Moostache's Community Day Impressions

[Moostache]

WARNING : THIS IS LONG....LIKE "WAR AND PEACE" LONG....

-------------------------------------------------------------
FedMoos (aka Moostache / Dan) Previews NCAA 2008fficeffice" />>>
> >
Where to begin? For obvious reasons (and some not-so obvious), I had an incredible time at this year’s Community Event. Of all the collected highlights though – winning the tourney and an Xbox 360 Elite, hanging out with the producers and community leaders for a few hours afterwards (and having a few beverages in the process), getting the little goodie-bag and an unexpected gift from Microsoft of a free year on XBL (hey, in my opinion they OWE me, but that is a lengthy story for another day), having my return ticket bumped to first class and sitting next to Juwan Howard on the flight into St. Louis – the single best part was being able to be at the actual event and participate and playing the game. Having that opportunity was an honor and a ton of fun to boot, so I hope to give people their money’s worth in writing this…>>
> >
What’s “NEW”?>>
> >
Well, in a nutshell, a whole hell of a lot is new to NCAA 2008 from NCAA 2007; and for the most part, I think these additions have been very positive. They have a definite impact on the part of the game that I care the most about – gameplay. Presentation and depth are important aspects – as are Dynasty Mode, Recruiting, Campus Legend and more – but in the end, only a game with strong gameplay will have me firing up my 360 (or PS3) well into 2008 to play it. Thankfully, it appears at the start that Nffice:smarttags" />CAA 2008 has a very good chance at being that type of game. (As an aside here – I still was playing NCAA 2007 as recently as the day I left for the Community Day – after playing 2008 though I find myself not really wanting to go back to 2007 any more; too many annoyances in 2007 have been addressed in 2008 to make playing 2007 seem like a good idea at this point!)>>
> >
It is also important to note that early-impressions are always done with limited time with the game; and definitely not with enough time to find exploits, repetitive animations, or really annoying online glitches that always pop-up with time. In fact, online features and online play issues are nearly impossible to address without having the demos online enabled! No game will ever be ‘perfect’ and NCAA 2008 is no exception to that rule; so remember while you read this, that we had a group of guys who mainly played the game straight-up (no intentionally stupid play, no ridiculous going for it on their own side of the field, etc.) and played the majority of the time on Heisman difficulty. These impressions are heavily influenced by those factors. If you are already pre-disposed to dislike either NCAA or EA games in general, there are still enough things here to keep you busy hating away; if you already enjoy the game (even if you ‘tolerate’ it) and are looking forward to the next one though, the improvements are many and the disappointments relatively few and somewhat minor.>>
> >
Let’s start looking at things I really liked:>>
> >
Start at the top of the list with COLLISION DETECTION. In-game (not so much BETWEEN PLAYS – which was very rough at times, with a whole lot of morphing/clipping – none of which affected the gameplay one iota mind you), I felt this was vastly improved. No more persistent animations means no more helpless defenders being in the path of the ball carrier only to have the ball carrier sail right THROUGH them. I rarely saw examples of defenders whiffing on the runner through a programming problem – if tackles were missed, it did not seem ‘cheap’ in very many cases and more often than not it was because the users had more control than ever before on next-gen systems. The near total lack of “Mario Running” (getting literally stuck to a pile of players and running in place with no way to break free) was a godsend. It felt great and really makes a big impact on the player feeling ‘in-control’ of the game. >>
> >
I know that others did see some of the annoying WR’s getting stuck on each other (or on a defender) in their routes, but it was drastically less than before and was not nearly as bad in duration or severity. I can remember many, many times playing games in 2007 and having WRs essentially take themselves out of the play and I did not personally notice this happen at all while playing 2008. I trust the opinions of those who DID see it though, so while that aspect is not completely ‘fixed’ is certainly addressed in a big way. Completely gone in my experience was the “phantom sack”, where a DE would be near your QB – say within a couple YARDS, never actually touch you, yet you would be sacked. Having that gone from the game certainly made me happy.>>
> >
The REDESIGNED BLOCKING LOGIC is also a thing of beauty to see. Pulling Guards and Tackles making to their assignments, FB’s actually sealing off a running lane? Effective double teams? Better interaction on pass blocking to form a pocket? These are things glaringly missing in previous titles but they are in 2008 – well the pass pocket still needs some work, but at least there were fewer head scratching moments when OL-men ignored a clear threat to the QB – but those do still happen occasionally.. They also DO move on to the next level and block downfield (on offensive plays and special teams plays). In general, the improved blocking combines very nicely with other features to enhance the game. That was something I noticed about this game versus previous versions – the pieces of the puzzle seem to work better together this year. In years past, new additions did not seem to mesh terribly well, leaving holes in the game that were ripe for exploits. I am NOT saying that 2008 will be exploit-free, but I am saying that a lot of effort was put into making the thing that are in the game intentionally work well together as intended.>>
> >
Also drastically revamped is PLAYER CONTROLS / RESPONSIVENESS. I was very skeptical when I read the IGN/Gamespot/TeamXBOX impressions and raves about player control; frankly because I do not think those guys ever really play the game very well or very much like a football game in their videos. I wanted to see it and feel it for myself to judge that aspect and I have to admit – THEY WERE ALL RIGHT! This game is tight. The controls were so good on the field that the massive button reconfiguration was not too difficult to adapt to. For anyone who played on the 360 last year, one of the biggest changes was the move of “jump the snap” from the “Y” (yellow, top) button and putting it on the LT (which used to control “Coach Cam” for viewing match-ups without play art) – this caused me quite a few offside penalties at first! Also new is the revamped hot routes (returned to the current-gen system) and the defensive back adjustments, which moved to the “Y” button from the “A” button. For current-gen guys moving over to next-gen this year, these changes will help make the game feel more natural, but equally important was the word from Ian Cummings that the user will have the ability to map the controls to any configuration they want! Don’t like the sprint button on RT? No problem! You can move it to whatever you want. I did not personally experiment with this, but since it came from the mouth of one of the lead producers, I trust that it will be a very welcome addition to many players.>>
> >
Back to the in-game controls, the user skills will once again be a big factor in determining the outcome of plays. User catching with the WRs and TEs is 10X better than in 2007. Also fixed (as advertised) is the elimination of sideline animations that carried a player directly out of bounds with the user having no chance to stop the outcome. The BRANCHING ANIMATIONS are very apparent here and they make the player really feel in control of their man again. Swing passes to a RB in the flats are a thing of beauty, as are the opportunities to make plays near the sidelines such a fumble recoveries and still be able to maneuver your player afterwards. Also significant, is that branching animations had a big role in eliminating Mario Running and the impact on the running game is dramatic. The ability to maneuver and pick a hole, especially for the running game inside the tackles has never felt better on any next-gen football game. You are also able to use this to avoid tacklers manually without needing a spin or juke or truck-stick to make it happen. This is hard to do to the CPU, but in head-to-head play you have sufficient control to make your opponent look silly by over-committing and running past you in ways that should bring a wide smile to many faces next month. >>
> >
Moving on to 60FPS DURING GAMEPLAY, this is something that comes as a bit of a double-edged sword at first glance. It looks ‘different’ to me, but not different in a bad way and it also takes a few snaps to get used to it. Kind of hard to describe, because the increased user-control and 60 fps make the game look smoother than ever before; but also seem slower, although in a way that I felt made the game feel more realistic too. I think this is due to the fact that I had simply adapted to the old-style 30fps with lousy reaction times and persistent animations and found myself at first over anticipating player moves that would happen in 2007, but do not happen in 2008 without user input. For example, one of my personal pet peeves over the years has been in the running game – there were simply too many times that the RB animations seemed too fast – your man would be out running his blockers even without a speed burst, and would often trigger the dreaded Mario running as a result. They no longer seem to do this in 2008, or if they do, it is greatly toned down. The result to me was that after I adjusted to what was actually happening (instead of what I was used to seeing on 2007 and previous games), it became something to really enjoy about the new game.>>
> >
Next was something that I expect should get a “Hallelujah!!” and an “Amen!!” from everyone – the return of INDIVIDUAL DEFENSIVE PLAYMAKER CONTROLS!!! It was not actually until late in the day that I really began using these again – I kept forgetting about it actually due to other factors such as trying to take everything else in – but once I started in with it again I was quickly becoming a bit of a mad-scientist on D – putting manually created zone blitzes and QB spies in effect and loving every minute or it. One of the great travesties in the next-gen football games was the loss of this feature in Madden and NCAA because it resulted in too much advantage to the offense and too few counters to the defense. Rest assured, this year if you like to be creative on defense and try to confuse you opponent’s read by giving him something he has not seen before in standard plays like DTs in drop zones and all LBs on blitzes or manned up, then you will have this option. It is just great to see and also goes a long way towards helping you feel in-control again.>>
> >
One of the other new additions that I liked was the LEAD-BY-EXAMPLE / MOTIVATION system. I know there was some concern that the “exploding field icon” would be really cheesy and unfortunately, I never saw it during any of the 7 games I was able to play; but graphical oddities aside, I discussed this at length with one of the producers and liked what I was hearing relative to what I had seen in gameplay. My personal fear when I heard of this (and of Madden’s “Weapons”) was that we would be reliving the “Impact Players” of a few years back – players “in the zone” would be superhuman wrecking balls. This new system is more of a melding of older features like MOMENTUM and COMPSURE into an individual player. It is designed with the idea that as a player has on-field success, he increases his own performance but also affects his teammates as well. Offensively OR defensively. The nice thing was that as I was playing a game with Notre Dame, I started having success with Travis Thomas running and was able to slowly see his “Motivation” meter rising. He was feeding off of successful carries and getting stronger, but not in an obnoxious superman sort of way. He broke a few extra tackles, but this was turning a 3 yard gain into 5 or 6 instead of 50 or 60 after bouncing off 6 guys along the way. It seemed to be a better version of In-game progressions as well as momentum and composure. In short, it seemed subtle and that has been one of my biggest EA-related complaints in the past – a lack of subtlety in their implementation of new features. It was definitely not an obviously over-powering feature to me, and that alone was reason to celebrate; but add that to the fact that it seemed to me to have a real impact on gameplay and I was quite pleased with it. Time will tell if this feature sustains this opinion in lengthier gameplay sessions, but at first glance I give it high marks.>>
> >
Another HUGE issue to me was FATIGUE and QB PLAY MECHANICS (throwing motion, throwing power, throwing accuracy, etc.). I again sought out and spent some time talking to Ian Cummings about the fatigue affects and how they are calculated in-game and in-play now versus years past when they would only be taken into account AFTER each play ended. This was in effect why someone could scramble around with a QB like Pat White or Mike Vick and run sideline to sideline without ever losing any speed, then run clear downfield also without losing speed at all.

In what may be one of the most revolutionary changes to gameplay in the "new" Madden/NCAA engine, players now have fatigue affects calculated DURING the play. For instance on long break away runs, you visibly see players start to slow down and lose speed instead of maintaining a constant break away speed - only the most "elite" players will have that true break-away speed and they also need to be relatively fresh to do so. I did not have a chance to really test this out and monitor the players over a specific number of plays to see how well it works over the course of a whole game, but in single play situations it is seen. The fatigue factor is made more pronounced if the user makes special moves like spins, trucks, jukes, etc. It also severely impacts a QB's accuracy when they do try to throw. The net effect is that is VERY difficult to run around aimlessly and still throw a good pass. It is not impossible to scramble though - good user skills make it possible to evade one-on-one tackles (even make guys look stupid in the process) but there is no longer a built-in play-long speed advantage. It remains to be seen how well this is implemented during full games – I thought players seemed a bit slower and ‘gassed’ later in games than at the beginning, but truthfully I was usually so caught up in the moment of a particular game that I did not pay close enough attention to this.

Since players actually so show this affect in the game, I am confident that fatigue IS working - HOWEVER - I also noticed during one of my games that the ICONS DID NOT SHOW THIS AFFECT AT TIMES. I was told it is a GUI-error in the build we were playing, and that although the visual cues for fatigue at times were NOT working, the in-game affects were clearly present. This is very similar to what happened at last year’s Madden event but unfortunately that ended up shipping with a broken fatigue system instead of a broken GUI-only. Let’s hope THAT history does NOT repeat!>>
> >
As for the QB play, that was waaaaaaaaaay overblown in previous games, in part due to the lack of in-play fatigue progressions, but also due to the laser-like accuracy of the QBs in unnatural throws or positions. Throwing on a dead run was deadly for all the wrong reasons, and that did not seem to work nearly as well in the 2008 game versus the 2007 game. There were also a noticeable increase in overthrows that resulted in picks. It was gratifying to see a QB overthrow the WR and suffer a pick because of it – it felt very much “risk-vs.-reward” at times – you COULD still try it, and even succeed at times, but it was no where near as effective as years past and almost (not quite, but almost) forces players to THINK about their QB mechanics and situations before heaving the ball up, If you have no clue what you are doing other than sprinting out and throwing corner routes all day, then you are going to be a sad puppy in 2008! (NOTE – this was on HEISMAN level; on ALL-AMERICAN, I felt the QB was not contained quite as nicely as on HEISMAN level! It was still an improvement from 2007, but I fear that it was not as good as what we saw on Heisman and that could be bad for online play in ranked games – which are AGAIN limited to All-American difficulty!)>>
> >
Vision Cone is again optional, and it did not seem to give a player much advantage in accuracy to use it versus not using it. I am in a distinct minority who actually LIKED this feature, so I am glad I still have the option of using it – even if it is only as a decoy to try to get someone to over-commit their safety in one direction, but I know many more people HATED it, so it is once again optional. One minor thing I noted was that WRs and TEs who wave and “call for the ball” on a play seemed to make catches in some very tight spots. They also dropped a couple on me, so this may or may not be something to watch for when the game launches – I got the impression that the improbable catches in tight coverage were more prevalent if you got the “wave” than if you did not. Precision Passing seemed a bit better to me– far fewer ridiculous bullet passes over the middle – although I don’t think it was always working very well, it seemed spotty. I know there were a couple cases of people trying to lead passes inside (Craig from ConsoleSports.net tried this a few times with little luck) only to see the pass seemingly not go where intended, or to watch the WR get jumped by the DB. It is something that clearly needs more gametime to see how well or how poorly it works.>>
> >
Now for what I am sure will be THE controversy about how NCAA 2008 plays – the speed of the QB relative to the rest of the teams and also the defense’s ability to contain this. First off the defensive pursuit angles are better, but I think they still need some serious work. There were times that I could see guys take a really shallow angle and go into the looping pursuit after a player had passed them, and I did not like that, but the closing speeds of players coupled with the in-play fatigue affects DID address the feeling of helplessness that accompanied every break away run last year. You have a better than average chance to run guys down from behind in what appeared to be a realistic (or at least improved) manner. Again – 7 games folks, so by no means is this gospel truth, but it felt better than 2007 – felt like you COULD make a difference, even if ultimately you did not. I often times felt helpless in 2007 once a guy was past my first defender, 2008 is at worst a step in the right direction and at best is much better there. The controversy will stem from people feeling that QBs have been crippled to help the defense. I did not personally feel this was the case, but I expect there will be many people who do not share that belief. Bottom line, it is going to take a lot more stick skill and a lot less relying on a moribund defense and programmed speed deficit to be successful with the QB this year. Throw in d-playmaker for QB spy and the defense has a much more level playing field in 2008. >>
> >
Another thing I disliked rather much was the ability of non-option QBs like Josh Booty and Jimmy Clausen to be even remotely competent on the option (let alone dangerous). This stems from their ability to pitch the ball on the option very late at times (well after they were hit and on the way down). The fact they can get the pitch off is not the part that bothered me though – it was that the pitch was ALWAYS accurate – the way to bust this up was to hit the RB and stop HIM from catching the pitch, but the QB did not seem to make really bad pitches – which is something I would like to see a lot more of in future games.>>
> >
GANG TACKLING? It is there, that much is certain. But there are MANY times that an apparent opportunity for a gang tackle goes by without triggering the animations. I have the feeling that this is a trade off to have branching animations and better user controls in other areas of gameplay, though that is totally unconfirmed speculation on my part. Regardless, the gang tackles are nice to look at, but their biggest impact on gameplay is taking away the free yardage people could rack up in 2007 by dragging someone through an animation. A slightly disappointing thing to me was I envisioned being able to manually come in to finish off a play more than what I was actually able to do. The ability to user strip is definitely in the game, as is the animation where you can literally see a defender trying to rip a ball loose (I saw this and actually successfully used it once on a kick return). Manually entering into a gang tackle though may very well come down to timing and skill in the end, so I do not want to sound as if it ruined the gang tackling for me. It was definitely something I wanted to hit practice mode or mini-games to delve into more but did not get a chance to do so. In addition to gang tackles, there are many new tackling animations as well – some nice mid-air stuff (I saw one in particular that had a TE going up for a high pass, getting drilled in the back and actually losing the ball as a result – it looked great!), some really nice Hit Stick 2.0 stuff (going low and flipping guys).>>
> >
Other new animations include some very nice one-handed grabs (MUCH better that what we saw in the Madden Sizzle trailer – where the ball seemed to stick to an outstretched arm like Velcro), a lot of new blocking and head-tracking stuff (especially nice was watching a DE tracking a RB while engaged to an OT and then trying to break loose to pursue), and much improved fluidity in the running and catching animations in general. The throwing animations looked slightly improved as well, but nothing that jumped out at me and made me take notice specifically.>>
> >
And now for something completely different…. (or THOSE THINGS I DID NOT LIKE SO MUCH):>>
> >
Presentation and ESPN integration in meaningful ways is virtually non-existent as usual. >>
> >
Seeing as EA publicly said they were focusing on gameplay this year, and for a large part delivered the goods in that area, I guess this is the trade-off we must accept. I know there is a lot of strongly held belief on the internet and on some fan sites that this may appear that simply believe that EA should throw more developers and more people into the mix to “make time” to add this stuff. In theory that may sound great, but in reality, rarely does an adding additional chef make for a better soup. There are tasks that extra hands may help with, but in game design that is not always true. Sure, it would be nice to have things like on-field referees (all of them – Linesmen, Field Judges, Umpires), chain gangs, cheerleaders and the like - which was again something I again asked Ian Cummings about point-blank; but if the choice comes down to either using a really bad looking referee model and mechanic and crappy thrown together stuff or spending the resources and time on something like branching animations and dynamic gameplay, then I agree with Ian’s assessment – error on the side of gameplay. I know many people will simply use this as cannon fodder for their incessant whining and EA-bashing, but I choose again to believe it. That certainly does not mean anyone else must believe the same – like Morpheous in the Matrix Reloaded, my belief does not require that you too must believe….>>
> >
Co-op play? On Madden 2008 = YES, on NCAA 2008 = NO!>>
> >
Commentary is serviceable but I largely ignored it by the third game anyway.>>
> >
Practice Mode does NOT have random plays on offense or defense, again making it nearly useless.>>
> >
No new mini-games or training drills, no online use of mini-games again this year.>>
> >
No new team specific introductions.>>
> >
I kind of disliked the new injury animation (or actual lack there of since it is done in engine and without cut-scenes) because it looked a little lame at times. OK, if by a “little” you mean “a lot” and by lame you mean “makes my eyes hurt”…>>
> >
Only one playable camera angle – although replays are available from other cameras, so maybe this was just something we glossed over in a rush to play the game, but I am reasonably sure there was only one angle in the game for playing…>>
> >
Weather effects – especially snow – seemed very blasé…although the dynamic lighting from 2007 was still there, if not as spectacular the second time around…>>
> >
I did not see any formation shifting in the game.>>
> >
Penalties are still badly lacking in variety and number. In 7 games I saw exactly ONE HOLDING CALL????? C’mon. usually you won’t go 7 MINUTES without a holding call in a real game and certainly not entire GAMES without seeing it!!! Also missing seemed to be facemasking, chop blocking and about 15 others. Pass interference is still spotty – sometimes called for no contact and other times allowing public rapes without laundry hitting the ground…>>
> >
The sidelines are a slight improvement as far as the players go, but nothing great and certainly not in a meaningful way…>>
> >
FG kickers are POWERFUL, accuracy depends a lot on the user (you CAN miss kicks) but I do not know about the CPU…>>
> >
Online was absent, as was the PS3 for meaningful, hands-on comparisons…>>
> >
I despise the new play calling screen and the rest of the UI seemed very similar to 2007’s….>>
> >
So….what’s the verdict?????>>
> >
Going back to what I said at the very beginning – if you are pre-disposed to hate EA games because they lack hand-towels, editable equipment and on-field referees….congrats, you will freely hate this game and have that right. My suggestion is to either buy it and deal with the shortcomings in these areas or refuse to accept it and refuse to buy it. That is your right of course. In my opinion, you would be missing out on one hell of a fun football game though.>>
> >
I believe that the many, many changes to gameplay – both huge, overt ones and the minor, subtle ones – give this game a very significant leg up on its predecessor and make this a MUST OWN title for serious football fans and gamers alike. The depth of the title is dependant on what you like (I did not even TOUCH on the Dynasty Mode or other aspects of the game in this diatribe), but the depth of the gameplay is not. NCAA 2008 has made significant strides in gameplay and succeeds very well at putting the player in control and helping him retain that felling of control throughout a game.>>
> >
Is it perfect? No, it is not. But it does show significant progress from 2007 and is one hella fun game to play. If your main focus is gameplay over all else, then this title is definitely developed with you in mind and should satisfy your desires for a solid, very nearly spectacular game. I would obviously like to have a lot more time with the game before making a final call, and there are some very significant things I am forgetting in this piece, but right now I am at least twice as excited about the upcoming release of NCAA and cannot wait to start playing MWCS games on it! >>
> >
> >
Acknowledgements and Thanks>>
> >
For years, really ever since online play started for consoles, I have been glued to my PC each year looking to get the inside information on the coming games – both Madden and NCAA. So, being able to actually provide my own opinion to that mix is something I really enjoy quite a bit. So, as always, a big thanks to Ray Goode (ShopMaster) for getting me involved in the first place, and allowing me to represent the site at EA for this event – he did not have to do that because he could have just as easily taken the opportunity himself, and I appreciate his generosity in sending me in his stead. Also, a big thanks to our hosts at EA (Mike and Will and the rest of the EA team and the MS folks) and a thanks to the rest of the community leaders for making these events a ton of fun as well. And last, but certainly not least, thanks to the entire Maddenwars community because without the guys that make up our league and this site, none of this would happen at all. I hope that people get a little something out of my ramblings that make it a bit justified to have me down there for this type of thing in the first place!>>
> >

[mike01]

wow! thanks man, I think I'll print this and head to the bathroom haha

[GTheorenHobbes]

Just saved me $60. I wish that wasn't the case, but thanks, man.

[VTPack919]

Quote: Originally Posted by GTheorenHobbes

Just saved me $60. I wish that wasn't the case, but thanks, man.

some of you guys sound like a broken record. sweet, you just saved 60 dollars, glaaaad to hear it.

[morganic]

Nice read, thanks for the nice write-up!

[ShureShot66]

this is always hands-down the best football game every year... interesting stuff here, but what i'm really anxious to hear about down the road is the deeper dynasty mode and recruiting. some of the best replay value around.

[Badboy49er]

wow great read, thanks for the in-depth info. Really appreciate it

[NYJets]

Good read, thanks for posting it.