I don't like cricket, I love it (International Cricket Captain III (PC))

Member Name: shanediablo

Product:	International Cricket Captain III (PC)
Date:	28/06/08 (51 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Cricket Management which is unique

Disadvantages: Pretty poor game

I don't like cricket, I love it!
When it comes to football management games there are a plethora available in all formats - in the modern day everyone wants to be the next Jose Mourinho or Alex Ferguson. Yet despite the recent rise in popularity of cricket in the UK (owed much to the Ashes win in 2005 and the advent of Twenty20) it is still difficult to find good quality cricket management games or in fact, any at all.

The ICC series of games have been churned out with regularity and really have stood on their own, unopposed. Whether this is because nobody wants to play cricket management/captaincy games or whether the developers struggle to reach the right formula is anybodys guess really I suppose.
Having bought the original ICC game in 2000, I felt that it was time to see if the game had evolved much after all these years and purchased the most recent edition, International Cricket Captain 3.

I purchased the game from a local second hand game store for £5 but if you are looking for new, I see it is available on Amazon in PS2 format for £17.98.
So it was time to put the game to the test. I logged in and decided to check out the available game modes. If you are looking for a straightforward career you can manage a Test team of your choice, a county side or even both if you so wish. Alternatively you can play a historic series of international matches.

The accuracy of the information on players is varied in its sucess. I understand that it is difficult with so many players on the game but to use an example, to define two incredibly aggressive players in real-life like Misbah Ul-Haq and Albie(Johannes) Morkel as "defensive" in mentality when batting is quite ridiculous. Maybe i'm nit-picking.
The game is let down really by it's pretty dreadful highlights option. The realism of the shots played by batsmen borders on the farcical and the commentary is erroneous and quite irritating at times and has not evolved in any way really.

The best facility on the game is the online play function. This function allows you to pit your wits against other people on the game over the web - you must have a saved county game to qualify. This is really interesting because you have teams set in 2007 or teams set in 3007 because there are no restrictions on how many seasons you can have done to play this facility. The only real downside is that there are not enough online players at certain times of the day.

You cannot fault the depth of the game from an informational point of view but its failure to evolve over 7 years (this game was released in 2007) is a major concern.
I personally, really enjoy this game probably because there are so few alternatives and certainly not because it is a fantastic game or anything, because it is not. And for £5 it has been value, but I certainly wouldn't advocate anyone paying the £17.98 figure on offer on Amazon.

If you love cricket and can find this cheap then it might be a worthwhile purchase.
If you aren't really into cricket at all do not purchase this game because there isn't exactly a great game playing feature to fall back on. One to dodge, unless somebody gives it to you for free and you just want to give the Australian cricket team a stuffing! (They are pretty poor according to the makers of the game, clearly they do not know their stuff!)

Summary: Pretty much on its own due to lack of competition