17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not sure it was worth the money, October 30, 2002
By A Customer
This review is from: Madden NFL 2003 (Prima's Official Strategy Guide) (Paperback)
Well, I bought this book with high hopes, but it kind of ended up being mediocre at best.
Don't get me wrong, the layout's nice and the screenshots sure are pretty, but the book seems rushed and thin. There are plenty of bad typos and screw-ups, some merely annoying (the receivers listed for the Titans and the Steelers are actually the 49ers receivers) and others that are flat out inexcusable (in the 'Key Plays' section for each team, you're supposed to get a paragraph on how to do a key play, and another on how to counter the play. Problem is, sometimes the 'how to counter' paragraph is about a DIFFERENT PLAY entirely, maybe one not even used by the team whose section you're in. What the heck? And it gets worse...the graphic for the layout of the 4-3 defense is that of the single back OFFENSE instead. Just...sad, really.)
Another prob is the book doesn't go deep enough. Sounds strange, since its 150 pgs or so, but there's 32 NFL teams to cover (at a mere 3 pages a pop) and a LOT of the pages are taken up with the many pretty screenshots (which strangely enough aren't diagrammed and don't really instruct you at all)... there just isn't enough text or explanation. For each team you get 2 or 3 'key' offensive and defensive plays explained...that's it. And the offensive and defensive 'tutorials' early in the book are too short and shallow as well, missing even basic info such as putting your corners into bump-and-run on blitz plays is generally a good idea if you want enough time to get to the quarterback. Special teams? They do that in half a page.
Another prob: They use a fair amount of football jargon, and don't define the terms. A lot of people don't know what 'the flat' means, or even what strong side/weak side are. I was lucky enough to know most terms, but if you don't, yer outta luck.
I wanted to like this book, really, but it is SUCH a slick, shallow, typo-ridden mess that you really can't. Next year, if they beef up the offensive and defensive tutorials, throw in a few DIAGRAMS on top of the screenshots, include a Team Ratings table (to compare all teams at a glance), and clean up all the stupid text and stats mistakes, then they'd have something worth getting.
But some people just feel better having a strategy guide, even a mediocre one. If you can avoid paying full price, know very little about football (and are willing to look up all the terms elsewhere) it might be ok, in the same way that a bad movie is almost OK as long as you saw it for $$$ at matinee.
If you already know a fair amount about football, save your hard-earned money, skip it, and check out a good Madden internet forum instead.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Just all right, December 27, 2002
By A Customer
This review is from: Madden NFL 2003 (Prima's Official Strategy Guide) (Paperback)
The main reason I was interested in this strategy guide was for hints on beating the Mini-Camp challenges. The guide was not helpful at all in this respect, the tips for the challenges are a mere sentence or two. Very disappointing.
As far as the rest of the book goes, a lot of it seems to be extraneous material meant to take up space, such as a list of all the Madden cards, a list of every player in the game, a section with one person's walkthrough of the fantasy draft, etc. This was interesting from a certain perspective, but ultimately not too helpful in actually playing the game.
The thing I liked most was the tips on rushing plays. The guide does give some good advice on when to juke, spin, stiff-arm, etc. Outside of this information, I thought this strategy guide was nothing special. A couple of pages on each team and some eye candy (in the form of unhelpful screenshots), and that's about it.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Terrible, March 13, 2003
This review is from: Madden NFL 2003 (Prima's Official Strategy Guide) (Paperback)
Don't waste your money. There is about 5-pages of this book that are of value regharding relative strengths and weaknesses of defensive formations. Other than that, it is like an instruction manual with larger type and pretty pictures. The publishers should be ashamed of theselves calling this a "strategy guide" it is nothing of the sort.
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