Thursday, June 4, 2009
11:19 PM - June 4, 2009. Posted by ChaseB. Written by Chase Becotte
E3 is thankfully over. As much fun as it was, I'm happy today was the final day. I'm sitting here at the airport, and in a couple hours I will be catching a late flight back to Philly.
Anyway, what did I do today? Well, I interviewed Peter Moore, captured some footage of some racing games (Need for Speed, Forza, Split Second) and also played some racing games (I heart Split Second). I also got a little more Madden NFL 10 footage and snagged a bunch of quick little videos so I could do some screen grabs and pop some images up on the site.
Overall, a pretty successful trip, and I'll be writing more about the games I saw and played during the next week. Expect to see some of my raw and edgy shaky-cam footage this weekend as well.
One last thing before I end this meaningless article: I was a little disappointed that there were not more diamonds in the rough on the show floor this year. I dedicated a large part of my day to finding the "hidden gems" at E3, but I simply did not find many sports games on the show floor to even play. Perhaps companies don't think about creating small-budget sports titles, or maybe they just don't think they would show well in this type of environment. Regardless, I wish there had been more sports games to cover at E3 this year.
03:44 AM - June 4, 2009. Posted by ChaseB. Written by Chase Becotte
OK, so I feel a little guilty because I know you guys all want the goods, and I want to deliver them. But, I'm pretty much a wreck after about eight hours on the E3 show floor today. I captured a ton of footage, played a ton of games, and was just running around trying to cover as many bases as possible, and I think I succeeded on that front -- I played NHL 10 for about an hour (embargoed until June 16), FIFA 10 for about an hour (embargo is now up but I will not write about it until this weekend), I saw Backbreaker (embargoed until June 15), captured a ton of Madden NFL 10 footage, captured a ton of NCAA Football 10 footage, and captured some Fight Night Round 4 footage as well.
That being said, I have to get up early tomorrow and do it all over again. I'll be on the show floor for the whole day, and then I'll head on over to LAX for a 10:30 p.m. PST flight and get back into Philly at 6:30 a.m. EST. (I'll have a nervous breakdown somewhere along the way as well.) But the flight is set up that way because I wanted to have another full day on the show floor to get some more hands-on and snag some more videos and screens.
So, I cannot wait to do it all over again in the morning because I want you all to get as much out of this event as possible. I have an interview with Peter Moore in the morning, and then after that I will be trying to capture some footage of some racing games, before trying to capture some more football footage and find some off-the-beaten path sports games.
Returning to the original point, though, while I'm not going to write any detailed impressions tonight, I have to give you guys something, right?
Madden NFL 10
-I see that a lot of people like the new Ray Lewis video. My understanding is that there are not a ton of those types of signature player intros in the game, but there are over 10 signature stadium intros. I'm pretty interested to see all of them once August rolls around.
(On another note, I see a lot of people complaining about the highlights within the halftime show. While I understand some of the complaints, I want to be clear that the reason the highlights are bad is because I Super Simmed to get to the halftime show quickly. When you Super Sim, the game does not create manufactured highlights from the simmed plays. In other words, the game only had a handful of plays from the half to choose from, so you saw things like a 4-yard run and so on.)
-In-game saves are not in the game.
-You can user control all 32 teams in offline franchise mode, and you can also edit every player on every team within the franchise mode. So if you don't like how a rookie was rated on so-and-so squad, you can change everything about that player's rating within the franchise mode.
-When you put a player on IR within franchise mode, you do get cap relief.
-Within franchise mode, there are still 53 players on a roster during training camp.
-There was a lot of talk about the lack of a salary cap in online franchise mode -- at the very least, it will not be there at launch. While that is a bummer, it's not a total loss. Since the commissioner can control every single move in an online franchise, it would be very possible to create "house rules" for who can sign what player and so on. Many people (including myself) play in things like fantasy baseball keeper leagues where you have house rules in place to figure out what players you can sign from free agency and so forth. It is more legwork for sure, but at least there is a way to get around the lack of a salary cap.
-Either way, you will want the commissioner to have full control over what moves happen throughout the online franchise mode, because any AI teams that are in the online franchise mode lack trade logic. If commissioner control is not on, you could hose any AI team in the trade department. Once again, house rules will be in effect here. Personally, the house rule I would enact would involve showing the whole league a trade you want to propose to the AI; then the league votes on the trade, and it either gets accepted or rejected.
Grand Slam Tennis
The game comes out next week, but I know some people were wondering what was going on in the "career mode" department.
First a couple little details:
-The career mode lasts 10 in-game years.
-Your player will be rated on a five-star scale.
-You create your own tennis pro before hopping into this mode.
OK, so within this mode you will only play at the four Grand Slam venues, but there are different courts within each venue. So you won't be playing on center court when you are a one-star bum, but you will be playing on it when you are a five-star stud.
But just because you are playing at these Grand Slam venues all the time, you are not actually in the French Open or Wimbledon tournaments at the start of the mode. Instead, you will be playing exhibition matches against generic players, rather than Nadal or Sampras. As you get better, you will unlock stuff (see: apparel) and eventually you will qualify for the Grand Slam tournaments.
At this point, you will then be facing off against some of the legends and some of the best tennis players in the world. In addition, if you beat someone like Nadal at the French Open, you will also acquire his speed ability. Simply put, if you beat the best players, you get their special attributes. Basically, it seems like your created pro will be like a sports version of Mega Man.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
04:45 AM - June 3, 2009. Posted by ChaseB. Written by Chase Becotte
I checked out NCAA Football 10, Madden NFL 10 (360/PS3 and Wii), Fight Night Round 4, NHL 10 and FIFA 10 today. FIFA is embargoed until tomorrow, and NHL is embargoed until June 16, so those are hush-hush for now. I've spoken about Madden (360/PS3) already, and you all can play Fight Night, so that just leaves NCAA Football as the unknown.NCAA Football 10
As someone who did not play NCAA Football 10 at all last year (I know, crazy right?), it's hard for me to really gauge too much from six quarters of gameplay. I feel like it would be better for me to just touch on some of the new gameplay elements because I wouldn't need a history with the NCAA franchise to gauge the new stuff. Before that, though, I must say that the game certainly feels much faster than Madden NFL 10, which I think is intentional.
Beyond the game speed, I know the game-planning option was a new addition this year, and it definitely seems like the ultimate test of risk/reward. As Air Force, I set a running game option to aggressive, which meant my running back would potentially break more tackles but also fumble more often. This held true. I fumbled twice within my first six carries, but I also broke off a big run.
I tried the "aggressive" option for a few other options on offense and defense and had similar results. I certainly would not want to leave an option as "aggressive" for a whole game, but that's why you can change the game-plan option from play to play.
The "linked plays" gameplay enhancement is an interesting one. For the uninitiated, this is where two plays are tied together on offense. If you run a lot of HB Dive plays effectively, the play-action pass that is tied to the HB Dive could potentially confuse the defense and result in a big play. In this scenario, if you wait longer to do the "linked" PA pass, the better chance the play will be effective.
While trying this gameplay addition out, it seemed like the percentage of effectiveness went up rather quickly. After one 11-yard carry, the passing play linked to that run shot up about 40 percent, which seemed to be a bit much to me. However, when trying the pass play at 75 percent effectiveness, it resulted in an incomplete pass. So, hopefully that is a sign that this feature will not be abused.
Beyond a couple of those new enhancements, I just get the feeling that any discussion about the game starts with the TeamBuilder and online franchise elements -- for better or worse when it comes to the rest of the game.
Fight Night Round 4
I think it would be counter-productive to talk about this game too much from an impressions standpoint because there is a demo for you all to play. However, I cannot say enough about how good the graphics look. It's easily the best looking sports game out there.
I love seeing things like an ice bag on my boxer's head in the corner, and watching instant replays of a fight just makes me smile -- it sounds corny to say but it is true. Watching spit, blood and sweat fly from a boxer's mouth and face in super slow-mo is good times.
I know some people have some questions about online and career modes, so I'll try to find out more on those fronts tomorrow.
Madden NFL 10 (Wii)
Not too much to say here. I'm interested in Grand Slam Tennis and Tiger Woods on Wii because I feel like the console adds to those games -- PS both games should be on my doorstep next week, and I look forward to giving impressions to you all. But I have never been that interested in Madden on the Wii, because I just don't think the Wii helps football games much. However, I did play the game for a bit, and I do think it serves its purpose for the "casual" fans out there. However, I'll always question how big that "casual" football market really is on the Wii.
The new Season Showdown mode also seems pretty interesting. Basically, week to week you can play with up to three other friends and bet (EA says make "predictions" but this is clearly Wii fantasy Madden gambling) on the games you are not involved in. In other words, if I think one of my friends is going to beat the other one, I can bet on him to win the game -- you start out with 200 fantasy Madden space bucks. Other bets will also pop up throughout the game (for example, who will win the time of possession battle).
You also earn Madden space bucks by winning the game when you are involved in it. I asked if you could "Pete Rose it" by gambling on yourself to lose, but that is not allowed. That's probably for the better, because I would definitely throw a very important game to win the gambling battle -- and receive a punch in the face soon after from an unhappy friend.
Essentially, if you stink at the game but are a good gambler, you could still potentially be the victor in this mode. Bottom line, it's certainly a unique mode.
Now, I believe the slowed down gameplay will work for Madden because of the QB pocket development, right-stick QB evasion moves and the fact that you will be pushing the pile or doing things like trying to maneuver while within a tackle. If the game was going a hundred miles an hour, I just don't think my brain would have time to process everything going on in this game. In other words, I wouldn't be able to effectively handle some of the new gameplay elements that are at my disposal.
After all, as nice as it is to say that I want Madden to mimic the NFL in every way possible, if the game was moving at the pace of a real NFL game, I would get sacked every single play. As a QB I would never be able to make my reads in time, and I certainly would not be able to find the holes in the offensive line quickly enough when I was using a running back.
But since the game is slowed down a bit, I can feel a pocket develop around my QB as I step up to throw a laser. During a running play, I have a split second longer to look for a hole and cut through it.
Beyond the slowed down gameplay, the next thing I noticed was the passing game. Besides the discussed evasion moves and pocket protection -- which like I said, are quite noticeable -- the inaccuracy of the quarterbacks was another culture shock of sorts. Tarvaris Jackson, not so hot in the accuracy department. Jay Cutler, strong arm but was not always on point with the deep balls. David Garrard, well he simply threw a bad ball to the flats while under pressure.
It's one of those noticeable differences that might make me curse out loud sometimes, but on the other hand, I'm happy it's there because it's a fact of football: quarterbacks are not always accurate.
In general, while it's hard to gauge the gameplay experience in this type of environment -- and I'll never say something overwhelmingly positive or negative after just a bit of hands-on time -- I know I'm excited to play a bit more over the next few days to see what else has changed.
And maybe that's the best compliment I can give the game: It's a yearly sports franchise that essentially feels like a whole new experience. The improved presentation, tweaked gameplay style and fresh technology help to prove the point that a lot has been crammed into this game on the gameplay front, which is not something you could always say about Madden in the past.
Does that mean Madden really nailed it on the gameplay front? It would simply be unfair for me to say one way or the other at this point, but the potential is there.
Online Franchise Mode
I know there are a lot of questions about this mode, so I want to do some quick hitters for this section.
-You cannot trade future draft picks in franchise mode (offline or online).
-There is no cross integration between the new co-op mode and the new online franchise mode.
-Online franchise mode goes for 10 years.
-You cannot import NCAA Football 10 draft classes into online franchise mode. There are only Madden-generated classes available for this mode. A quick note on this, though, Josh Looman (a developer who worked on NFL Head Coach) essentially brought over tweaked draft classes from the Head Coach title. That means that the draft classes should be quite good because they were very solid in NFL Head Coach.
-I'm still trying to hunt down a response to this question (and rest assured I will), but I get the impression that there may not be a salary cap for online franchise mode, at least not at launch. Now, it could be that there just is not a salary cap when it comes to the free agents, but if there is no salary cap, obviously some house rules will need to be created. Stay tuned for updates on this during the course of E3.
-You can do an online franchise with just one user. I guess the nice part about doing this is you can check your team online when not around the computer.
-There is always 32 teams in online franchise mode. If you're alone, you will still be competing against 31 AI-controlled teams.
-There is no Extra Point weekly recap show in online franchise.
-Otherwise, it seems like anything you can do in offline franchise mode, you can do in online franchise mode.
-One offline franchise note: Josh Looman pretty much took over offline franchise mode. He tweaked a ton of AI logic within the mode, and also dealt with draft logic and so on. While the franchise mode obviously won't be as in depth as the one found in Head Coach, I would suspect that the experience will at least be more fine-tuned and realistic this year.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
01:59 AM - June 2, 2009. Posted by ChaseB. Written by Chase Becotte
All right, so day one has come to a close at E3. I hope you all enjoyed today's live blog of the EA press conference, but that's just the beginning of the coverage.Tomorrow the E3 show floor opens at 12 p.m. PST -- the show floor opens so late because of the Sony and Nintendo press conferences that are going on earlier in the morning -- and I'll be there to hunt down and play as many sports games as possible.
My first stop will be at the EA Sports booth. I went by the LA Convention Center today, and the EA Sports booth was already pretty much ready -- I also ran into some Madden developers, including Ian Cummings and Phil Frazier, and had a quick chat with them. The games in EA's booth that I could see from afar included Madden NFL 10, NCAA Football 10, Fight Night Round 4, Tiger Woods and so on.
On another note, I was going to do podcasts while here, however, Bryan's (PastaPadre) Internet is not holding up very well at his hotel, so that will not be an option. Instead, we'll just do one big Waiver Wire podcast post-E3, and post that on iTunes and OS at the start of next week.
You probably won't here from me much tomorrow since I'll be on the show floor from 12 p.m. until probably 5-6 p.m. PST, but my previews, impressions, and so on will start to show up on the site tomorrow night.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Sunday, May 31, 2009
With that being said, starting tomorrow at 2 p.m. PST (5 p.m. EST) there will be an EA Press Conference, and of course I'll be there to live blog it. At this press conference, there is expected to be a Madden online announcement -- and I'm assuming it is in some way separate from the already mentioned online franchise mode and co-op mode. You will be able to follow the happenings at the EA press conference right on our front page via this CoverItLive window:
Beyond Monday's press conference, on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday OS will be providing you all with info from the show floor. Plus, in addition to the original list of expected games I posted in my earlier blog entry, we have found out that the football title Backbreaker will also be at the show.
So be back tomorrow at 2 p.m. PST for the start of this crazy week of gaming news.
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