NFL Blitz

NFL Blitz is a series of American football themed video games by Midway featuring National Football League teams. It began as a 1997 arcade game that was ported to home consoles and spawned several sequels. Rather than being designed as a realistic interpretation of the sport of football, like Madden NFL or NFL 2K, the Blitz series was created as an over-the-top, exaggerated version of the sport, inspired by Midway's own NBA Jam basketball games.

In 2005, following the loss of the NFL license, the Blitz series was relaunched as Blitz: The League, featuring fictional players and teams in a fictional league with slightly more realistic (though still exaggerated) on-field play and a focus on the seedy behind-the-scenes lives of the players.

The series rebooted January 4, 2012 on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live. The game took the series back to the original style of NFL BLITZ, but removed the late hits due to input by the NFL.^[2]

Creation

The game was created by Midway Games and headed by lead artist, Sal DiVita and lead programmer, Mark Turmell.^[3]

The NFL paid little attention to the game's development until just before the launch. Upon watching a preview scrimmage by Turmell and DiVita, league representatives said they could not have the NFL associated with the game as it was then programmed. They said there was too much violence in the game and offered to refund Midway's license fee. Midway was eager to keep the NFL's endorsement of the game, so they compromised on some of the graphic violence and "late hits" in the game.^[4]

NFL years

In the original Blitz games (beginning in 1997), all NFL teams appeared (however, the Houston Texans and Cleveland Browns did not have a team), but there were several differences in the rules to make Blitz different from standard football games. After the commercial failure of Blitz Pro, Midway did not release a Blitz in 2004 for the first time since the series began. Blitz Pro was thought to be the last NFL Blitz game; then, Blitz: The League came out. When NFL Blitz was released on the Nintendo 64 in 1998, it was referred to as "the best football game ever made" by GameSpot.com.^[5]

Rules differences

In 1997, seven players are on the field per side (as opposed to eleven). Not only were there fewer players, but positions were flexible at best. Wide receivers could be known to run the ball and sometimes pass, and defensive players were all crosses between pass rushers and defensive backs. 2002 saw an increase to eight players and NFL Blitz Pro (released in 2003) increased to eleven.

Unlike the NFL, pass interference is allowed, as are late hits, showboating and excessive celebrations.

There are no timeouts, but the clock stops after every play, and extra points after touchdowns are claimed to be automatic, unless it is chosen to go for two points. However, although rare, choosing an automatic extra point can sometimes result in the extra point being missed if the kicking team is winning by a wide margin.

Quarters have been shortened to two minutes (default setting) with a faster running timer than real time. For most releases, a first down would mean you would have to go 30 yards, instead of ten.

Play differences

Unlike standard American football sims, Blitz played fast and furious. Points After Touchdown are automatic (however, if a team was ahead by a large margin, there was a chance the PAT could be missed), but Field Goals are still manual. Like Midway's NBA Jam series, players were able to pull off fantastic moves. Plays such as "Da Bomb" allowed for a quarterback to accurately throw the ball most of the length of the field at will and receivers could make impossible catches. On the other side, defensive players were able to leap up and swat (if not intercept) balls no other game could allow for or dive incredible lengths to make a stop.

From the beginning, one of the key changes in Blitz was the animations. Where other games had to keep normal tackling and stops, Blitz players were able to stop a play in a variety of interesting ways. One of the most common was for a defensive player to grab his opponent and spin him around and fling him to the ground, sometimes giving them extra yards in the process. This violent and theatrical style allows the players to execute textbook professional wrestling moves such as the German suplex, elbow drop, and leg drop even after a tackle has been completed and the whistle blown. This concept was likely inspired by the significant popularity of professional wrestling in the late '90s. In addition, the team with the lead often receives kick-offs deeper in its own territory and are more likely to fumble or throw interceptions to help level the gameplay to encourage closer games. This is called "Getting Midwayed" or "Blitz God Intervention," and is often frustrating for players in the lead. Those who give up the lead due to Blitz God intervention are referred to as "Blitz Job," and often encouraged by the victorious players to "curse Blitz gods, and die."

The NFL, however, made Midway tame most of the more violent or insane aspects of the game as the license progressed. Subsequent releases stripped down "excessive celebrations" and late hits until the game was almost one of the sims to which it was originally opposed. However, the game still retained its over-the-top aspects including censored profanity done in a comical manner. Raiden and Shinnok, characters from the Mortal Kombat series, a series also developed by Midway, are unlockable characters.

Installments

Post NFL

Midway brought back the Blitz style play by launching in 2005 Blitz: The League. The celebrations and the violent aspects were back and have been ramped up to levels that the NFL never allowed. In place of real NFL teams are fictional teams such as the New York Nightmare and the Minnesota Reapers. One team roster even has a speedy quarterback named "Mike Mexico," which is similar to the "Ron Mexico" alias allegedly used by Michael Vick. In Blitz: The League II, the character participates in a prison football match, and injuring him in both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions will unlock the achievement/trophy "Pitbull Payback", referring to his illegal dog fighting ring and subsequent arrest. Another notable feature of the game is that, when a player gets injured, what the game terms as "juicing" him with what seems to be the equivalent of a cortisone shot is a choice.

Blitz: The League was created with the help of one of the writers from ESPN's Playmakers. Notorious former linebacker Lawrence Taylor was recruited to promote the game as well as add voice talents as linebacker Quentin Sands, one of the game's main characters. A second release of Blitz: The League was released in 2006 for the Xbox 360 which added Bill Romanowski voicing linebacker Bruno Battaglia and changing Battaglia's number to 53 which was Romanowski's number during his playing days. Also, gameplay was much smoother and less loading times than the PS2 and Xbox versions.

Other notable celebrity promotion for the game include Blaze from American Gladiators saying in an interview in the April 2002 issue of Men's Health that every time he gets sacked in NFL Blitz he does 100 push-ups and 100 squat-thrusts.

Critical reception for Blitz: The League was mostly positive. Gamerankings.com gives the PlayStation 2 release a score of 75% and the Xbox release a score of 77%. GameSpot.com gave both PS2 and Xbox versions an 8.6/10. The 2008 sequel Blitz: The League II was released on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on October 13, 2008.

Post Midway

After Midway's bankruptcy filing in 2009, EA Sports, publisher of the popular NFL simulation series Madden NFL and the exclusive holder of the NFL's video game rights, acquired the rights to the NFL Blitz intellectual property, and on October 19, 2011, EA Sports announced NFL Blitz' return via a story with Electronic Gaming Monthly and the release of an announcement trailer. EA Sports intends the new NFL Blitz to be an "arcade" football experience, different from the simulation-oriented Madden series.^[6]

See also

• Mutant League Football
• MLB Slugfest
• NHL Hitz

References

External links

• NFL Blitz series at MobyGames