Most people have probably never heard of Inside Lacrosse’s CL2010, and for good reason.  Mainly because it’s an Xbox Live Indie Game and those don’t get much of any press, second because it’s not a great game.  This is my first experience with lacrosse as a sport in any fashion and to be honest I am probably not the audience this game was going for.  If you are into lacrosse I would say you could probably get around this game a bit easier in the beginning, but the real problems will never go away.

The on-field problems start as soon as you start to move the characters around. I can clearly see that my players are supposed to be playing on grass, yet the movement feels very ice hockey with the players sliding around all over the place.  The passing is actually good because it gives you a line when you hold down the right trigger showing who you are passing to.  This comes in a great help when you’re running up the field and you can’t see who you have up-field because of the huge scoreboard.  That thing caused me to throw an interception several times simply because I could not see who on my team was up there and if anyone was in the way.  The shooting is handled with the right stick which works decent enough just to flick some quick shots at the net.  There was also a glitch I ran into several times where the ball would go out of bounds and in the course of my player running over to get it he runs into it and knocks it out again so it goes back to the other team.

The presentation is decent, with the onscreen action actually looking pretty good considering this is an indie game, except where all the players are running off the field at the end of a game and completely clipping through the stands.  The in game announcer actually sounds really good and professional.  The menus are clean and easy to navigate and there are a few different modes of play.  There is a “play friendly” option (quick match) and a season mode.  The season mode just lets you pick a team and up to 60 other teams (which is every team in the game) and enter into a tournament.  The games play out one after the other in pretty quick succession.  You earn money at the end of each game that you can use to buy upgrades for your team.  There is an actual online mode to the game as well, that seemed pretty laggy unfortunately in the couple matches I tried.  You can also edit teams and make your own, but this process was a little confusing to me.

If you are actually into lacrosse this game might manage to be enjoyable, because I did feel like scoring a goal was satisfying even if the AI is a little dumb. And for five bucks (400 Microsoft Points) you certainly could do worse.

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