Rugby World Cup 2011 – review

Xbox 360, PS3, 505 Games, cert 3, out now

Fans of rugby games, rather like fans of the All Blacks, have had a long wait. Although the four-year delay since the last oval ball-based offering from the gaming industry is hardly in the same league as the 24-year wait New Zealand have had to endure since they last won the World Cup (not that they're chokers or anything…), it still feels like a very long time. Factor in that the last game in question was EA Sports' lacklustre Rugby 08, a hasty remake of Rugby 06 rushed out to cash in on the 2007 tournament, and the hold-up is even harder to bear.

Unfortunately, playing RWC2011 only forces one to question what the game's developers, HB Studios, have been doing in this intervening period, since it does not appear to have included much time working on this title. However, fans of the old EA Sports Rugby series may well love it, if only because, despite the gap in time, there are so many parallels between them.

Anyone concerned, for example, about new controls need not worry – they are more or less exactly the same as they were in Rugby 08, a comprehensive first-match win proving their familiarity. Admittedly, there was not much wrong with the old control system, but it still seems lazy not to even try to innovate. Even the old bug of having "punt" and "dive for a try" linked to the same button remains, leading to some embarrassing incidents of a player hoofing the ball into the stands rather than diving for the line. However, the rucking system has been tweaked slightly for the better, with excessive button bashing resulting in the referee reaching for his whistle, and possibly even a card, if you get carried away.

While the gameplay remains solid without being spectacular and the graphics nice but nothing special for a next-gen console, even if played on HD, perhaps the most noticeable let-down is the lack of two specific team licences. For an official World Cup game not to have real player names for Australia and New Zealand is very disappointing, and undermines the effort that has been put into rendering the stadiums so accurately. The paltry selection of available sides also seems conservative, with only the 20 World Cup qualifiers included. Too little, too late and too average – a poor reward for those who have bided their time patiently since 2007.

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