It’s almost impossible to be a South African and not have Rugby enter your life at one stage or another. Whether you like the sport or not, you’ve probably been to a braai, bar, or basement with Rugby playing in the background.
And for good reason: South Africa is good at Rugby, and we like supporting our own klap the snot out of other countries and scoring a try or two while doing it.
If you are an avid gamer and fan of the sport, you’ve probably been tempted once or twice to pick up one of the Rugby games out there, and if you enjoyed it, then the latest edition to the series, Rugby 25, might be on your wishlist.
Well, before you end up spending between R950 and R1,150 on the game, depending on your platform of choice, read this review. That pair of Vellies you’ve been eyeing for your birthday might be coming sooner than expected.
Let me kick the review part of this review off with a bold statement. Rugby 25 is the most realistic rugby game I’ve ever played.
Now, let me explain that statement. If you’ve ever sat at the stadium, on your couch or perched on a sticky wooden bench at the local and had your team play in front of you, you’ll get where I’m coming from.
You’ve probably caught yourself shouting plays, tactics and swear words like a madman, frustrated to the nth degree that no one is listening to you.
Playing Rugby 25 is exactly that.
No. Sorry. It’s worse.
It’s worse because you have the controller in your hands and are smashing the buttons as hard as possible, attempting to get the tiny guys on your screen to do something.
There’s a chance they’ll listen, but there’s a higher chance you’re putting money in the swear jar.
The game just feels like an early rendition of what could’ve been a great rugby game but then the developers decided version 0.002 was good enough, or they just reskinned Rugby 2004 and called it a day.
Let’s start with defensive play. The objective here is to win the ball back and prevent the opposing team from scoring. The majority of this play is spent rucking.
I reviewed Rugby 25 on PlayStation, so the buttons will be described as such, but even if PlayStation isn’t your thing, you’ll get the gist of it.
You can do two things here: button mash Circle to add players to the ruck and hope you push the ruck over, or button mash Square and do nothing.
Square is supposed to be the steal option, but it never works. Ever. To get the ball, you have to hope it’s kicked to you or overpower them in a ruck with more players.
Scrumming involves hitting buttons at the exact time a bar fills up, which is simple enough. The bar never matches up to the sound of the referee, though, so, as professional sportsmen do, just don’t listen to anything the ref says.
Lineouts are easy; you just have to predict where the ball goes by pressing one of the four action buttons. The same applies if the lineout is yours to throw.
Speaking of lineouts, successfully kicking into touch from a penalty will result in the commentator calling you a noob for failing the kick. Then you throw your lineout.
If you are defending, never touch the analogue stick to move the player you control. You’ll likely have them on the other side of the field doing some sort of Michael Jackson shimmy as you repeatedly tap the “add player to ruck” and “steal ball” buttons until something happens.
That or you’ll end up intercepting a pass from an offside position.
Attacking is, of course, a lot more exciting. You can pull off almost all the moves you shout at the TV when watching real-life players do their thing. However, it’s still as infuriating.
Rucking is the same procedure, but sometimes, for some unknown reason, your players do nothing while the ball sits in the ruck, and then you lose it to a penalty.
Sometimes, you just press all the buttons and kick the ball back towards your try-line. It’s always frustrating.
And when you break through the defence and run for the hills, the players feel restricted to the original 8-axis released when analogue sticks first became a thing.
Every move your players make on the field feels delayed. You tell them to pass right, and they have to wait for that thought to process before doing it.
This happens for almost everything, from kicking to passing to diving over the try line.
I admit there is some satisfaction in Career mode, where you manage your team and get them through the league.
However, it’s very short-lived because, at the end of the day, you end up jumping into a game of rugby that’s more frustrating than trying to smack a mosquito in the middle of the night.
If you are looking to play The Sims: Rugby Edition, then Rugby 25 has got you covered because where the game performs terribly as a rugby game, it does the complete opposite at allowing you to create and customise pretty much everything rugby-related.
From creating new players to clubs, club kits to logos, and even stadiums, there’s more than enough customisation here.
It’s just a pity that it’s all tied into the rest of the game.
Perhaps Big Red Ant and Nacon will take some time to turn this into a proper rugby game, but by then, it will probably be 2028, and we’ll be staring down the lineout at a new rugby game anyway.
Rugby 25
BOTTOM LINE
Rugby 25 is not just a bad rugby game, it’s a bad game overall.
It feels unfinished as if it were the first version of the game meant for pre-alpha testing.
The audacity to charge nearly R1,000, or more, depending on platform, is absurd. Stay far away from this one. Rather, go play outside.
PROS
Nice customisation options
A lot of licensed stuff
CONS
Feels unfinished
Controls don’t work
Frustrating
I could go on
