_____This is my first review for the venerable Rice World syndicate, and I am quite honored to have been accepted on this staff. Bear w/ me.

_____First off, I would like to establish my criteria for a video game. We must realize that technology has its limits and not all games can be made perfectly. So I base my judgement on these 5 categories:

Gameplay - How the controls are, how easily you can maneuver, etc.
Graphics - The video and such. High importance.
Sound - What you here. Underrated but very important feature
Smoothness - Is the game choppy? I have a 200MMX, so it better not be
Repeat play - Will I play this over and over and over and over and...?

_____Madden 99 is a pretty large game, plus commentary, sounds, and software rendering all in one, which enables you to play this sucker on a ordinary Joe computer w/o a 3dfx. The immense size is worth it.

_____When you load the game, you see the nice NFL logo all smooth-lookin, and then you see John Madden's ugly face. He's cool, but dang, do they gotta have his mug all over the place? But the graphics are smoooooooth. The loading is kinda slow on my CPU. I guess it's guess it's cause my computer ain't that good. But it's good enough.

_____But this game is fun. Go out and purchase it. DO NOT PIRATE. That is absolutely wrong. <GERRY THE PREACHER>

_____The graphics are great, the gameplay is user friendly, and the animation is great. I still suck at this game, totally, but I'm willing to spend my nights trying to perfect my skills. Thumbs up.

_____Get ready to lose a lot of games. Madden 99 is one challenging mother. Maybe it's because I suck, and I've never played any football video game in my entire life. Oh well, I still had a blast. And so will you. If you don't, then you're a girl. (I better get mail about that).

Gameplay ***** (out of 5)
Graphics *****
Sound ****1/2
Smooth ****
Repeat *****

Overall - 4.7 stars out of possible 5

*Note: These screenshots are courtesy of Game-Over Online magazine