NFL PRO ERA Review - A Decent Football Virtual Reality Game

Looking for a football Virtual Reality game? Wondering when Madden VR is finally going to come? Well if your standards for Virtual Reality football are low and very limited to being a quarterback then the football Virtual Reality game you want might already be here in NFL Pro Era VR.

Well NFL Pro Era VR isn’t a very deep or rewarding experience, even for lovers of football, and certainly isn’t the NFL VR game or Madden VR game you might be hoping for. Still, there are things worth enjoying in this Football Virtual Reality game. While this VR game falls short of its flatscreen counterparts, there is still good VR football fun to be had.

In this NFL Pro Era review we’ll talk about what this early attempt at an NFL VR game does right, but mostly where it falls short of what a fantastic football Virtual Reality game could be.

Oh, and this review will focus on the Meta Quest 2 (or Oculus Quest 2) version of the game, though NFL Pro Era on PC is the same, just better looking.

Your First Play - NFL Pro Era VR Review

So let’s say you start NFL Pro Era for the first time. Well at first you’ll probably be pleasantly surprised. The game does a good job of putting you right into the action and letting you run a few plays to get the hang of it.

The first tutorial, which covers about 90% of the game

No lengthy intros that make you wait ten minutes before getting into some VR football, just a couple of setup menus and a quick bit of NFL style fanfare before you’re throwing your first touchdown.

It’s nice to get right into things, and the controls are pretty simple, and explained pretty quickly. Just hold down the trigger to hike the ball and start the play. You’ll see all your AI teammates run for the pass, and then you can toss the football.

You’ll quickly notice that well… it kind of feels like throwing a football. Though not as much as you’d think in a football Virtual Reality game. It feels a little off, because there’s an auto aim sort of feature enabled by default. Even if you throw off course from a receiver, the ball will still go to them more often than not.

It makes the throwing feel a little weird when compared to a real football, but it does feel better if you turn the auto aim off in the settings later. If you do the throwing feels pretty accurate and satisfying, but if you’d rather keep auto aim on and have a little help then that’s okay too.

Throwing a Touchdown

We’ll get more into the gameplay later, but for now we can definitely say that it’s a good thing that you can run a play within four minutes of starting NFL Pro Era.

Especially in VR it’s good to avoid standing around and just get into the action, and that’s something that this Virtual Reality football game does at first. Once you’ve made your first touchdown it’s off to the locker room to choose your name, number, and look.

Oh, and most importantly, choose your team.

Character creation is pretty great in NFL Pro Era VR

Creating Your Player - NFL Pro Era VR Review

Yep, you can play as or against any NFL team in this NFL VR game, which is really cool. So if you’re a big football fan looking for some Virtual Reality football action then you can play as your favorite team.

There are also a ton of personalization options that are fun to play around with, like choosing what gloves you want to use, and you can always go back and change them later. You can even change your team later on if you change your mind.

What’s an NFL VR game without playing as an NFL team? All of the player models, jerseys, and gloves, even on the Meta Quest version of the game, also look really good no matter what team you pick.

The Running Back getting tackled

Going To The Practice Field - NFL Pro Era VR Review

After you make your character to your liking you’re off to the practice field. Once again it’s nice to get right into the football in this football Virtual Reality game.

So now you get another chance to throw some passes and learn more about NFL Pro Era. The basic flow of the game is revealed to you pretty quickly, and like we’ve already said it’s no Madden VR.

You look at your wrist before a play to see the play being called by your coach as your team is gathered around you. Then you tap the “break” button to break the huddle and start the play.

You wait a bit for the “hut hut” and then you pull the trigger to have the ball hiked back to you.

The ball being hiked to the player

Your AI teammates play out the play, almost flawlessly most of the time, and then you either throw the ball, pass it off, or run with it until you get sacked. Really they play too flawlessly, stupidly flawlessly, and we’ll talk about the AI more in a minute.

You go down, new play, rinse and repeat. So you learn the whole loop of this football VR game within the first thirty minutes of playing it, and it quickly becomes obvious that this is more of a quarterback VR game than a football VR game.

You only play the position of Quarterback, though you can run the ball yourself and ignore the Running Back if you like.

So that’s basically the entire game. In NFL Pro Era VR you’re the Quarterback and mostly throw the ball.

A Very Limited Football Virtual Reality Game - NFL Pro Era VR Review

Tossing the ball before getting sacked

So that’s the game. Sure, it’s a football Virtual Reality game, but you’d be right in thinking that this doesn’t sound like a VR experience that really encompasses the sport of football.

NFL Pro Era is certainly fun for what it is and does the job of simulating being a Quarterback well enough, but it really lacks the depth of strategy, planning, and customizability that you would expect from a Madden VR game, if that’s what NFL Pro Era is trying to be.

Sure it has great visuals, even on the Meta Quest, but there’s no team management, and it isn’t even obvious how to select a play to you. The excitement of being on an actual football field and playing an actual football game fades quickly when it isn’t matched with having options to affect whether you win or lose.

There’s not much more to say without being cruel to the game. NFL Pro Era is a quarterback simulator. When you do Season Games against other teams you’ll have absolutely no control over the defense. Oh, and you’ll have to watch every punt and kick from the sidelines. You’ll watch a lot of kicks when playing this football game.

Another kick

You can watch your defense go up against the enemy offense too, but it’s all largely uninteresting, because unlike a normal game of football this game is just bots against bots. On offense or defense they’re not terribly intelligent and are very boring to watch.

So you inevitably end up standing around and not doing much for a good portion of every game. Thankfully you can press a button on your handheld menu to skip all of the opposing offence’s plays, but you’ll still have to watch every kick and punt. So you still end up spending a substantial amount of time watching bots run around.

It’s boring, it would be better if you could get into the action a little faster, but it’s not a game stopper by any means, just a constant annoyance.

You’ll also start to notice the limitations of the AI when you’re throwing passes as well. There will always be at least one receiver who is wide open no matter the play, and you usually have plenty of time before getting sacked. So if you’re expecting NFL level pressure and difficulty in this NFL VR game, you might be disappointed.

Even with the hardest throwing difficulty it isn’t very hard to throw a pass even for someone who isn’t great at throwing an actual football. Though this can be a good thing depending on how you look at it, it would be nice if there was more to aspire to.

Moments before a successful pass

Sure there’s a trophy room you can fill up by beating enemy teams and getting achievements. Sure you can go through a whole season of Football as your chosen team and destroy each enemy team, but the victory is pretty hollow because it’s just too easy.

Football is a hard sport, and the AI in NFL Pro Era make it far too easy. So if you want an NFL level of difficulty in this official NFL title, you’ll be disappointed.

The Multiplayer - NFL Pro Era VR Review

Well the AI isn’t the greatest and the game is both limited in what you can do and how hard it is to master. It doesn’t sound like NFL Pro Era is the VR football title that you’ll be sinking hundreds of hours into so far, but what about the multiplayer?

Well you might already be looking ahead and wondering if you’ll have to watch every play that your opponent does while you wait for your defense to try to stop them, and that they’ll have to wait for your offense to finish.

After all you have no control over how your defense performs on the field, which always makes it feel like you’re not really in control of your fate during a game.

Luckily there won’t be a bunch of waiting in the NFL Pro Era multiplayer, because in this VR football game’s multiplayer you don’t play games of football. You run drills and play catch.

Multiplayer is lackluster

So even if you were willing to wait for another player to finish their drive before you get a chance to play again, you won’t get that option. NFL Pro Era’s multiplayer is purely hanging out on a football field and doing various football throwing minigames.

It’s really a letdown. So if you wanted a Madden like multiplayer experience in VR football you won’t find it here. Really the ‘multiplayer’ in NFL Pro Era being just a glorified practice session outlines just what is so disappointing about this game.

Though if you’re still looking for that Multiplayer football experience NFL Pro Era 2 has promised to deliver the Quarterback VS Quarterback multiplayer system that you could be looking for.

It Just Falls Short - NFL Pro Era VR Review

When you first start NFL Pro Era it is amazing. The visuals are awesome, the experience of being in the middle of a stadium and scoring a touchdown makes you feel like you’re actually a Quarterback in the NFL. The immersion of Virtual Reality really makes it feel like you’re there, and it feels so great.

Then once the initial rush wears off and you get used to things you quickly learn just how shallow of an experience NFL Pro Era is. The realization that what is marketed as the official football Virtual Reality game on the Meta Quest is really just a glorified Quarterback simulator.

Yea it looks good, but that can’t overcome the disappointment that comes time and time again when you realize just how little value NFL Pro Era gives you as a football fan or even a casual gamer who thought playing football in VR sounds fun.

An Easy Pass before getting sacked

You think “Oh wow a football Virtual Reality game!” Then realize that all you can do is be a quarterback, and you have no control outside of what the quarterback does. You have no control over the rest of your team or the game.

You think “Oh wow multiplayer, now I can outthrow my friends and beat them!” Then realize that you can only outthrow them in abstracted minigames where your goal is to hit a target with the ball, not a game of Virtual Reality football.

It’s easy to look at NFL Pro Era and quickly assume that it will be more than it is, but it really isn’t much. Still, the price tag is low at 14.99$ on the Meta/Oculus Quest store. If you’re a football fan and think that a quarterback simulator sounds fun and worth it for that price, then NFL Pro Era VR is a fantastic game for you.

If you’re expecting Madden VR, then unfortunately the conclusion of this NFL Pro Era Review is that this Virtual Reality football experience is not complete, and you’ll have to wait longer for a more full football game in VR.