Hayden is on strike, and the ball pitches just outside the offstump from the left armer Vaas. Playing it safe I decide to shoulder arms. Thankfully, for the sake of fairness, Gilchrist isn't the only wicketkeeper in the game with a hollow abdomen, and the ball passes through for four byes. Time to console myself in a simple fact - dear God, I hate this game!!!
The score moves along rather smoothly to a very realistic 0/78 off of seven overs - including 24 byes. Did I mention how much I really, really hate this game?
Into the eigth over, and Gilchrist plays a nice leg glance into the deep. But then something weird happened. In a moment of David Blaine inspired magic, the fielding team all dissappeared. All of them bar the guy fielding the ball, who picked it up and threw it back to a keeper who wasn't there. Sweet!!! Invisible players or not - I hate this bloody game.
And then came the piece d'resistance. The rain. Oh joy. With my innings cruising along at an unbelievably realistic 1/134 after 14 overs, it started to rain. And then it rained some more. And then some more. And then some more. And then I realised, that I couldn't press resume - or do anything except watch it rain. The only thing that would have been funnier than a bug that stopped me from playing this god-awful game, would have been if animals had of started streaming into the ground as part of the bug, and started boarding the ark. It just wouldn't stop raining!!! And the only thing I hate more than this game, is the fact that I spent $90 bloody dollars like a completely gullible twat to buy it!
In over twenty years of gaming, I cannot remember ever seeing a computer game released with lower comparative production values than Cricket 2004.
I may have wasted $90 on it now, but I am sure that is $90 well spent to keep me away from any software your company develops in the future.
Regards
John Caulfield
