First Madden/NCAA 2006 Screens - New Details

[bdoughty]

ok, let me get this straight....Yall say EA and Sony are both making huge amounts of money so the must be great. Well my point is the exact opposite. I think the leader or monopoly companies stifle innovation b/c focusing on marketing instead or real game development.

Sure EA and Sony make a ton of cash. I said nothing about their ability to make money. M$ is a monopoly in the Operating system arena. Do they make cash. Yes. Are they smart business wise. Yes. Is their product the best it could be. Hardly. Apple's OS (even though they have tons less money) is a hell of a lot better.

Lets look at each of my arguments.

Oh how cute M$, never seen that one before. You seem to have a distaste all things successful, which shows why you love your Apple. Some who study these things feel that if there was "competition" in the OS market we would not be as far "technologically" as we are today. When you have a bunch of different platforms it makes it hard for developers to produce software for each OS. Heck just look at the limited software you have to pick from for your apple. In our video game market Sega and VC said no more Sports game for you Gamecube, and on and on.

IGN. Every game is "major" is a game that gets hyped by previews by a major gamesite. This is most EA games as well as other games. Lets look at reviews of major games.
god war 9.8. Midnight club 3 9.2. Jade Empire 9.9, Doom 3, 9.3, SC3 9.6, Timesplitters 9.0, Brothers in Arms 9.3, MVP 9.2, Fightnight 9.0, Nba Street 3 9.4. Gamespot is a hell of a lot better. But even they overrate most games.

Did you ever once read the text from any of these reviews?

Yes IGN is the king of hype

http://img.penny-arcade.com/2005/20050218l.jpg


You are not really getting the point. Review Scores are for those who prefer to be humored by decimal points then reading the content. When I pick out a game it is NEVER because of a review score from any site. I can pretty much decide on a game from previews and if I am still in question about a game, a rental. IGN is good for a few things like Media, roundtables and news. You say they suck simply because they give out 9's. I feel bad for you.

I remember when IGN gave Full Spectrum Warrior for Xbox a 9.2. That game was pretty bad. Any sequel to a major EA sports game will get 9.0 or better, even though the game has barely changed in 3 years (madden).

...

EA. What has EA created that is good. Madden is a good game, but the same. MVP is good. Fightnight is decent. Burnout 3 was really another company the bought last minute. Sims sux and the milk that franchise. NFSU sux. Goldeneye = trash. All their movie games are shallow (LOTR and Harry Potter). Medal of Honor series going downhill, etc. With all that money, I would think they could at least optimize a game for the xbox instead of having framerate problems and bad textures.

Yea the Sims is only one of the top selling games of all time. Of course you don't like it so it SUX. There was Battelfield 1942, from what I read it did not SUX amongst the masses. Many think Tiger Woods 2005 on the PC is solid, including myself. You know it is hard to have a discussion with someone who uses SUX.

Sony. PS2 is ancient. The jaggies and flickering hurt your eyes on a big screen TV. Why don't they have 4 ports on their machine. The only "emotion" i get from their engine is anger and disappointment. Load times from Hell. No video ram. Bad online gameplay. God of War is good. GT4 is sh$t.

Yet they were still able to make a portable version of the PS2 and it is selling. Guess you are right and the majority are wrong/stupid or just not l33t for you.


EDIT:

I should have been like Divot and taken the high road. I will not reply to your rants again on this thread as I do not wish it to be locked.

[bdoughty]

We have no way of knowing how well this will be implemented but this is, IMO, by FAR the most creative and risky feature for an EA Football game since the launch of the PS2 and Xbox. I think on paper this is absotively wonderful.

I cannot remember the last time I saw a fact sheet/feature list for a Madden game and my eyes widened with surprise like it did yesterday. The DB awareness stuff combined with the Passing Awareness stuff has me all aflutter with anticipation. Is the day finally here where Awareness matters for a human controlled QB? Will QB accuracy finally matter? And it's EA SPORTS that's doing it? I gotta play the lotto today.

I assume NCAA is getting the shaft with these features, though.

With NCAA we just have to wait one more year for those features.

You know the little thing that had me was EA's was able to admit they were wrong.

From the IGN preview

And yes the control system in Madden06 has mimicked NCAA Football 2006 so that X on the PS2 controller is now a permanent sprint button and the passing icons are always up on a pass play.

Assuming they don't forget to implement this in the Xbox version I get to play defense once again. Of course if it is permanent I do feel for the Madden guys who played all these years with the default setup. Oh well it makes me happy, plus it is common sense to have the sprint buttom be the same on offense and defense.

[wco81]

We have no way of knowing how well this will be implemented but this is, IMO, by FAR the most creative and risky feature for an EA Football game since the launch of the PS2 and Xbox. I think on paper this is absotively wonderful.

I cannot remember the last time I saw a fact sheet/feature list for a Madden game and my eyes widened with surprise like it did yesterday. The DB awareness stuff combined with the Passing Awareness stuff has me all aflutter with anticipation. Is the day finally here where Awareness matters for a human controlled QB? Will QB accuracy finally matter? And it's EA SPORTS that's doing it? I gotta play the lotto today.

I assume NCAA is getting the shaft with these features, though.

The idea does sound good on paper. I don't know that they will necessarily change the awareness of DBs. One other thing mentioned elsewhere is that it will be easier to throw bullet passes over LBs.

As for the cone of vision, I don't know that it necessarily represents how QBs see the field. In the screenshots, you see Peyton Manning with a wide cone. But I think sometimes, his accuracy, particularly the way he leads a certain WR, is because he's made a good presnap read and focused or locked up a particular WR. If anything, he probably has more of a tunnel vision when he sees a mismatch or a route which isn't going to be covered well.

Plus that focus or concentration varies from game to game or even quarter to quarter. That is why QBs are "hot" sometimes and not so hot other times. That variability of concentration doesn't have to do with his field of vision so much as how much he's prepared and how "in the zone" he is. When coaches and QBs talk about progression in the reads, it suggests they are looking narrowly from WR to WR more than having a wide field of vision.

However, a feature like this doesn't have to be realistic. It's an analog to variability in focus or accuracy. The big problem with the Madden passing game has been uncanny accuracy and arm strength. So however they introduce variability is a good thing, as long as you have control over this. That is, the performance is up to you, not some factor beyond your control

[Brando70]

Sounds like the NCAA team spent all their time with this Race to the Heisman gimmick rather than fixing last year's game. I guess we'll get a better impression of the gameplay at E3, but this isn't good news so far.

Why such a desperate ploy in the name of innovation? There is a ton of things that have been done by others or even done by themselves that just need to be redone or improved upon to really bring their football into a solid "above the crowd" level. If they fart around the whole time they have these exclusive licenses by hurling cheap gimmicks at the wall to see what sticks, they'll be sitting on their thumbs at the end of those licenses with games that are just 4-5 years more tired than they are now.

The Madden vision passing thing does look like a step in the right direction though. I'd like to see blind passes downfield be way off target, but blind underneath stuff still a viable option. Need to have some way to have a QB make his reads downfield and still have the option to dump underneath quickly... but not just fire to a 15 yard curl that is on the complete opposite side of the field out of view.

Is it just me, or does it seem like EA swapped several key NCAA and Madden developers after NCAA 2004?

Well, developers never really talk about stuff like "we fixed the screwed up passing" when their just starting the publicity blitz. Yet EA in the past has done just that under the radar (like the DB AI in NCAA getting fixed a couple years ago). I of course want the gameplay to come first, but the Heisman thing sounds like it could be fun, like the similar mode they have in Sony's MLB.

I think EA gets way too bad of a rap for being EA. They have moved their once craptacular basketball and football games in the right direction, kept Madden solid throughout the last few years, and kept improving NCAA until last year's debacle. I don't think their suck-to-good game ratio is any worse than most publishers.

[anchester]

I guess my writing style was a bit inflammatory, but I am suprised at peopele defending IGN and EA so much. IGN reviews are just plain bad. And yes I read them, not just the scores. There reviews are 5 pages long and say absolutely nothing about AI or gameplay for the most part. In general their reviews are a recitation of a fact PR sheet. If a "huge" game like Halo 2 or GTA san anreas is being reviewed, they hype it up like "this game will own you" or "you know this game is going to be awesome, so just go buy it".

When EA is pushed it can really innovate/improve in the sports arena. When not pushed, it sits on its butt. Triple Play series, NBA Lives and NHL used to be horrendous on the console and have improved (except NHL which reverted back). Tiger Woods for console is exactly the same game as it has been for 3-4 years (where 50 scores are the norm). FIFA was trash until WE, and now its a bit better than trash.

SIMs is a clever idea. How many sequels and expansion packs did EA make for that. I remember a top ten list where SIMS and its expansion had like 5 of the top 10 slots.

[DivotMaker]

I guess my writing style was a bit inflammatory,

NOOOOOOOO!

but I am suprised at peopele defending IGN and EA so much.

Defending EA? Hell, if anyone defends EA more than I do, I have not seen him/her. I will defend EA when people make sweeping irrational statements about the company. I will be the first in line to list their deficiencies as a developer and/or publisher. However, I don't believe in making generalized, irrational statements about ANY company because such statements can be easily refuted. I also get a bit testy when people post in inflammatory styles that tend to become emotional flames instead of objective discussions.

Hope you catch my drift here....I don't think anyone here disagrees with the fact that all three entities you describe are FAR from being perfect. However, as you have discovered, there is not a great deal of agreement that they are as bad as you are trying to portray them. If they were, each company would be on the brink of, or already out of business. Think about it....

[Leebo33]

IGN. Every game is "major" is a game that gets hyped by previews by a major gamesite. This is most EA games as well as other games. Lets look at reviews of major games.
god war 9.8. Midnight club 3 9.2. Jade Empire 9.9, Doom 3, 9.3, SC3 9.6, Timesplitters 9.0, Brothers in Arms 9.3, MVP 9.2, Fightnight 9.0, Nba Street 3 9.4.

It should be noted that in each case, IGN's score is within 8% of the Gamerankings average. Many times it is less than 5%. It doesn't seem like grounds for a Congressional inquiry. So what? IGN inflates scores. They do it for most of their games. For instance, it seems like they have higher scores for some of the PSP sports games like Gretzky and World Tour Soccer than most sites. I'm not big on scores, but when I do take IGN's scores into consideration for comparative purposes I usually chop 5 points or so (so an IGN 94=everyone else 89).

[GTHobbes]

Yawn, these new features do nothing for me. I was not buying Madden anyways due to the boycott thing, but I'm glad to see that EA did not choose this year to go and implement some new features/graphics that would make me regret my decision.

[Danimal]

Yawn, these new features do nothing for me.

Shocking!!!

[Danimal]

I assume NCAA is getting the shaft with these features, though.

I hope they give it some speed, God that game is so slow on the Xbox.

[XXXIV]

I think we should wait til the game comes out before we rip it...As for ripping EA?...keep up the good work.

I hope none of the new features will cause slowdown on the XBOX ala that fan noise garbage on NCAA 2004.

One last time I will hope that EA makes an effort to use the XBOX and not give us a crappy port of a last generation system...Again that slowdown was ridiculous.

[Badger_Fan]

I think the passing vision and accuracy features sound great...if they work how I would like them to. We have screamed for years that football games (not just EA games) need to do something to make user QBs have awareness and accuracy ratings that matter. If the vision feature makes it so that it's a hell of a lot harder to QB with Kyle Boller than with Daunte Culpepper I think it's fantastic. I do have a couple of questions:

1. They state that rolling out will decrease the vision cone. This makes total sense but I would hope that the decrease for QB's who can throw on the run well (Culpepper and McNabb for instance) is smaller than a statue like Bledsoe.

2. The precision thing sounds good, again if it works correctly. Will they make it a lot easier for a guy with good accuracy (Brady, Culpepper, Manning) to throw high and outside than a guy like Boller. If so it will be fun to be able to throw a dart in there with a guy with good accuracy.

Personally I think the vision feature could be the most innovative football feature in years on any game. If it truly differentiates the QB's in the league and allows you to look off defenders it will be outstanding. Another thing that I read that would be great (and I'll believe it when I see it) is the dbacks not reading run right at the snap when they're in man coverage. If a corner is in man coverage and the receiver streaks upfield he's going to be in coverage mode, not in run-stuffing mode. And play-action just doesn't do enough to counter that currently.

[bdoughty]

One last time I will hope that EA makes an effort to use the XBOX and not give us a crappy port of a last generation system...Again that slowdown was ridiculous.

Reminds me of the endining to Shawshank Redemption as Red strolls down the beach to greet Andy.


I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend, and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope.

[XXXIV]

One last time I will hope that EA makes an effort to use the XBOX and not give us a crappy port of a last generation system...Again that slowdown was ridiculous.

Reminds me of the endining to Shawshank Redemption as Red strolls down the beach to greet Andy.


I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend, and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope.

I think you have captured exactly how I feel with that analogy....Im not very proud.