PC Review of Cricket 2005

After playing Cricket 2005 on the PC for a few days now, here's my take

Overall : 7.1 / 10 Recommended to buy only if you are a hardcore
cricket fan ready to dedicatedly play this.
If all you want is to blast away, forget it. Not for you

Batting

+ superb graphics
+ Gameplay is not slow as in the demo. Decent pace
+ Realistic Sim. Very hard to score runs. Takes perfect timing and
patience. ( at least on Medium and above )
+ Confidence meter seems to help and works
+ Small animations between balls are good.
+ excellent stumpings. Feels genuine
+ Innings highlights
- Ball physics not accurate
- Wierd camera angles on a few shots means you cannot see how you got
caught etc.
- Wide bug ( anyone else notice this ? ). Basically leg byes are given as wides sometimes
- seems like there's only a few ways to hit a shot. Forget scoring off the leg side early. Or off side too. Ball seems to travel the same path
- All cover drives and other animation shots seem the same
- useless commentary again
- - - - SUPER TOUGH BATTING. Putoff for casual gamer or those looking
to score 200 runs in 10 overs. Forget it. Not gonna happen w/o patch
+ Dive button

Bowling and Fielding
- Ball bounce seems odd. It drops with a thud and rolls along the ground. Not quite realistic feel
+ CPU no-balls. Few in the innings.
+ Bowling HUD
+ Nice Wicketkeeper movement.
+ Nice swing and seam of the ball. I even saw what looked like reverse swing once. ( anyone else confirm ? )
- CPU kills you in batting. Too aggressive. I scored 70 once off 10 overs. CPU scored it in like 4 overs !!
- Bowling meter too tough
- Bowling tough in general. Not for casual gamer.
- Field placement doesn't seem to stick ?? ( anyone else confirm ? )

Miscellaneous Notes
- Some useful features of C2K4 missing. !
- Couldn't change default controls on the PC.
- Cannot control camera angle on replays. Bad
- Fewer stadia. All stadia feel small and seems like the fielders zoom across
the field.
- Forget easy scoring of two's or three's. Not possible it seems.
+ Stats accumulation
+ player creation capability is detailed as in Top Spin.
+ EA Trax music

Great review

Ball seems to travel the same path

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Do you play with a controller? That was the case in Cricket 2004 as well, but I'd get proper variation when playing with the keyboard

- - - - SUPER TOUGH BATTING.

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Recommended to buy only if you are a hardcore
cricket fan ready to dedicatedly play this.

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Not for casual gamer.

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Good

- CPU kills you in batting. Too aggressive. I scored 70 once off 10 overs. CPU scored it in like 4 overs !!

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10 over games were always like that, even in cricket 2004- do they pace their innings well in 50 over games?

Good review, thanks

you cant change controls??? what about if i use a USB PS2 joypad??

Thanks for the review, seems half decent,, i like the fact that its difficult to score, i'm thinking i might have to head in and buy it now.

arghhhhhhhh ****

Good to see, EA seem to be making the AI a lot better, im strugling with rugby 05

brad352 said:

10 over games were always like that, even in cricket 2004- do they pace their innings well in 50 over games?

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Brad, I only got the game a day or so ago so only have played it a bit, but in my first match (Eng(me)/Aus(cpu) on hard level), I had the cpu at 90/4 after 15 overs. I thought it would be all over by 25 overs, but they rebuilt and ended 290 odd all out (49.2).
I started another, (same teams but medium level coz I could hardly get the ball off the strip in hard , and Aus have gone wild (mainly Gilly, 102 off 60 odd balls) and are on target to top 400. Of the top of my head they're 200ish for 3 off 25, so I've got some work on to pull it round.

jonah said:

Brad, I only got the game a day or so ago so only have played it a bit, but in my first match (Eng(me)/Aus(cpu) on hard level), I had the cpu at 90/4 after 15 overs. I thought it would be all over by 25 overs, but they rebuilt and ended 290 odd all out (49.2).
I started another, (same teams but medium level coz I could hardly get the ball off the strip in hard , and Aus have gone wild (mainly Gilly, 102 off 60 odd balls) and are on target to top 400. Of the top of my head they're 200ish for 3 off 25, so I've got some work on to pull it round.

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Sounds good, cheers

I love the ai this time too, I have being getting beaten regulary in my tour of asia but I def am improving each game.
It's important to get that confidence bar at least half way to start the counterattack!

That sounds pretty cool as you cant just attack if your in trouble unlike previous versions. Pretty much like real cricket where if you slump to a hole you shouldnt be able to make 300+ with ease.

brad352 said:

Sounds good, cheers

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Don't want to hijack your thread, fanirama, but although imo c2k5 is an improvement over the default, 'straight from the box' version of c2k4 (pre mods/editors and patches), I still have several gripes about it.
1. Leg byes given even though you may have played a shot off the bat.
2. Field settings same (or near enough) as default c2k4.
3. Cpu still has that EA flaw (again, imo) of bowling too many yorkers. More shorter/ back of a length stuff needed.
4. Game is too slow (like the demo); I read you disagree fanirama, but its slow for me. Needs speeding up a bit (unfortunately !xspeed causes it to freeze/crash on my pc, but others may be OK).
5. Fielders are built like and have the speed of Maurice Green on amphetamines.
6. Can't choose cpu line up, again.
Plus points:
1. Bowling
2. In my limited time of playing the game, cpu AI seems improved (haven't played a Test yet though).
3. May seem strange, but I like the nets (something I never used in c2k4). You get the option to not only choose the type of bowler to face, but also the line and length he bowls, so it gives you the opportunity to play continuous shorter stuff or full pitched balls outside off .
As I say, I've only played a couple of matches, so there's bound to be more gripes/plus points the more its played.
Again, sorry fanirama for butting in on your thread .

It's good that you can't choose the cpu line up. Would Vaughan select Aussies team today?

Sureshot said:

It's good that you can't choose the cpu line up. Would Vaughan select Aussies team today?

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Obviously not, but for realism's sake I'd prefer to play against the current Aussie line up, and that doesn't include Katich.

jonah said:

Don't want to hijack your thread, fanirama, but although imo c2k5 is an improvement over the default, 'straight from the box' version of c2k4 (pre mods/editors and patches), I still have several gripes about it.
1. Leg byes given even though you may have played a shot off the bat.

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Agree. This is a gripe I have too.

2. Field settings same (or near enough) as default c2k4.

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Agree. Not good IMO.

3. Cpu still has that EA flaw (again, imo) of bowling too many yorkers. More shorter/ back of a length stuff needed.

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Didn't notice this too much. I started to notice that CPU does mix up the deliveries and does bowl to its field which seems nice.

4. Game is too slow (like the demo); I read you disagree fanirama, but its slow for me. Needs speeding up a bit (unfortunately !xspeed causes it to freeze/crash on my pc, but others may be OK).

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Hmmm... I guess its a tad slower but not as slow as the demo I reckon. Perhaps I've started to get used to it and haven't noticed it that much whereas you might have.

5. Fielders are built like and have the speed of Maurice Green on amphetamines.
6. Can't choose cpu line up, again.
Plus points:
1. Bowling
2. In my limited time of playing the game, cpu AI seems improved (haven't played a Test yet though).
3. May seem strange, but I like the nets (something I never used in c2k4). You get the option to not only choose the type of bowler to face, but also the line and length he bowls, so it gives you the opportunity to play continuous shorter stuff or full pitched balls outside off .

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Oh yes. Forgot about the nets. I think its implemented very well. What I did to improve was to head to the nets and have the bowler bowl the same type of delivery over and over. Then I'd try different shots till I started getting the hang of timing and shot selection for that type of delivery. That was good stuff and actually helped me react faster and score more runs. Thanks for bringing this up, Jonah.

As I say, I've only played a couple of matches, so there's bound to be more gripes/plus points the more its played.
Again, sorry fanirama for butting in on your thread .

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Feel free to chip in anytime. Thanks your for feedback Jonah. Much appreciated.