All-Pro Football 2K8

All-Pro Football 2K8
Developer(s)	Visual Concepts
Publisher(s)	2K Sports
Platform(s)	PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Release date(s)	NA July 16, 2007
Genre(s)	Sports
Mode(s)	Single-player Multiplayer
Rating(s)	ESRB: Everyone 10+
Media	BD-ROM, DVD-ROM
Input methods	Game controller

All-Pro Football 2K8 (abbreviated APF2K8) is a football game for seventh generation consoles and the spiritual successor to the ESPN NFL 2K series. APF2K8 is the first football game to be published by 2K Sports since EA Sports purchased exclusive licenses to the intellectual properties of the NFL and NFLPA; the last football game published by 2K Sports was ESPN NFL 2K5. Barry Sanders, John Elway, and Jerry Rice appear on the cover. Due to poor sales, the franchise ended after one installment.

Overview

All-Pro Football 2K8 features a custom league called the All-Pro League, or APL. The APL consists of 24 teams that are grouped into six divisions of four teams each, whereas the NFL's 32 teams are grouped into eight divisions of four teams each. Both leagues, however, run a sixteen-game schedule and hold a championship game at the end of the playoffs.

Horse-collar tackles, which were made illegal in the NFL due to the risk of injury, are not penalized in All-Pro 2K8, though they cannot be done intentionally and are rarely seen. Midway's Blitz: The League is another unlicensed football title, though comparisons with APF2K8 are few and far between. The Blitz series has always featured over-the-top arcade style gameplay. This is in stark contrast to the 2K Football series, up to and including APF2K8, which offers a realistic simulation style game of football.

The game offers a free 30 minute mix card of the artists who add their songs to the game featuring DJ Z-Trip.

Legends

2K Sports has licensed over 240 retired NFL players for APF2K8.^[1] Some of the legends included are listed below:

Reception

The gameplay of APF2K8 is very similar to the gameplay of NFL2K5, lending well for existing fans of the series. However, All-Pro Football 2K8 has received criticism by some because of the game's lack of features previously made possible by way of the NFL license.^[2] Most notably, the lack of a multi-season Franchise Mode as seen in competing titles such as Madden NFL 08 and NCAA Football 08 is a large omission, given Visual Concepts' last football title, ESPN NFL 2K5, contained a similar Franchise Mode. 2K Sports and Visual Concepts chose to omit a franchise mode because since the game revolves around the use of Legends from different eras, naturally there would be no rational way for the Legends to develop or age, therefore a franchise mode with aging no-namers and immortal legends would be non-sensical.^[3] As of October 3, 2007, APF2K8 has a score of 74/100 on Metacritic^[4] and 75% on Game Rankings.^[5]

Controversial Legend

In a court ruling, O.J. Simpson was ordered to pay the family of Ronald Goldman any money made for his appearance in the game. Simpson was found not guilty of murdering his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Goldman in 1995, but was found legally responsible for their deaths by a civil court jury two years later.^[6] A common misconception is that O.J. Simpson is a member of the fictional New Jersey Assassins. To make it worse, Assassins players will perform a throat slash as a touchdown celebration, and the animatronic mascot for the Assassins will make a slashing motion. Some pre-release videos showed Simpson performing these moves, implying to some that the designers were intentionally referencing the murders. However, Simpson is actually on the roster of a team named the Cyclones. Although he was on this team (New Jersey Assassins) in the pre-production of this game, as noted in the "Sign of the Apocalypse" part of Sports Illustrated.

Season teams

Even though there are not any NFL teams in the game, the player can still create similar looking teams to their actual NFL counterparts. For example, the Chicago Grizzlies with the orange "C" on the helmets bear a resemblance to Chicago Bears' helmets. Also, the Pittsburgh Iron Men wear black and yellow just like the Pittsburgh Steelers. Similarly, the Create-a-Player feature allows the player to add some notable names that were not included in the game roster.

While the game includes teams representing Los Angeles and Las Vegas, both of which currently have no NFL teams, there are no teams representing the current NFL markets of Buffalo, Kansas City, Baltimore, Jacksonville, Tennessee, Indianapolis, San Diego, or New Orleans (incidentally, all but New Orleans are AFC teams). Cleveland and Cincinnati are conflated into one team representing Ohio, only one team represents the San Francisco Bay Area instead of two, and while Green Bay is not represented, Milwaukee is.

Atlantic Conference

North

• Philadelphia Americans.
• New Jersey Assassins - The team called the New Jersey Assassins play at DiMeo Stadium, named after the DiMeo Crime Family. The crime family is the one Tony Soprano works in on The Sopranos. The Sopranos is set in New Jersey, just like the Assassins. Possibly a reference to the New York/New Jersey Hitmen of the XFL.
• New York Knights - The New York Knights (possibly a reference to a WLAF team) play in a stadium that the game says was designed by G.L. Costanza, a reference to the Seinfeld character, who always wanted to be an architect
• Boston Minutemen.

Central

• Washington Federals (possibly a reference to the former USFL team of the same name).
• Detroit Firebirds.
• Pittsburgh Iron Men - The team known as the Iron Men play in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh is known for its steel and iron industries (hence the NFL team the Pittsburgh Steelers). The Iron Men play at Steel Mill Park, which (in the game) is constructed of over 30,000 steel rivets. Possibly a reference to an early name used by the Steelers, circa 1940.
• Ohio Red Dogs - the Cleveland Browns play at an arena given the nickname the Dawg Pound, and there was an early NFL team known as the Canton Bulldogs (hence the name red dogs).

South

• Carolina Cobras (Possibly a reference to the former arena football team of the same name) - The Carolina Cobras play in a stadium that is called The Extensive Enterprises Stadium. Extensive Enterprises was a front company for the Cobra Organization in the G.I. Joe comic book and animated series.
• Tampa Bay Top Guns. (Possibly a reference to MacDill Air Force Base, which is in Tampa.)
• Atlanta Wasps - The Atlanta Wasps play in a field called Van Dyne Field, which is a reference to Janet Van Dyne, who in the Marvel universe is known as the superhero Wasp.
• Miami Cyclones. - A reference to the vast amounts of hurricanes in Miami.

Pacific Conference

North

• Chicago Beasts - The stadium that the Chicago Beasts play at, Wolfram & Hart Stadium is named after the fictional international and inter dimensional law firm Wolfram & Hart in the TV series Angel.
• Milwaukee Indians.
• Seattle Sailors - A reference to the Seattle Mariners of Major League Baseball.
• Minneapolis Werewolves.

Central

• Denver Cougars.
• Dallas Gunslingers. Veiled reference to the Dallas Cowboys and USFL's San Antonio Gunslingers.
• St. Louis Rhinos - A reference to the NFL's St. Louis Rams.
• San Francisco Sharks - The team called the Sharks play at Amity Stadium, named after the fictional town Amity in the famous shark film Jaws.

West

• Los Angeles Legends.
• Las Vegas Rollers.
• Texas Rustlers.
• Arizona Scorpions.

References

Community Site

• 2K Football.net

External links

• "The Road to Rebirth" – GameSpot's interview with Greg Thomas
• "APF 2K8 Gameplay Footage"
• "2K Games Returns to the Gridiron"
• "All-Pro Football 2K8's Resurrection"
• "All-Pro Football 2K8 Trailer"
• "All-Pro Football 2K8 Legends List"
• "Comparison to Madden 08"
• A list of Xbox 360 Achievements for All-Pro Football 2K8