Adam Thompson (NCAA Designer) Q&A Thread

[Adam_Thompson_EA]

Quote: Originally Posted by adembroski

*worried* Designers being assigned to this website, that website... I think the thing that really helped was the free-form, very NOT corporate way Ian and Phil approached the community. I hope the whole "you go to this website, you go to that website, open one Q&A thread" thing wasn't an order from above but something you guys decided to do for the sake of getting wider coverage.

Well, we certianly want to get a wide range of coverage. Four of us volunteered to do this and we don't want to leave out message boards. Since Operation Sports was my personal favorite, I decided to post here. Greg just randomly picked NCAA Strategies. I've made a couple posts there, too.

I plan on hitting up more message boards. The reason I have been exlusively on OS since I started is because of the number of questions I'm getting. You guys are keeping me too busy to go somewhere else!

[Adam_Thompson_EA]

Quote: Originally Posted by Pokes404

Hey, Adam, I wanted to let you know that the logo on Oklahoma State's helmet is incorrect. There is no black field behind the logo. Here is a link to a picture. http://static.zoovy.com/img/helmethead2/H237-/oklahoma_state_ny.jpg I realize it is too late to be fixed now, but I'm sure I can live with it this year. I don't want to sound unappreciative though, you did a lot of work for Oklahoma State. All the uniforms look perfect. The new stadium is nearly 100% accurate, which is very impressive considering it's not complete yet. Very nice job.

No, I am upset that this is wrong.

In the past, I used to go over every uniform with a fine tooth comb. I didn't have time to do that working on commentary so we turned over the job to our testers. They do a great job finding bugs, but finding uniform mistakes is not their strong spot. I am going to address this somehow so there aren't so many uniform mistakes next year.

When the game comes out, I'll open a thread and all the mistakes you guys find I will mark down to be fixed. One good thing is we won't be getting new player models for the first time on Next Gen. This is the third version of the player in three years, and we are finally happy with it. In 08, the uniforms had to be completely redone (obviously they had to be done in 2007 for the first time). It wasn't as bad last year, but they did redo a lot of uniforms. We saved enough time to get in 50 alts. But things that were correct in 08 got redone incorrectly.

[dbrandon]

Sorry I guess I am old school a manual is much better then trying to remember everything the guy says. So I have to keep going back and watching again and again. I think you know what I am talking about.

I am also curious about how little the sliders seem to affect the gameplay. Take penalties sliders and turn it up all the way, and you see little if no difference at all. Heck you have sliders in the game for penalties that are never called even once in a game. I would think that turning a slider up all the way would make a huge difference. EA sliders have little to no affect at all. Is this fixed? Also if they had a numerical value to them then we could post sliders that we found to our liking that is if they get them working in the first place. I think madden had a few roster updates last year far to few and the fact that you can't use updated rosters online is a real bummer.

Sorry if this sounds angry. I am thankful for you time and input. Just frustrated with things that go on year after year.

Thanks

[Pokes404]

Don't worry about it. I realize what a massive undertaking it must be to put out a game like this. You got much more right than you got wrong.

And by the way, thanks for doing this. Answering 250 questions a day can't be much fun. So, thanks again.

[adembroski]

I miss the historic teams with the leather helmets and half-sleeve sweater uniforms and grainy 50s style photography... has this ever been discussed for next gen?

[ODogg]

Quote: Originally Posted by Pokes404

Don't worry about it. I realize what a massive undertaking it must be to put out a game like this. You got much more right than you got wrong. And by the way, thanks for doing this. Answering 250 questions a day can't be much fun. So, thanks again.

Maybe it is fun since he might be getting insight into issues he hasn't thought about before. Just a thought.

[Adam_Thompson_EA]

Quote: Originally Posted by CRKnight13

Thanks for the quick replies, Adam. I'm sure I speak for everyone in saying how great it is to have direct communication with people directly involved in bring us the game. I hope that one day, the ability to win/lose trophies will be availlable again. it opens up a whole new dimension to online play. Have any new rivalry trophies been added to '09? How are is it decided which Rivalry trophies are to be included? It would be great that Rivalry games/history/trophies are the focus in the near future, as it a fascinating aspect of college football and is one of the things that sets it apart from the NFL.

I'm not sure if we have added any new trophies or not. I don't think we did. I DO know that Ben went in and updated all the rivalries. We haven't done much to change the rivalry database in years. This was one of the things we were able to port from current gen. Then every year when we submit screenshots to each school for approvals, we'd give them a list of rivals. They would have us add or remove them. But like with everything else, some schools give us more info than others. Our rivalry table was, quite frankly, out of date.

So Ben pulled all the data out of the database, hit up the internet, and did major overhauls to the rivalry database. He removed old rivalries that have fizzled out, and added new rivalries that we were missing. I also had Brad Nessler record new commentary with the rivalry names that we added (every named rivalry has commentary with the name). Ben also made sure that every team has an in-conference rivalry game. You get a big bonus in recruiting if you have a recruit visit during a conference game versus a rival. So teams like Texas that have 3 conference rivals would have a huge advantage over say my team, UCF, who only had one rival and they were out of conference.

Ben and I both decided that our new favorite rivalry is the Battle for the Bones where Memphis and UAB square off to see who wins a giant trophy modeled off a rack of ribs! http://media.www.dailyhelmsman.com/m...-2330210.shtml

I know we didn't model this trophy, that's why I don't think we added any trophies. Cause if we did, I promise this one would be in there!

[ucfbreath]

as far as the USF uniform goes, i dont know if Adam's hiding it for a reason, and if so I'm sorry for this post, but i found a screenshot that Steve took of Grothe in the depth chart and from what I can tell its the new jersey (part of it). has the UA logo on it and looks the same as the away jersey's they recently revealed.

http://www.operationsports.com/image...844-media.jpeg

also, Adam, i had a question a little bit back about online dynasty stuff that you've seemed to skip over. has it already been answered by you, did you miss it, or should i just drop it ?

[Adam_Thompson_EA]

Quote: Originally Posted by CRKnight13

Have any new rivalry trophies been added to '09? How are is it decided which Rivalry trophies are to be included?

Forgot to address this question.

I don't know how they were decided on, because I wasn't at Tiburon then. When we did trophies on 08, we found we could get the most trophies in if we took the models from current gen and redid the textures (the "skin" of the trophy, if you will). The art team that does our stadiums and did the Shrine also did the trophies, and we still wanted to get more authentic stadiums in the game, as well as other updates like Nebraska's endzone... I think I remember that being a big update for 08.

I'd love to add more rivalry trophies. If we go with a rivalry theme this is more likely to be done. I wouldn't count on it, at least while we still have generic stadiums out there.

[ODogg]

Adam - is there an achievement or any sort of way in the game to track what all teams you've used and/or what all teams you've gotten wins with? This was on the PS2 and it made me play the game a ton more, I loved it!