The producers of Tiburon Football titles a deeper look

[Russell_SCEA]

First I would like to thank EA, Tiburon, Will Kinsler, Ian Cummings, Sean Bailey, Anthony White, Donny Moore, Josh Looman, Phil Frazier, Ryan Ferwerda, and all parties involved for their hospitality and taking time out of their busy schedules to speak with us.

The producers of Tiburon Football titles a deeper look and where do we go from here?

(I originally planned on posting this article after I posted my impressions on NCAA, Head Coach, and Madden. However because Phil and Ian have started posting on some of the forums a lot lately I thought it would make more sense for this article to see the light of day first.)

Last year I took it upon myself to shed more light on Madden's producers with an article focused on them more so than the games they make. The article was well received by most, but many people thought it was just more EA spin to quote one poster. Well its Madden 09 time and I would like to revisit that situation now and see where we stand and hold all parties accountable for what they told us.

The passage below is focused on my time spent talking to Ian Cummings last year who now has become famous for posting on multiple fan site forums. Below are exerts from Ian's passage from my original article last year.

NOTE: These are not the full passages from that article, but included is the link to the full version. (Just in case anyone thinks I made any of this up or that I changed their reply's.) For the sake of article length I cut them down a bit.
The Producers of Madden a deeper look a sneak peak at Madden 09! - Pastapadre

Quote:

Game is looking and playing nice Ian, but you know I have some questions. He was like I"m all ears so I started dropping the bombs and was very surprised at the answers I was getting. Formation specific depth charts? 09 Smart routes and smart zones? 09 The radio announcer you know everyone hates him are we going to see him again in 09? No Are there any plans for a revamp in the area of presentation? Yup I continued to ask Ian a lot of questions like the ones above and all the answers I got where very informative, and detailed. So I grabbed a chair sat down and we really got down and dirty about Madden 08 and ideas for Madden 09. Our discussion lasted for about an hour or so during that time we covered plenty of topics. Online leagues/franchises, new ratings for the QB position, what really went down with Madden 06, VJ Leblanc even stopped by and we talked about the new blocking engine and the 3-4 defense. There was a ton of information exchanged during our extended conversation so I will break it down into bullet points and go from there. (I think it will be easier that way) -The QB position- I asked Ian if there where any plans to expand on the ratings for the QB position since every other position has been giving new ratings and A.I. rewrites in the last two years. He replied first that they did tune the QB position in 08, (and it shows) then he stated that more ratings for the QB position are in the books for 09. You remember the ratings from Head Coach. Throw accuracy short, medium, and deep, throw on the run etc…. Ian is trying to get all of those ratings in the game and then some. I was very happy to hear this indeed. If you read any of Ian's producer blogs you will remember that he would ask us what we thought about particular issues. He did the same thing with me he actually took notes on what we talked about. Contrary to popular belief the producers do care about what the hardcore community wants. Of course we can't get everything in the game. Although if we are organized and can come to a general consensus on what features are most important to us year in and year out. They will attempt to get those features in the game. Honestly I brought up a ton of stuff to Ian about possible features and fixes to Madden not many of the ideas where new to him. Case in point smart routes, smart zones, formation specific depth charts, slide protection. If it could have been in 08 trust me it would have been in there, but due to time constraints it was not possible. (Some of that stuff is already in the very, very early builds of 09) (Also they just don't want to port everything over some things they want to revamp and give a fresh coat of paint with that next gen feel) -Online Leagues & Online Franchises- I asked Ian what where some of the biggest issues and areas of interest for Madden 09. The first thing out of his mouth was online and presentation. Due to the natural progression of the game we should expect a major jumps in those two areas for next years game. We spoke quite a bit about online and I tried to convey the fact of how important it is to have a dedicated web site. Full stat tracking, online sliders, etc........ One thing that we might not see for a while is spectator mode. Apparently that feature is a real b&tch to program so don't expect it anytime soon. Ian asked me which one did I thought was more important I replied leagues. They have to be fully featured and work right there really is no point to have an online franchise if its buggy as hell. We continued talk about online and how important it is to have a large feature set. (But they are going to look at doing online franchises first because if you can do a franchise online then you can most definitely do a league. D.Ortiz brought up this point later on in the day) -New Blocking Engine- We eventually got around to the new blocking engine and I expressed my overall appreciation on how well the blocking was done this year and concerns about the 3-4 defense and the lack of true NT in Madden. (You can in fact run a successful 3-4 scheme in the game this year, but I still think it needs some work.) NT in the game like J.Williams, V.Wilfork, and C.Hampton should command double teams on almost every down. (They do in real life) Only a couple of ELITE centers in the game can handle those guys one on one. If at the very least highly rated NT in the game should control their gap and dominate at the point of attack. Allowing LB's around them to make plays About that time VJ Leblanc (next gen blocking producer) walked into the room how ironic is that. So he immediately joined in on the conversation. He stated that that the new blocking engine is only the beginning and assured me it will continue to expand on the new blocking engine that was introduced in Madden 08. VJ broke it down on how he totally rewrote the blocking logic in Madden this year you will actually see LT kick out in protection and things of that nature. I did my best to act as a voice representing the hard core community and I was very elated to see that nothing that I brought up caught him off guard. If anything his replies and willingness to listen caught me off guard. I know some of us think that if we ever got the chance to talk face to face with the producers on Madden that we would teach them a thing or two about football. (While I don't share that sentiment) I came away with way more knowledge and understanding of video game football than when I walked into the room with. If anyone learned anything during that conversation it was me. I.Cummings was very informative and he answered all of my questions. Some thing that was a little surprising was for every question I had for him he had two of them for me. Good things don't last for ever so he eventually had to leave and he went back up to the 6th floor and started working on 09 stuff. (With a pad full of notes that he had been taking during our conversation if that doesn't let you know they care I don't know what does.) It was a great exchange of ideas, comments, and concerns I was very impressed by Ian's knowledge of football, willingness to listen, and his commitment to making Madden the most Sim can it can be year in and year out.

Ian Cummings

Well where do we stand from what he told us last year and what the team was able to deliver on for 09? Formation specific depth charts check, smart routes check, slide protection check, radio announcer gone check, expanding the player ratings.

The QB position did not however get those new ratings this year. So naturally I asked him what's up. He replied it doesn't make sense for us to add any ratings to the QB or any other position for that matter if the ones we have now aren't working correctly. (But THA and THP was tweaked extensively for this year)

The team didn't feel like the 50 or so ratings they had where tweaked enough, so for 09 that was the focus on player ratings. He and Sean came clean and admitted that many of the new ratings that where added the past two years either didn't work at all or the proper amount of time wasn't spent making sure they all made a difference in game play. Making sure that press coverage rating really meant something in game in real time. Making sure the hit power rating really increased your chances of causing a fumble etc... How player ratings effect game play this year is a subject you probably won't read to much about this year from mainstream media sites.

I can guarantee you its a monumental steep in the right direction from last year and 07. As everyone already knows by know OL/DL interaction did not receive a ton of attention this year. In addition the current system doesn't have constant double team blocks/gap control for NT in the 3-4 defense. Naturally I inquired about this and the conversation went down a different road and we started talking about Madden 2010.

Notes Ian took from talking to everyone

I asked Ian what his top five concerns or areas of focus were for game play next year moving forward and one of them was OL/DL interaction. In next years game we should expect major jumps in that area just like we saw in other core areas of game play this year. The same goes for their gang tackling system the team would like to have true 3,4, and possible 5 man true gang tackles and dynamic pile ups.

Spectator mode also was anothe topic he touched on last year and he replied its an enormous endeavor. I revisited this possible feature with him again, however this time I was able to obtain more information on the subject. Ian asked "What are you looking for exactly?" I replied most people would like the ability to watch the playoff games and the Super Bowl in their leagues.

This feature would also allow players to scout opponents in their league games. He replied we probably won't see real time spectator mode. Although its entirely possible that in the future all games played in a league could be recorded and played back at a later date. Its not real time spectator mode but its better than nothing none the less.

I conversed with Ian some more, but I don't see any need to post what we talked about by now know everyone should have a really good idea on what type of game producer, person, and NFL fan he is.



Next up Playbooks guru Anthony White below is what he told us last year.

Quote:

I know the majority of you are like who in the hell is A.White well you can call him Mr. Automation, M.Wildcat or a genius. This is the main man behind the play books and getting those crazy formations like the wildcat, emory and henry, and Nevada Pistol in the game. If you noticed the play books in Madden are getting more and more like their real life counter parts. In Madden 09 expect to see a major jump in how robust the play books are because he is strictly working on Madden Next Gen from now on. The first thing we talked about was R.Ryan and the Ravens defensive scheme. I was not ready for the bombs he was about to drop (If your a raven fan your going to love this) I first expressed my concern over the ravens play book and lack of formations and blitz packages that they use. He was like yeah I got some real big plans for the ravens play book next year I"m hoping to get a defensive play book for every team in the NFL eventually. He then told me that R.Ryan had just left the studio a couple of months ago thanks the the NFL license EA can have coach's come and give feed back on the play books and even show Anthony some new plays even before you see them in real life. Him and Rex talked a ton about A.Thomas and mostly how the scheme works. He is even working on a system that would allow the Ravens to move around pre-snap without any manual user control. Can you say auto motion in the Ravens defensive play book. You won't just see it in the Ravens play book either the Broncos do a ton of shifting on defense as well. Anthony wants to make it so that J.Lynch comes down into the box on his own depending on the play. Another thing thats already in Madden 08, but will be a big play book focus moving ahead in the future is to have truly unique play books with their own verbiage as well. Instead of every play book having a single back formation and it being called that he is working on having the true verbiage that the team uses for that package. For instance if you look into the Colts play book this year you will see the single back double TE formation. But P.Manning, and T.Moore calls it DEUCE in their offense and that's what its called in Madden 08. Its the Colts version of that package and it has Colts only plays in it as well like PA 218 Marvin and Double China. The Colts also have DICE and DICE slot formations in the game. If you look around in some of the other play books you will see team specific formations and packages like PANTHER TRIPS. Remember J.Fox would put J.Peepers at WR from time to time last year well its in there. Just keep hitting X until you see DE wide out. This is only the beginning if he can get approved for it (I will explain in my next article) expect to see a lot more of this. I had a blast talking to Anthony and his plans for future play book additions. (Talking to Anthony was like that first time you went online in Madden you thought you where the sh%t then you lost 46-7 and you realized you aren't the best player in the world I thought I knew a little bit about NFL schemes and play books turns out I don't know sh*t lol)He went back up stairs to continue working on the play books for 09. But before we left he came back down with this stack of DVD's in his hand around 30 or so. It was all the game tapes form last years season. The NFL sends out these DVD's to all 32's teams. Its not the broadcast view though, if you have ever watched a lot of ESPN inside training camp. You have seen that overhead sky view all of the videos are taken from that view point. The NFL sends A.White all of them. He also had this folder which contained drawing diagrams of plays that the Bengals ran last year. (He drew the diagrams himself after watching the game film) now he also gets the information on how many times the Bengals ran this formation last year and what plays that they ran out of it. Then this information is compiled and put into the game. So that when you are playing against the Bengals the cpu play calling will resemble what M.Lewis called last year on a week to week basis. If the I formation is ran 30% of the time on first down well in Madden its going to be run 30% of the time on first down. Anthony's football IQ was literally through the roof I had a blast talking to him at in Orlando. He has one of the most tedious jobs at EA working on Madden. So what can you guys expect to see in the future possibly from a play book stand point. Truly unique team defensive play books for every team in the league, difference cadences and verbiage for different teams out of the same formation, auto motion on defense , and more package options in the play call screen. I have no idea how much stuff Anthony will be give the go ahead for to put into 09. Politics comes into play with every single dollar that is spent on developing Madden. If this is the type of stuff you like to hear and see in the game then let us know and we can rely the message to the producers. Who then can turn around and present these issues with the black suit and tie guys.

Anthony White

First off I would like to clarify that Anthony worked on the playbooks for all Tiburon football titles this year. Well where do we stand from what he told us last year and what was he able to deliver on. Team specific defensive playbooks check, defensive auto motion formation shifts big check, and more package options on the play call screen check.

This year Anthony did receive a larger memory allotment to use on the playbooks this year for Madden and NCAA. NCAA and Madden 09 both have over 800 new plays and over 45 new formations to boot. Both games playbooks are approximately 30% larger than last years.

Rhombic, CDJ, and myself conveyed just how impressed we all where with the playbooks in NCAA this year. Sadly the builds we had of Madden did not include the final versions of all the teams playbooks. Anthony did make it very clear they are bigger than the ones in NCAA.

In my article from last year I talked about the folder Anthony showed me with the drawing diagrams form the Bengal's playbooks. This year I took pictures, the photos below contain play diagrams form the 49ers playbook. As I stated last year Anthony watches Coach's camera game film and draws the plays from those videos.

That stack of plays was about 45 pages deep and I believe Anthony stated 40% of those plays are in Madden 09 right now. The 49ers, Saints, and Patriots playbooks are just nasty this year. All of the teams offensive concepts are represented well in their respective books the Patriots have around 14 Shotgun formations for example. While the 49ers playbook is stacked with auto motion concept running and play actions.

We also talked extensively about the Ravens defensive playbook and the pre snap movements since it was the topic of our conversation last year. Watch these two videos I made on defensive pre snap movements or auto motion on defense, also I'm not manually moving the players around.
Ravens Auto Motion on Defense (ALPHA BUILD WORK IN PROGRESS) on Vimeo
Vimeo

This year you will see pre-snap movements from all the teams in the game some more than others. I enjoyed my conversation with Anthony and I'm really looking forward to seeing the finished playbooks in Madden this year. I was extremely impressed with what I saw from the 49ers and Saints playbooks on Friday. (They where the only playbooks in this build that where almost 100%)

Sean Bailey

The new kid on the block (I mean that as a figure of speech Sean has been with Tiburon for years) is Sean Bailey. Game play lead for Madden and NCAA. For a little background info on Sean he started out in the testing department with Ian years ago, he also wrote some of the commentary in NCAA a few years ago. Sean is extremely hardcore when it comes to game play just like Ian and I hope at some point he can start posting abroad as well.

After I spoke with Sean and played the games for myself. I can say with extreme confidence that Madden 09 has the most responsive user control out of the franchise, current gen can't touch what they did this year.

Also their new branching system is crazy when you are tackled don't put down the controller, because you can break out of the tackle animation (potentially). Its calculated in real time based solely on player ratings for example W.Mcgahee has one of the best stiff arms in the league. So you should try and stiff arm out of tackle animations with him, while an elusive back in the mold of B.Westbrook it would be smarter attempt a juke or spin move out of the tackle. Wether or not you are successful depends upon the ratings of the move you are using at that time, to counter act this on the defensive side of you ball you can attempt strips mid tackle. It's risky though I whiffed on many tackles trying to strip guys to much.

We then conversed about player ratings for a while something I talked to Ian about as well. He basically stated they added all those ratings the past two years and frankly they didn't take the time to tune them. It became a priority to rectify this issue for 09 and I like what I'm seeing so far.

At some point in that day Rhombic, CDJ, and myself had a chance to talk to Sean about the three big issues with NCAA. First up the excessive QB drop backs. Here's the deal NCAA is done they can't make any changes right now. However there could be a band aide fix in the form of a patch. This patch would make the WR icons disappear once you dropped back more than 12 or 15 yards. We also threw around the idea of not allowing you to throw bullet passes once you reach the 12 yard drop back as well. Hopefully there will be a patch for NCAA to fix this issue and the other two issues the game has.

Madden on the other hand isn't locked down yet and once we found that yellow coverage zones don't work they way the should they where able to fix those issues before we left the studio.

As I did with all the producers I asked Sean about Madden 2010 he quickly answered OL/DL play and interaction is at the top of my list. (Which is exactly the same line I heard from Ian.)

I was able to speak with Sean for a decent amount of time on both days. Dude is crazy hardcore when it comes to game play and he was more than willing to fix any issues we found with the game. There has also been a change to some user control features on the higher difficulty levels this year. First off on All Madden and All Pro difficulty you can NOT manually trigger spectacular catch animations. In addition we no longer have the ability to strafe when trying to catch passes. Which is just music to my ears. (It really bugged him that they couldn't fix the issues concerning NCAA before the games release.)

Sean left the same impression on me that Ian had left last year. After talking to him I had the utmost confidence in him and his ability to help make Madden a better game year in and year out. In my opinion the series is still in very good hands.

Josh Looman

Donny Moore

Next up Josh Looman (Senior Designer) and Donny Moore (Designer) for NFL Head Coach 2. Josh and Donny gave a great presentation on Head Coach during the second half of our first day at Tiburon. You can see the video here
http://www.maddenwars.com/index.php?...=109&Itemid=98

Head Coach originally was not a game I had a ton of interest in, my stance on the game changed over the course of the evening. For Head Coach 2 I want to talk about how the community will directly make or break this title and if it becomes a franchise. Potentially we could see an NCAA Head Coach game in the next couple of years, but the success or failure of this title will dictate what happens moving forward.

During my time talking to Josh and Donny they constantly reiterated how important the community is for this title and how many of the games features were taken directly from wish lists around the net. Josh is looking forward to feedback on Head Coach from the community after the game has shipped. He is extremely exited about the idea of posting on different forums and engaging in direct communication with the fan base to help take the series to the next level.

I spoke with Josh about online franchise for Head Coach and having the ability to see the game play out as it does in single player online in the future. He was all for both ideas and they have already talked about it.

Phil Frazier

Last and certainly not least I spoke with Phil Frazier for a while late Friday night. He has been very visible this year on the EA Sports and MM forums. So everyone should be acquainted with who he is by now. Phil talked about continuing to strengthen the relationship between the fans and developers moving forward after these games are released.

Phil had a great sense of humor. While Madsci was making a video about leagues Phil would pop in and out of the camera from time to time making faces. He even provided us with two alpha 24 builds late Friday night. They where the most recent builds of the game anyone had. The video of me and Shopmaster playing Ravens vs. Chargers is using that build.



Final thoughts
When I left Tiburon last year my lasting impressions had to do with accountability and community. I felt this way because they wanted us to hold them accountable for these games. (That's the reason I did that article in the first place.) As you can read about 90% of the content they promised us from last year is in this game. In the past people have been quick to judge and bash Tiburon.

Even now as Ian and Phil are posting out in the open some people are still very skeptical and that's reasonable. I'm a firm believer in giving credit where credit is due especially since Madden and NCAA has taken quite a bit of heat since its next gen inception some of it rightfully so.

Every year these games should be substantially better than the year before that's a given. However the leap this year in both titles are enormous in comparison to 07 and 08. (Both games do have issues though)

I feel that moving forward we can only continue to make progress in the relationship between the producers of content and the consumers of content. Before long we will have that ultimate football gaming experience that everyone can enjoy.

[LBzrule]

Videos not working

[Russell_SCEA]

Aight everything should be working now

[adembroski]

O.O




Egon + Xzibit r 2 pimp mah futbawl gaim nao?!?!


EDIT: How is MadSci now anyways? Tell him we miss him on MM.

[Rainey]

Very nice article Russell. Gotta love the behind the scenes look.

[a4reak]

Great write up, I remember reading your stuff when you reported back looking ahead to 09. Im so glad that it seems like a change in regime has altered the mentalitiy of how this game is created. They seem to have goals that they attack head on and admit their flaws

[SteelerSpartan]

Great Article,

These guys are definitely gaining a lot of respect from me with what they are doing with the community. They've been very forth right and honest about their flaws/goals this time around....the "rouges" have done a lot already just here at OS, and hopefully tons more to come as we strive for that ultimate representation of what we see on Sundays in video game form


However there are still just criticisms of EA to be made, albeit in a fair manner in the right time and place. I don't encourage anyone to go looking for a flame filled fight with the "Rogues" here. especially not in a thread created to help us get what we want.



However I feel given the right thread, many should be able to ask and vent on questions like:
"Why has it taken/taking them so long to fix our complaints of oh so many years"

"What standard should we hold EA to with these games, considering how big they are"

"Shouldn't the EA upper echelon suits be pouring more funding into Ian's devoted team to help them out to achieve that standard"

"Can't we expect to go through this mess again when a new set of consoles emerges".

These are all debatable topics that I hope we can still have here in the future



But alas seeing as how I might be posting on something out of context of the thread ,(Feeling kind of theoretical right now) I'll reiterate that these guys are starting to get mucho respect from me for doing what they are doing. In fact they are even looking for criticism of their games(constructive of course).

I don't really think anyone can deny that they(Ian's Team) really want what we all want....which is taking Madden to that next level. And having read this, its only furthering my belief of that statement.

[Exonerated]

Very nice post Russell.

Happy with the direction Madden is heading in.

[Deltron]

Just to add on to one of your points about 3-4 DTs, the same logic should apply to 4-3 run cloggers like Pat Williams; they should demand double teams and control their gaps to free up the LB corps to make plays.

And another item which hasn't been mentioned enough is opening up the use of custom playbook for online matches. With all the focus on blowing out the playbooks, it would seem only right that I should be able to tinker with a custom playbook offline and put together my own schemes and systems for use against other players.

Then adding Head Coach's create-a-play to the online player's arsenal would be the icing on the cake.

[Rawdeal28]

great stuff russell. i read your article last year and i enjoyed it just like this one. excellent stuff man. i cant wait to play madden. im really loving that auto motion.

now im really scared to play against ravens!