NFL Quarterback Club 2000 Dreamcast prototypes
Regularly, in the United States, the entire population stops and livens up in time for the Super Bowl, one of the biggest sporting events in the country. Its fame is such that it exceeds that of the Olympic Games.
It's no wonder, then, to see American football simulations flourishing there. In Europe, this sport still occupies a marginal place. The Dreamcast suggested some, including one title released in European territories: NFL Blitz 2000. The latter has a particularity: it does not have a slash on its beautiful blue box !
Acclaim, through its Acclaim Sports division, had made such games a specialty. After successful iterations on Nintendo 64 and Playstation 1, the publisher came back in force across the Atlantic with NFL Quarterback Club 2000 on Dreamcast.
The NFL license acquired by Acclaim allowed them to offer 31 teams and hundreds of players and of course, the NFL championship. It is better to know the rules. Otherwise you will understand absolutely nothing. NFL Quarterback 2000 turns out to be quite complex.
NFL QBC 2000 has five different game modes: Seasons, Playoffs, Exhibition, Tournaments and Probowls. A story mode allows you to review live all the Super Bowls from American football history, recreated especially for the occasion.
The player will also participate in the training, recruitment and player transfers. The management side had not been forgotten since it was even possible to negotiate the salaries of the men playing in their team.
Touchdown, Quarterback, Linebacker and First Down. These terms take on their full meaning in this style of play. Who will lead their team to Super Bowl victory ?
The specificities in the menus:
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When starting NFL QB Club 2000, before getting to the menu with the game title, the "Acclaim Sports Feel It" screen is missing.
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The presentation of the loading screens is simple, without the title of the game and without the Acclaim Sports studio logo, on a black background with a green progress bar instead of red.
prototype
Final
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Once in the title menu, by doing nothing, the demo starts. Normally it should say "DEMO PLAY-PRESS BUTTON" and not "Demo-Press Start".
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In the title menu, when the game asks to press Start, it just says "PRESS START" instead of "PRESS START BUTTON".
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The game can't be paused.
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In the main menu, at the top right, under the Acclaim Sports logo, there is the "HELP" help button. The green Y key should be assigned to it and not a triangle in a gray circle. Holding Y opens the help menu explaining how to navigate the screen. The X and Y buttons are missing from the screen.
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Going into the credits, the order of people working on the NFL QB Club draft is not the same as final. The role of some people seems to have changed between the beta and the retail version.
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By selecting "Memory Card Options", the screen label is called Memory Pack: A-2 instead of Memory Card: Port A, Slot 2.
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In the main menu, the Audio options are named differently, "Audio/Video Options" instead of "Audio Options". Going through this menu, we distinguish that the option to activate the sound of the memory card, "VMU Sounds" is not yet implemented. Options new to this build to adjust and modify the image of the game exist (Vertical Center, Horizontal Center, Vertical Size and Horizontal Size). I don't know if they work. Still in the same place, if you want to reset the default options, click on "Reset All", which should be named "Initial Settings". Moreover, "Initial" is replaced by "Reset" no matter where you are, for example in "Manage Rosters".
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By following the path "Manage Rosters" - "Custom Creation" - "Create Team" you arrive on a window with modifiable elements in a black box. The top left character should be located in the box just above the logo.
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Following the same path as before, but this time selecting "Create Playbook", the buttons assigned A, B and X from left to right should be X, A and B on this screen.
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Decidedly this path is popular, if you go to "Create Player", the number on the back of the character is red and not white. By modifying the appearance of the helmet in "Helmet Type", "default" on the prototype version replaces "based on pos" in the final version.
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In the "Trade Players" menu of "Manage Rosters", by choosing certain players, these have no profile picture. In the final version, the photo of athletes without any photo is represented by the silhouette of a person in which it's written "PHOTO UNAVAILABLE". In the prototype, there is nothing at all.
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By choosing "Game Type: Exhibition", at some point it is possible to choose the "Stadium Select" stadium in which we want to play. In this screen, the stadiums are shown in a short video, where normally it would just be a simple still image.
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Once you get to the "Game Septup" window, the one that allows you to go to the stage selection screen, the option to activate the vibration kit "Jump Pack: On" is not present.
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By choosing the "Game Type: New Season" mode, selecting "Weekly Schedules" in the "Season Menu" window, it is possible to import a created team. To do this, it is necessary to press Start; the button normally assigned for this function should be the left trigger.
For the in-game part, I'll let you do the analysis. Knowing nothing about American football, it is difficult for me to carry out this analysis. However, I have already seen a difference; it's up to you to find it !
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You can download the NFL QB Club 2000 Dreamcast build below
The other prototypes:
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The presentation of loadings, unlike the previous build, has evolved. On this prototype, it is written in yellow without a frame red in color.
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Many of the features mentioned above have disappeared to lead to what is found in the final version.
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Acclaim Prototype from the " Duff'y Dreamcast Collection " Project: Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX - Dead or Alive 2 - Ducati World Racing Challenge - ECW Hardcore Revolution - F355 Challenge - Fur Figthers - NFL Quarterback Club 2000 - Re-Volt - South Park: Chef's Luv Shack -South Park Rally - Spirit of Speed 1937 - Vanishing Point
Acclaim prototype of the project "Duffy's Collection Part 2" : Shadowman (Unreleased) PC - Shadowman Ps1 - South Park Rally Ps1 - South Park Rally PC - Re-Volt Ps1 - The Red Star (Unreleased) Xbox - NFL Quarterback Club 2002 Ps2 - NFL Quarterback Club 2002 Gc - Heaven's Drive (Unreleased) Ps2 - Crazy Taxi Gc - Armorines: Project S.W.A.R.M. Ps1 - Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX: Maximum Remix Ps1 - Forsaken PC - Machines PC - 18 Wheeler: American Pro Trucker Gc - All-Star Baseball 2003 featuring Derek Jeter Gc - Aggressive Inline Ps2 - Jeremy McGrath Supercross World 2002 Ps2 - XGIII: Extreme G Racing Ps2 - XGIII: Extreme G Racing Gc
More than 200 prototypes, documents, press kit have been dumped or scanned, you will find them in free download in the "Releases de prototypes et documents"