During the World Cup craze that swept over me and my college buddies, this game was a must-play. We would pick our favorite countries or U.S. by default and would play a game of international importance. It was fun, to be sure, but once the World Cup buzz wore off the game got old fast.
The reason is because for an Xbox sports game, the bar has been set pretty high. The graphics, while pretty good, could have been smoother. The control was a little awkward, and just stringing together some passes proved to be very difficult. If you actually passed a few times successfully down the field and got to the opponent's goal area, scoring was a hit-and-(most-likely)miss affair. That is, except for one of my friends who killed us 8-0 if he felt like it. I guess I just never got really good at the game like he did, but overall it just felt like it could've used more balance and polish. I played 2003, and it definitely improved upon these areas.