Rapala Tournament Fishing (Xbox 360, 2007)

I'm a tournament fisherman with 30 plus years on the water and I can tell you this game is full of holes if you love fishing. Lets start with the negatives first. I'll start with the fact that all you have in you tackle box is Rapala plugs, Rapala line, Rapala reels ect. This makes for great advertisement, but not such a great game. It's like having a racing game with only one car or a shooter with only one gun. All the other methods and forms of catching fish are forgotten, worms, jigs, tubes, spinner baits, ect. Now, when you do get to fishing in the game all the fish act alike. They all run at the bait stop, look at it and then all you have to do is stop tap the lure twice and they hit. Even the PIKE, tell me one time anyone has ever seen a Pike run on a lure then stop to look at it. They hit a lure at full speed and never stop. When a Bass hits a sub-surface plug they don't stop to check it out. Now let's get to the fight, once you have a fish hooked I couldn't see any change in the action when I moved the pool one way or another with the fish close to the boat. The fights were often short and not very challenging. Now we have the fish in the boat. When was the last time anyone has seen an 11 inch 3 pond bass or an 18 pound large mouth. The sizes on these fish are not possible in many cases and hard to believe in others. When it comes to the size of the lakes, they're more like ponds than lakes. I couldn't figure out what season it was. This has a lot to do with were to look for fish. So I found myself going to point and other structure were you might look but this took a lot of fun out of the game.
On the plus side, the graphics are good, castings not bad and I did find fish were you would think to find them. Pike in shallow bays, Walleye on rocks a ledges ect. In close, if you know fishing try Pro Fishing Challenge this game was done by people who know fishing. All type's of presentations are available. Fish move with the seasons they hit and fight like they should. It will give the fisherman in the family hours of fun. Rapala Pro fishing should be call Kids Fun Fishing and as such might rate a little higher. If you want to buy this game for a young player they might have fun with it. Just stay away if it's for someone who Know's Fishing.