Bored as hell(We need multiplayer FOF dammit)

[dread]

This would definately alleviate any AI issues and satisfy the fan base that IM sure 95% would love this capability. I know Im about to get flamed because Jim has commented that he did not want to go this direction.

[Blackadar]

No flaming. A lot of us want it.

[daedalus]

I think you'll find that, in spite of this place having originated as an FOF fan site, questioning or being critical of FOF isn't necessarily a flame inducer. It's just something we do. :)

And, as Blackie said, lots of us want it.

I say we make sabotai finish his game. Soon. :)

[Anrhydeddu]

But more of the customers who bought FOF4 wants NFL Europe.

[sabotai]

"I say we make sabotai finish his game. Soon."

I'm TRYING. :)

[Anrhydeddu]

From primelord

I don't know what to tell you Anr. I think many people on this board have unrealstic expectations of Jim. Have you had many long dialogues with Sid Meier in the past? When is the last time an EA developer took the time to respond to your e-mail personally?
I know by saying that someone is going to point out that Marc Vaughn is so great at interacting with his fan base. And I think what he does is awesome. But the fact is Jim isn't Marc Vaughn. Or Markus or Arlie etc etc. He handles these situations in what he thinks is the best way. Right or wrong this is what he has decided is the best way to run his business. I don't know what else I can tell you. Clearly he is listening to the community as many changes that have been requested over the years are in FOF4. Clearly not everything people have asked for is in there, but think about the massive difference between FOF1 and FOF4.

I believe Jim has said in the past he doesn't like to say if a feature will be included in a future release because a) there may not be a future release and b) he doesn't want to promise something and then have to cut it later. So that could explain some of the percieved indifference in his e-mails. Or it just may be he doesn't agree that option would benefit the game. I have made plenty of suggestions to him that were not implemented.

The thing I think gets lost sometimes is that just because a lot of noise is being made about something on the board doesn't mean it is important to the majority of his customers. 10 or 12 people can get a thread going that is 80 posts long and it looks like the whole world is backing a certain idea when in reality it is a very small portion of his customer base.

I have seen very little mention of it on this board, but Jim has told me the #1 feature request he has received is to implement NFL Europe. That is #1 over every other issue and he said pretty overwhelmingly #1. Personally I have 0 interest in Jim spending time coding NFL Eurpoe into the game. There are other areas that are more important to me and I think would be a better use of his time to improve the game. Anr there are several issues taht are more improtant to you etc etc. Jim takes all this in and then decides what would be best across the board and what he feels would improve the game.

[Kodos]

We also need monkeyplayer.

[mckerney]

Non webbased multiplayer FOF...

we do need this indeed

[Darkiller]

I think implementing an "NFL Europe" thing would be just awesome for one simple reason :

help groom/grow your late round projects faster than if they had to ride the inactive bench for 3-4 years.

By "implementing NFL Europe" I am by no means thinkingd t about a new league being set up but more of a message/email saying to the GM something like :
"it is time for your franchise to allocate 2 to 6 players for the NFL Europe league"

That kind of message would appear between free-agency and the Draft and would make you send those allocated players overseas for a chance at gaining playing time and valuable starting/gaming experience.
Basically, before Training camp, you would then receive another email saying something like :

"Player XXX did very well with the Barcelona Dragons and gained valuable experience"
"Player YYY was injured with the Rhein Fire and might not be ready for training camp"
"Player ZZZ was a disapointment with the Frankfurt Galaxy and did not play much"

So all in all, afterwards, you switch back to your Roster screen and you see an evolution in the allocated player's ratings.
A player who has gained "valuable experience" will see his ratings improve a certain number of points while another could have his be just about the same or even decrease if he's a big failure.
an injured player would carry his injury to the NFL roster and that would affect his ratings from then.

[EagleFan]

NFL Europe is fine, but give me multi-team control options and HTML reports. I'm not even talking about entire internet FTP importing or anything. Just allow control of more than one team. Not a very hard thing to impliment. Add a flag to each team, if flag = CPU then run CPU processing whenever that gets done, if not, don't. That same thing can be added to the scouting system, since that seems to be some major concern around multi-player from him, relatively easy changes. I know there's al ittle mroe than that, but it should already be code that is modular enough to be able to impliment easily enough, I would assume.

Of course, if the .400 Software Studios football game has a good sim engine and is bug free, or relatively, at it's release than maybe I would rather Jim stick to single player. That way we'll have a good version of both types of games.

[Buddy Grant]

I was one of the people that overwhelmingly chose "FOF5:NFL Europe", but the only other options on the poll were "TCY2: The student-staff Intramural Leagues", "FOF3005: Robot Football", "TCY2: Quit the team and concentrate on grades", and "FOC1: Front Office Curling". Seriously, I think the multiplayer game thing is just a fad, plus who wants to have to buy joysticks just to play a sports text sim.:rolleyes:

[Fritz]

Originally posted by Darkiller
I think implementing an "NFL Europe" thing would be just awesome for one simple reason :

I am from France

[andy m]

NFL where?

[mckerney]

Speaking of:

From VikingUpdate
History is a funny thing. When it happens, it isn't history. It's only later that it is viewed in its proper context.

So it was on Sept. 11, 2001. When terrorists commandeered planes out of Boston and attacked New York and Washington D.C., America learned it was vulnerable to the same terrorist activities that have plagued many other countries throughout the world.

Whether it was timing -- the attacks happened early on a Tuesday morning (hours after the completion of NFL Week One -- or recognition of past mistakes, the NFL suddenly appeared on the terrorist radar screen.

A very public debate ensued following the Sept. 11 attacks whether the games of Sept. 16 should be played. The NFL's old guard still carried the scars of not postponing games of Nov. 24, 1963 -- two days after the assassination of President Kennedy. Many believed that keeping America's newest pastime going was important following Sept. 11. But, with the Jets being asked to fly across country to Oakland, as well as the Patriots asked to fly (the terrorist planes took off from Logan Airport in Boston), it was clear that the NFL would face a forfeit (at least in the case of the Jets-Raiders game) if the league wasn't shut down for a week.

If you're wondering where this is leading, look no further. VU has been told that the NFL, its players and their agents as well as the U.S. government is contemplating whether to play NFL Europe this spring. While the United States has beefed up its internal security, it has only an advisory role with European countries that host NFL Europe.

The league realized when it stopped the 2001 season after one week that its impact would be felt. If the terrorist community didn't realize the impact on America that the NFL has, it surely became obvious following the attacks. Public debate among media types -- VU reversed its initial reaction to play the games (so as not to let the terrorists "win") to err on the side of caution until the country was better prepared to handle the threat. NFL Europe may be facing a similar crisis.

Whereas World War II opponents of the U.S. had hoped that shutting down Major League Baseball would be a moral victory, the so-called Axis of Evil learned (perhaps inadvertently) how much the NFL represents the common man in American society. A terrorist attack on the NFL would be comparable to an attack on all Americans.

VU has been told that league officials are discussing the possibility of moving the NFL Europe games to places within the U.S. -- Florida has been one area mentioned -- so as to protect players and fans from potential attack. While some may view this as a "sky is falling" mindset, several allocated players have expressed concerns for their own safety and the league may be forced to take drastic measures -- especially with a war with Iraq looming on the horizon and Al Queda still operational.

By the time the rest of the national media hooks on to this story, a decision will have been made one way or the other -- go or no go on NFL Europe 2003. But, VU continues to be told that nothing is set in stone and that, if threats to the U.S. continue, the season may be scrapped or moved to within the U.S. borders until the heat dies down.

[Anrhydeddu]

I brought up NFL Europe again to show 1) that we may be the most vocal customers but not necessarily the majority and 2) assuming that one cannot do both adequately, how does a developer decide between a very popular request (NFL Europe) and a high profile feature (multiplayer)?

I can see NFL Europe as a "minor leagues" to the current NFL universe, if it is implemented as such. On the other hand, multiplayer (or at least being able to have more than one human-owned team) offers an exciting and new dimension. But it does come down to what Jim is comfortable coding and supporting.

[Darkiller]

Originally posted by Fritz


;) :D

[QuikSand]

I've given this thread a bit of thought... it presents a bit of a conundrum. (I missed the bit about NFL Europe whenever it was posted before)

Initially, my instinct is to think "Jim, no matter how many dopes ask for NFL Europe, you have to be the judge about what's important... you have to be able to see through that and to know that this is not really the right direction for your game. It's simply not a top priority, and you'd be better off focusing on other additions or improvements."

Trouble is... I then realize that I could follow that exact reasoning by substituting in the word "multiplayer" for "NFL Europe" and the logic follows just the same way.

[wade moore]

I know maybe this seems weird, but a huge part of me does not believe that NFL Europe is the most desired new feture.. Jim may have th emost requests for it, but I just cannot see how more people would want NFL Europe than multiplayer.. It gets no ratings, etc, etc... it baffles me..

[Darkiller]

As I mentionned above, the way I see this feature is not for the "sake of NFL Europe" but for a newer chance at improving a bunch of subpar players : some late round picks or even UFA that I'd like to give a better inside look at.

I really believe that would be a tremendous thing to do.

[wade moore]

All fine and good dark, but it still seems that the overall consensus would be that there would be MORE improvement from human competition than a little development of your 3rd stringers..

[Darkiller]

I agree with this !
and if I have the choice I would indeed vote for Multiplayer first BUT since Jim hints that there will be no multiplayer in his games ever...than once must push for a single player feature like "NFL Europe" in a future version of FOF...

[wade moore]

And I wonder if that's the crux of it being the "most requested feature"... everyone thinks Jim WON'T do multiplayer, so they don't bother asking..

[HornedFrog Purple]

So start a email campaign regarding multiplayer since there seems to be a fair number of people who want it and see what he says. That is the kind of thing he encourages.

The thing I have difficulty understanding why people are so disenchanted with emailing Jim directly. Anytime I have, he has responded quickly and politely. I admit it is not as conventional as some companies but it is an outlet that people for some reason don't take advantage of.

[JHandley]

Originally posted by EagleFan
NFL Europe is fine, but give me multi-team control options and HTML reports. I'm not even talking about entire internet FTP importing or anything. Just allow control of more than one team. Not a very hard thing to impliment. Add a flag to each team, if flag = CPU then run CPU processing whenever that gets done, if not, don't. That same thing can be added to the scouting system, since that seems to be some major concern around multi-player from him, relatively easy changes. I know there's al ittle mroe than that, but it should already be code that is modular enough to be able to impliment easily enough, I would assume.

Of course, if the .400 Software Studios football game has a good sim engine and is bug free, or relatively, at it's release than maybe I would rather Jim stick to single player. That way we'll have a good version of both types of games.

I think I must be misunderstanding something in regards to implementing multi-player. TDCB still doesn't have multi-player released, 2 months after the intial release. 2 months after they said they were going to release multi-player and for 2 months, the solo played suffered drastically due to trying to get multi-player inplemented.

Took that long to implement multi-player on a game that was designed from the start to include multi-player. Knowing that, how can it be concluded that adding multi-player to a game that was NEVER intended for multi-player play should be a simple conversion?

[Ben E Lou]

dread gets his wish.

[Easy Mac]

Skydog shows he has nothing to do after church on a Sunday :p

[Celeval]

But is NFL Europe in??? :-D

[Buccaneer]

FYI, Jim brought up NFL Europe again in an email to me last week. Nothing planned or imminent but it's still there.

why did you have to bump a thread with ornerydoodoo in it?

[Easy Mac]

Originally posted by Buccaneer
FYI, Jim brought up NFL Europe again in an email to me last week. Nothing planned or imminent but it's still there.

why did you have to bump a thread with ornerydoodoo in it?

because ornerydoodoo is more fun to say than fuckanear

[Ben E Lou]

Originally posted by Easy Mac
Skydog shows he has nothing to do after church on a Sunday :p Actually I was doing a search for something else, and ran across this thread title. Had to bump it.

[Eaglesfan27]

I'm really bored right now, and I wish this game was out right now ;) I keep checking the site, hoping it will somehow be out already.

[Easy Mac]

Originally posted by SkyDog
Actually I was doing a search for something else, and ran across this thread title. Had to bump it.

I told you skydog, porn is easier to find on google than FOFC.

[Franklinnoble]

Originally posted by Buccaneer

why did you have to bump a thread with ornerydoodoo in it?

Hey, don't let one night of drunken intimacy ruin our little term of endearment.

[Killebrew]

Originally posted by Buddy Grant
I was one of the people that overwhelmingly chose "FOF5:NFL Europe", but the only other options on the poll were "TCY2: The student-staff Intramural Leagues", "FOF3005: Robot Football", "TCY2: Quit the team and concentrate on grades", and "FOC1: Front Office Curling". Seriously, I think the multiplayer game thing is just a fad, plus who wants to have to buy joysticks just to play a sports text sim.:rolleyes:
I also overwhelmingly chose "FOF5:NFL Europe" in that poll, and then I created a buncha' aliases and logged onto FOFC to vote for "FOF5:NFL Europe" again and again and again.