Updated Madden and NCAA 2005 previews.

[bdoughty]

Madden 2005
http://sports.ign.com/articles/511/511942p1.html


NCAA 2005
http://sports.ign.com/articles/511/511944p1.html




Looks like Tiburon played some ESPN College Hoops from the look of the images

http://sportsmedia.ign.com/sports/image ... 882546.jpg

http://sportsmedia.ign.com/sports/image ... 882543.jpg

[bdoughty]

Introducing Create-A-Sign. NCAA is going to feature a number of cut scenes (think ESPN NFL) that show fans doing everything from the Gator chomp to the tomahawk chop, and gamers will be add their own twist. Before games, you can create custom signs that say anything you want.

Interesting idea but I hope it is something they turn off before an online game. I can just imagine some of the "creativity" in the signs people would come up with.

[Murph]

Madden 2005
http://sports.ign.com/articles/511/511942p1.html


NCAA 2005
http://sports.ign.com/articles/511/511944p1.html




Looks like Tiburon played some ESPN College Hoops from the look of the images

http://sportsmedia.ign.com/sports/image ... 882546.jpg

http://sportsmedia.ign.com/sports/image ... 882543.jpg

Considering the decent job Tiburon does with Madden and especially NCAA Football, I've often wished they were the developer to also do Live and March Madness.

I guess one developer can't do 'every' EA game.

[koebner69]

Lets' hope they are right about 75 man rosters.

[kevinpars]

All that stuff is great, especially the addition of 'athletes' and the 75 man roster.

But I hope they tweaked the gameplay so that you don't have to mess with things manually to get your AI opponent to run the ball.

I wonder if the 75 man rosters are for both xbox and PS2? The main excuse for not doing this in the past was the prohibitive size of the memory card save. It would suck (for PS2 owners not me ) if this option was only available to PS2 owners with hard drives.

[Waddupcouzin]

Madden 2005
http://sports.ign.com/articles/511/511942p1.html


NCAA 2005
http://sports.ign.com/articles/511/511944p1.html




Looks like Tiburon played some ESPN College Hoops from the look of the images

http://sportsmedia.ign.com/sports/image ... 882546.jpg

http://sportsmedia.ign.com/sports/image ... 882543.jpg

Looking at those cut scenes, they played a lot of NFL2K4 as well

[ubrakto]

I've gotta wonder about some of this off-the-field stuff for these games (having to run plays for specific players (Madden), making sure my "kids" go to class (NCAA)). I mean it's this kind of stuff that makes me not want to watch Sportscenter (well it's one of the things anyway) and the lack of player attitude and BS is one of the reasons it's fun to play sports video games. Do I really want to worry that if I don't throw the ball to TO every other play in Madden that his catching rating of 92 is going to turn into an 80?

I really don't know. Maybe this type of stuff will add a ton to the GM/Coach experience of these games, but right now I'm very skeptical. I mean don't they have enough to worry about with improving the on-the-field game, fixing existing bugs/problems, and making the computer GMs manage their teams like they're a step above Forrest Gump? (MVP Baseball, anyone?)
---Todd

[wco81]

Well I'm probably not the right person to judge since I'm not a franchise mode guy, but it seems they've reached the limits or run out of ideas for the franchise mode. Hence they have to come up with this peripheral stuff like building stadiums, having mini-games, etc.

Meanwhile, gameplay has a lot of room for refinement or even dismantling and rebuilding from scratch.

[Zeppo]

. . . but it seems they've reached the limits or run out of ideas for the franchise mode.

If this is the case, then it belies a tremendous lack of creativity and a complete lack of understanding about the processes of NFL football.

I am still waiting an NFL franchise mode that in any way at all resembles the real thing. Mini camps, training camp practices, and preseason games (especially preseason games) exist in order to allow coaches to evaluate the some 85+ players they have on the team, in order to cut that number down to the 53 that end up on the roster, and the 5 that are on the practice squad.

As far as I have seen in an NFL franchise mode, you have your set roster, and that's your roster. There is no such thing as competition for starting positions, beacuse players have their ratings and there they are. Unknown players will NEVER get starting positions (happens all the time in the NFL) because their ratings in the video game are so bad. You don't have to make tough decisions about who to cut (as happens all the time in the NFL, and cut days are in fact the most intriguing days of the NFL preseason) because your roster is you roster; you don't make cuts because you don't have too many players.

Basically, franchise modes in NFL games still feel like arbitrarily invented mini games that have no relation whatsoever (IMHO) to the process of the NFL.

So if they are 'running out of ideas' as seems to be the case, perhaps they should pay attention and read the papers this offseason and through the training camps, watch preseason games (what purpose do preseason games have in a video game? I have no clue. This arbitrary ratings boost from playing preseason games is just stupid IMHO), and take a look at what really happens in real life, what the drama is that occurs during training camp/ preseason, and then maybe try to distill that process/experience down and include it in the game.

[skidmark]

Create-a-sign and no mention of a option to end the season with a Tournament? Sigh

[wco81]

But the question is, do people buy the games to play the game or to play fantasy GM, owner, coach?

I know there are capologists among football and basketball fans who delve into this aspect of sports. Salaries aren't always publicly available so they're digging around to find them and then playing accountant.

That's all fine but it seems they've greatly expanded the realm of sports fandom.

It seems the only way they're enhancing the franchise mode is to expand the borders of what fans perceive running a football team is about. First and foremost, fans identify with players and then maybe secondarily with coaches. But with franchise modes, you're now taking the role of GM and owner as well.

Now even concentrating on players, I just don't get into the notion that you have to worry about their emotional states being in flux and affecting their performance. Sure in real life that happens, where athletes are disconnected in some games or they're distracted by other events in their lives.

But some people just want a stable platform for multiplayer gaming. They don't want one QB to perform badly because he hasn't been trained enough or is behind on his homework or some other arbitrary reason the game uses to make him perform worse, like his biorhythms are at a trough.

What's next, tracking astrology charts for these players?

[skidmark]

What's next, tracking astrology charts for these players?

Actually that's already been done and it was horrible.


I think the expansion of the franchise mode just delves into what they can throw in that would be seeming fun as a mini-game. If they can take an aspect of the game and give you some type of management or control over it then they feel they have given you more of the "feel" of the sport. I'm a big fan of the franchise modes in games, spoiled by the FBpro series, but there definitely are some features that are more meaningful than others. I would like to see them concentrate on playcalling recognition quite a bit more. They've somewhat improved the existence of the work-every-time money play, but they need to put together a much more sophisticated playcalling model for the cpu offense and play recognition model for D.

[wco81]

You know there is one feature for ESPN NFL that I noticed. I think they store actual clips of other games in league. You would need the HDD for the PS2 version, otherwise, you just get screen shots. But these would be highlights like Sportscenter highlights.

What if they actually created game film of upcoming games, using cameras at the top of the stadium like the way teams use to scout upcoming opponents?

But better still, what if for online leagues, they let you store games of other teams in your league and you can download them and view them? Of course a lot of storage would be needed but it would help you scout the kinds of plays and formations used.

[kevinpars]

Create-a-sign and no mention of a option to end the season with a Tournament? Sigh

I agree. The best feature in the psx version of the game and it has never made its way to this generation of NCAA games. We get screwed by the real BCS and are stuck with it in our college video game as well.

[wco81]

I bet the NCAA is exercising more and more control over what they could do since the PSX days.

If NCAA the game offered an alternate option to determine the national champions, it would make NCAA the organization look bad, since the BCS is so controversial.

[Gman33]

I'm not to excited at all about what EA is doing. Hopefully, you can turn the "emotion" off for franchise. This trend of trying to make sports games more like a role playing games is disturbing to me. I wish EA would concentrate more on the AI, so you don't end up having 56-52 scores, without needing to tweak the hell out of the sliders. The player models need work, as well as the playbooks, but no, we'll make it so you have to worry about a fictional players fake feelings in franchise mode. Yeah, that's a good idea. I usually buy both Madden and Sega's game, but this year that may change.

[Brando70]

Well, I see all this as making it more challenging to maintain a winning team. People used to complain that it was too easy to stock up on great prospects/free agents in NCAA or Madden, when those players would never be happy sitting on the bench. Now you have to take into account a player's grades, attitude, playing demands, etc.

If you're going to simulate the recruiting/GM/coaching experience, it makes sense to include real-life factors like these. It adds a sports RPG on top of the on-field action.

Of course, they do need to fix things like the CPU playcalling in NCAA. But if they can do that and add these elements, I'm all for it. It will be like getting Front Office Football The College Years and NCAA wrapped in one.

[skidmark]

It sounds like they've added some new wrinkles to recruiting with the ability to sign a db/wr/qb and test the player out to see what position he is best at. Hopefully recruiting is also more difficult as it was way too easy to stockpile talent once you brought your team up to respectability.

[GTHobbes]

How did these companies get so overtaken with all this RPG stuff in sports games, anyways? Call me old fashioned (I'm really not), but I just want to sit down with a football/baseball/hockey game for an hour at night after work before I got to bed and play a game. Maybe play an online opponent. Who has the time to take advantage of this franchise stuff anyways?

Seems like some of us old timers are taken for granted some times. Give me great graphics, realistic stats and gameplay, and I'd be happy.

[blueduke]

Seems like some of us old timers are taken for granted some times. Give me great graphics, realistic stats and gameplay, and I'd be happy.

You got that right. I just want to have a fun, realistic game or two in the evenings. I don't give a flip about ticket or hot dog pricing or recruiting players or any of the other rpg stuff that has gotten into sports games.