4th & Inches

4th & Inches bares more resemblance to Accolade's Hardball! than it should, considering that 4th & Inches is an American football sport sim as opposed to a baseball one. When the game finishes loading, you are greeted with the same intro music as Hardball! Hmmmm...Except that the 4th & Inches title screen doesn't look nearly as impressive as Hardball's. Onto the game itself...hey, more music from Hardball! And did that menu screen look just like Hardball's? Watching a demo game, you can see that commands are carried out by menus at the bottom, which can be chosen by pressing up, down, left or right with the fire button. Just like Hardball! As the demo game plays on, you can hear the same crowd from Hardball! Wacky, dedicated sports fans, right? They just go to every game Accolade will put on, won't they?

I think 4th and Inches is lame. The graphics are really rather poor and the sound and music...I've heard them someplace before. Accolade's shonkiest release for the IIGS. Play John Elway's Quarterback instead.

Update: To my humiliation and inadvertently discrediting Accolade, I had previously reviewed a development version of 4th & Inches! The proper release features its own music and looks and feels much more polished. However, I'm going to keep my earlier remarks. I've never written with so much venom!