NFL QB Club 98 on the N64 has Great Graphics

NFL Quarterback Club 98 was an exclusive for the N64 and was released in 1997. It was published under the Acclaim Sports banner and was programmed by Iguana. This was the first football game announced for the N64.

Brett Favre was the spokesman for this game. This was before he started stealing welfare money from Mississippi and sending pictures of his junk to female reporters. As a Detroit Lions fan, I don’t like him that much. He was a big deal at the time and designed the playbooks for this game.

I couldn’t find a copy of NFL Quarterback Club 97 on the PS1, and I wasn’t going to start collecting for the Sega Saturn just so I could play that game. What this means is that I don’t have a game to compare this with. The only other one I have is the SNES game, and I don’t think that is fair.

There were a few improvements made to this game as it moved to a new console. Other versions of the game were in production, but ended up getting canceled. Acclaim pulled support for the Sega Saturn, and I couldn’t find a reason for the PS1 and PC versions being scrapped. Anyway, let’s get into the game.

TLDR: Nice Graphics don’t make up for the Bad Gameplay.

Narrative

There isn’t a story for this game. Most sports games from this time didn’t have one, so I wasn’t really expecting anything. This was still a little early for a career mode, but you could play a season.

Gameplay

I think I prefer the gameplay in NFL Quarterback Club 96 more than this game. The developer made a decent game, but I just don’t think this game would’ve pulled me away from other football games. The passing game is a mess, the running game isn’t good, and the A.I. is a mess.

When you pass the football, it just hangs in the air for an absurd amount of time. While it is possible to complete passes, the hangtime on the ball makes it easier for anyone to get the ball. This leads to a lot of incompletions. I can almost forgive this because it is a move to a new system.

The A.I. in this game is pretty stupid. Specifically in the passing game, where the receivers run routes that don’t always lead to where the ball is thrown. Part of this has to do with how the ball floats, and part of it has to do with the wide receiver’s route not matching up with the quarterback’s.

For a series that puts such a heavy focus on the passing game, it sure took them a while to get it right. Well, it kind of sucks here, and the run game isn’t much better. Nothing in this game is done well, but it is all good enough.

Overall, there are a lot of problems with the gameplay in this game. I’m not sure what happened with the passing game, but it is really bad. At times it feels like the receivers are running completely different routes than the play you selected. The run game isn’t too much better.

Visuals

This game looks pretty good for the time. The character models get the job done, the digitized photos of players look good, and the field looks great. NFL Quarterback Club 98 has very good weather effects. I didn’t see anything that looked bad.

Character models look a little weird at times. They have big arms, tiny waists, and skinny legs. The running animation is also strange to watch. You can see what the jersey numbers are, and sometimes you can read the player names.

The stadiums and field look pretty good. There is more detail on the field, and you can easily see the endzones and sidelines. The crowd isn’t all that special, but that isn’t a big deal. You don’t see anyone on the sidelines, but that wasn’t outside the norm for a football game from this time.

The weather effects look great! It is always fun to play football in the snow, and playing in the rain looks fun. It is nice to see stuff like this in a retro game, especially when it looks good.

The digitized photos of the players look great! I like that they are in the game. Sometimes they’re a little funny, which is something that I like.

Overall, the graphics are the best part of the game. I haven’t played all the football games from this time, but this one looks good. I wish the game had better touchdown celebrations. It will be interesting to see how the graphics improve or get worse in the next entry.

Reviews at the Time

This is one of the times that I agree with some of the reviewers. NFL Quarterback Club 98 received scores between a 5 and a 9/10. Most scores were between a 7 and an 8.

Gamespot gave the game a 5.2/10. This was considered mediocre at the time. They mostly liked the graphics, but really didn’t like the gameplay, especially the passing game.

EGM had four people review the game, and their scores were mostly consistent with three 7.5s and a 7. They said that this was the “best-looking console football game to date,” but criticized the gameplay by saying “the passing game stinks.”

IGN gave the game a 7.8/10. The reviewer called this a “shining example of what’s technically possible on the Nintendo 64.” They also said it had “solid gameplay,” and ended up recommending the game.

For the most part, I think the reviewers were right about this game. It is a good looking game, but the gameplay isn’t all that great. The physics in the passing game are really bad, and also quite inconsistent when it comes to catching the ball.   

7/10. For the time that this game was released, the graphics were quite good. It is impressive for an early N64 game. Unfortunately, the gameplay isn’t all that great. Passing the ball is pretty awful, which wouldn’t be bad if there wasn’t such a heavy focus on it.

Pros

• Graphics are good
• Easy to learn

Cons

• Awful A.I.
• Bad gameplay
• Terrible passing

Conclusion

The best part of this game really is the graphics. It outshines the gameplay, which is never what you want. The developer took advantage of the N64 hardware, and there has to be a story behind why the other versions of this game were cancelled. Most of those answers were likely lost to time.

Acclaim was trying to create a series of games to rival Madden. Not being on every platform probably didn’t help this series that much. It will be interesting to compare these series at some point. That way I can see how they stack up in a more meaningful way.

I wasn’t all that interested in these games back in 1997. Most of my friends were playing other things as well, and only one of them had an N64. The PS1 was what we mostly played.

My friend Drew was a die hard Nintendo fan back then. He didn’t play sports games, as far as I knew. Once Final Fantasy VII came out, he pretty much abandoned the N64. Because I didn’t have a friend who owned this system and cared about NFL games, I completely missed out on this series. I don’t think I was missing much.

If you liked this post, check out my other reviews of the NFL Quarterback Club games. Such as NFL Quarterback Club on the Genesis and NFL Quarterback Club 96.