Cricket 2005

Electronic Arts continues its yearly cricket franchise with this outing. The Australian, English, South African and New Zealand national and league teams’ names and likenesses are licensed. If you don’t want likenesses of official players, then make your own with the built-in player editor to make the game custom to you. With 35 stadiums accurately modeled with real crowd noise the atmosphere is set for this TV style presentation (with action replay mode, third umpire, animated duck sequences, and TV style overlays) of cricket.

Fielding is fully automated, and it is possible to skip the entire bowling innings. Batting depends as much on shot timing as selection, while running between the wickets is faster than in previous editions. There are 13 tournament modes including domestic and international one-day and test matches, including England County Cricket’s fast-paced Twenty20 Cup, and 2 net practice modes. The game has commentary from Richie Benaud and Jim Maxwell.