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Brian Lara Cricket 2007 (PS2)
| Overall Customer Rating: |  | | | | Graphics: | (Not Yet Rated) | | Sound: | (Not Yet Rated) | | GamePlay: | (Not Yet Rated) | | Addiction Level: | (Not Yet Rated) |
26 Customer Reviews
RRP: £29.99
Amazon Price: £3.96
You Save: £26.03 (87%)
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
Platform: PlayStation2
Publisher: Codemasters
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Editorial: Disc in excellent condition with manual, post 1st class. |
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"One of the Worst World Cup cash-ins" - 3 April 2007
As a connoisseur of sports sims I came to Brian Lara Cricket 2007 with high hopes, and as a Codemasters franchise it had had a moderately decent track record for delivering the goods. Not anymore.
While the potential number of shots and bowling options deserve eulogies, when the gameplay begins you soon begin to learn it's all for nought. As per usual for a cricket game you can play two or three shots which virtually guarantee a boundary for most balls so for a realistic game you're forced to contrive a result by holding yourself back.
Meanwhile your opposing batsmen will similarly slog a few fours, then let a ball through the gate, and never ever will they go for a safe defensive stroke. So under this inscapable pattern you literally bowl an entire team out cheaply yet they can often keep a strike rate of around 6/over. Point being the AI for the batting is poor.
There's worse, the fielding. For returns to the keeper and catching you need the reactions of hawk to anticipate a meter that quickly zooms by fully expecting you to stop it dead in the middle. This makes most catching situations virtually impossible to master.
Finally, the glitches and reliability. For some reason I can't save mid-game despite what the booklet says, and at the completion of my first World Cup match the game always freezes and I have to restart, so no campaign for me.
All of which means I'm returning my copy to the store, this game just isn't worth £[...] of anybody's money.
At the risk of sounding like comic book store guy, worst game ever!
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"Disappointed " - 3 April 2007
Upon hearing that Brian Lara 2007 was due to be released, I couldn't wait to see how Codemasters had improved from the 2005 edition.
Like Pro Evolution is to EA Sports Fifa series, Brian Lara 2005 beat any of the EA cricket games hands down, and I was hoping this trend would continue in the 2007 instalment. But I was to be greatly disappointed, and further more frustrated with the game in the first 15 minutes of playing it. Here are the Positive and Negative points I found with the game:
POSITIVE
· Extra features such as being able to run down the wicket and the use of various sweep shots brings extra realism to the batting side of the game.
· Graphics are a lot smoother as to be expected.
· Being able to throw to either wickets as apposed to just the wicket keeper end.
NEGATIVES( where to begin! )
· Bowling was far to easy, my mate managed to Kenya out for a grand total of 2, and even the better teams faired only slightly better.
· The wicket keeper taking the bails off, even if you've ran and been in your crease for ages. Gets very frustrating when that happens and a replay always follows.
· The new catching meter is terrible, even simple catches are hard to time, very frustrating.
· The unlocks are now bats and caps, not very exiting when compared to 2005 where you could unlock classic players and teams. Surprised they didn't include the unlocks of grass colour and crotch shield accessories.
· Not being able to edit player names!!! Somehow the excitement is taken away when you get a wicket with Freddie Flantiff.
· Not being able to customise you own tournament is annoying and also the sheer lack of game and menu options as apposed to 2005
· Not being able to check what score/ target you have to reach during the game, as well as checking the previous batting teams innings during the game
I have yet to try the new EA cricket, and after this disappointment of a game i am willing to try anything!
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"It is just too easy" - 28 March 2007
I really looked forward to playing this game and started to get in the Caribbean Cricketing mood when the music kicked in setting the atmosphere for the World cup. The graphics have improved and the game looks better that the 2005 version.
I started the competion on test level as England and I found it was just too easy. New Zealand offered some resistance at posting a score of 115 all out after twenty overs but I manage to meet this after only 12 overs. When I played Canada & Kenya they were all out for 15 runs and I started to get really bored. Another thing that started to get annoying and I think other reviewers have talked about this was the fact that Paul Nixon kept taking the bails off at every opportunity despite the fact that the batsman had been in for about five days. Paul if ya do that again your going to get a slap.
On a positive note the bowling has improved slightly with a few variations and the fact Monty was in the team was a winner for me and his fielding skills were fairly realistic as he dropped a few catches.
All in all I think had this game been more of a challenge I would have kept it as I can't get that flamin tune out of my head and two player would be good fun. I have just order Cricket 07 from EA sports to see what thats like but I will be interested to see how they develop the series. Basically Brian Lara cricket had the potential to be the PES of the cricket genre taking EA sports head on but sadly it fell short on this occassion.
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"I thought turkeys were for Xmas?" - 25 March 2007
BLIC 2005 was a great game - it was very playable both with the one dayers and the test. I was to have many nights in doors with beer and friends playing this. It suffered a little from a flaw where you could bowl out left handers by pitching on leg and swinging the ball in, causing the batter to chop onto the stumps. All in all though it beat EA 05 hands down and was the better game.
BLIC 2007 is a good looking game. Work has being done on the graphics, the music and commentary. It looks far better than previous. However the game play has not advanced and there are some flaws. Every time the ball is thrown in the fielder takes the bails off the stumps - which gets annoying. On several occasions the wicket keeper seems not to be using gloves when taking the ball.
Improvements are purely cosmetic the AI is terrible. Quite disappointingly there is no real work done on the test matches. This is a one day game and there are no world tours. Very little is in place for playing tests as the game prefers to concentrate on the ICC Championship and 2007 World Cup.
Sadly the game is a let down because it is so easy on even on the 'test' level. While going back to BLIC 2005 proved to be very hard at some of the basic levels, with 2007 you can freely murder your opponents at county level - easily bowling them out for under 20. All you have to do is pitch on the wickets. Test is slightly less 'really easy' (I would not say 'hard')as the batters can hit a ball on target at times. EA has a far better system with the IA and difficulty.
For me EA Cricket 07 wins here on sheer playability and challenge. Avoid BLIC if you are over 12.
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"unrealistic big let down" - 25 March 2007
I really was looking forward to this game.my first game was against zimbawbe in a 50 overs match resulted in me bowling them out with ireland for 10 runs.its far too easy bowling and what annoys me with the wicket keeper is that every time he receives the ball he goes for a stumping with the batsmen being clearly home.The fielders drop far too many easy catches too.I would recommend the ea 07 game instead.This game is a complete waste of money dont buy it!
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"Could have been so much better." - 2 April 2007
Fair enough, they don't have licences for the real names. But what has happened to "Edit player names"??? I don't want to hit sixed with Flaniff or Gilchurch! They don't exist!
Basically nothing has improved. Nothing at all. Sweep shots and throwing to the bowler. Whoopee. Not much of a consolation when the imbecile doesn't even stop the ball anyway.
And what happened to the classic matches? I now have no intention of ever playing against the computer team. What's the point?
If this was the first ever Brian Lara game then it would be OK, in the same way that an Austin Allegro would be a revelation if it were the first ever car. But it's not. The developers have shown their utter contempt for people who loved BLIC 2005.
I invited a mate round to play yesterday, but having had a practice game in the morning I texted him to tell him not to bother coming round. I was too gutted for him to even come round and watch Sri Lanka v Windies. And the poor sod dosn't even have Sky. That's how much of a disappointment this game is.
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"Hugely disappointing" - 2 April 2007
There has been a lot of talk about how this installment of Brian Lara Cricket is much better than Cricket 2007, but in all honesty is far from it. First of all the i was very unhappy with the annoying player names given to the England team A.Flentoff etc as Ea Sports Cricket 07 has at least the proper names for England and Australia. Even though some of the other test nations have incorrect names you can change them with the edit function. There doesnt appear to be anyway to change the player names on BLC 07. You cant customize your own tournaments or test series like you can on Cricket 07. The graphics are some what worse and the player graphics very unrealistic. As for matching the Cricket 07 commentary this doesnt come close as the comments become repetitive and robotic. The batting still lacks the finishing touch as the computer still automatically decides whether you should be back or forward unlike Cricket 07. This makes batting very easy and predictable.
If you were to decide between BLC 07 and Cricket 07 i would say go for Ea Sports once again as codemasters are still quite far off matching them.
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"Poor!" - 10 April 2007
Still a ok game, which can be fun when you are entertaining mates, but it really lacks quality and realism.
Feilding isnt that much better and although you can choose what end you want to throw the ball, it is still very poor. Feilding is also pathetically slow and sometimes the batsmen can head off for another run when you pick the ball up and they still get away with it. You have to catch in the slips and wicket kepper which can be irratating when you miss a perfectly easy catch. Overall, feilding gets a 2/5.
Batting hasnt really changed that much, still unrealistic when you hit a ball, and hitting a six is much to easy for what it should be. One thing that is good though is that the tail enders have got much better, in Brain Lara 1 they were rubish and you were lucky to get 10 runs from the bottom 4 batters. Overall, batting gets 3/5
Bowling hasnt changed much either, although some of the spin you get from the spinners is completely unrealistic. You dont get close to the amount of seam you got from Brain Lara 1, which i suppose is more realistic. Bowling hasnt changed that much at all, so i give that 3/5.
I bought this game becasue i friend reccomended it, but he was well wrong, it lacks in every department and i keep wondering when someone is going to bring out a GOOD cricket game....
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"Great to begin with then flaws open up" - 9 April 2007
I brought this game hoping for a great game where the computer would be harder than they were on the 2005 version. Back to that in a bit... Me and my mates thought we'd start off this game with a 4 way tournament between ourselves and we put it on the easiest level to start off with "slog mode". On this batting was easy and as soon as the batsman had played themselves in sixes came frequently so we finished that tournament and thought what the hell lets put it on "test" the hardest level, I started off by bowling my friend out for 9 and we were all a little happier that the game was a lot harder so we carried on playing but people were still hitting big scores and sixes were still coming often... So after we completed that tournament we discussed the flaws... Fielders were frustrating when the balls seemed to roll straight passed them when a dive would of stopped it, catching sometimes isn't obvious enought. The computer is easy to destroy on any difficulty, batsman are played in too quickly sometimes after 2 balls, no online play :(, wicket keeper constantly knocking the stumps over, casual batsmen not diving. There are some good points: good player models, fun to play with friends, good touches with 3rd umpire and hawkeye. So it's up to you if you have friends then buy it.
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"non stop action" - 24 December 2007
Brian lara 2007 is a arcade type of cricket game non stop fun bowling out or sixes. This time your wicket keeper can catch manualy. And you can throw to both ends. It still could be licensed. But if you had a problem choosing between brian lara and cricket 07 I would go for brian lara.
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