NFL Blitz

About NFL Blitz

NFL Blitz (1997) is Midway's seven-a-side arcade football game from the NBA Jam team, with no penalties and late hits, dropkicks and dogpiles so violent that the NFL nearly handed back the licence fee.

NFL Blitz in Depth

Teams play seven-on-seven, and the traditional rules are thrown out: there are no penalties and no substitutions, and players can attack each other illegally, even with dropkicks. The game carries a full NFL licence, with the players and teams of the 1997 season. Its makers wanted to get players to the action faster than other football games, which they felt bogged players down in play-selection screens and setup menus.

AllGame's Brad Cook likened it to neighbourhood pick-up games "when every play was a pass and you needed two completions for a first down", adding that anyone who had treated opponents as a child the way the game allows was "probably reading this from prison right now". Next Generation called the arcade version "an unrealistic but adrenaline-packed experience", and later said the PlayStation version offered "the most intense game of football you're likely to find at home", though it found that the lack of play variety grew stale, especially alone. Computer Games Strategy Plus quoted the announcer's line after a late hit: "That was totally uncalled for, but awfully fun to watch."

Making NFL Blitz

The team, led by NBA Jam's Mark Turmell and Sal Divita, spent two years on it, aiming, in Turmell's words, to "do for the NFL franchise what we did for the NBA franchise". When NFL executives saw it at Midway's Chicago offices a week before launch, they reacted so badly to the violence that the league offered to return Midway's licence fee; it was approved only after compromises, including removing blood splatter and shortening the window for dogpiles and late tackles after plays. It was named Arcade Game of the Year in EGM's 1997 Editors' Choice Awards.

Ports followed in 1998 for PlayStation, Nintendo 64, Windows and Game Boy Color. The N64 and PlayStation versions received universal acclaim and ranked eighth and tenth among US home console games in their first month; N64 Magazine gave the N64 version 87%, and Hyper called it "the most satisfying quick-thrill game I can imagine". The PC version won IGN's Best Sports Game of 1998, and the N64 version was an AIAS nominee for Console Sports Game of the Year.