2K Making a Return?

[kjcheezhead]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

I agree saturation is completely possible. It happened just prior to the exclusive when QB club, NFL Fever, Gameday, 2k and Madden offered similar games.

The NFL deals in exclusives. hard to argue over saturation in a market intentionally limited to one option and 1 price point.

[roadman]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

This is my take on the interest/no interest in the NFL.

Football is a contact sport, no doubt. I feel that concussions are played up more today vs 20 -25 years ago because of social media and the recent discoveries of what concussions have the potential to do to a person later in life. My point is, even while I was growing up there were a lot of parents blocking their children from playing football at all during their youth on up. I don't think any of that has changed much since then. Football will always be a contact sport.

On a related note, over the past 20-25 years, there has been an explosion in youth sports for soccer. There are a lot of kids who start playing at the age of 4 on up. Soccer's popularity as a sport has really taken off during that timeframe. It's what you do around this area, watch your kids as grandparents and parents line the sidelines as spectators in the spring and fall during the weekends.

And, I also feel there are less and less children over that same timeframe. It's very rare nowadays to find families of 5, 7 and 9 children anymore and when I was growing up, that was more common.

Just my take on the discussion.

[Dead2009]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

I agree saturation is completely possible. It happened just prior to the exclusive when QB club, NFL Fever, Gameday, 2k and Madden offered similar games.

The NFL deals in exclusives. hard to argue over saturation in a market intentionally limited to one option and 1 price point.

NFL Fever was amazing.

[elgreazy1]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Again, I leave for another year and come back to this.... tsk, tsk.

I still think 2K put out the best football games of our generation, period. I finally put down All Pro Football 2K8 a few months ago, not because the game is old but because the online competition simply cheats (hacking roster files to give their players a boost). To this day, there are parts of that game that still feel and play better than Madden 18 - weight distribution, OL/DL play, signature/special moves for players, etc.

I honestly think 2K (or any developer) would be better served making a generic, highly customizable football game. NCAA 14's Team Builder was a powerful tool that allowed the user to create every aspect of a team. MUT follows a similar path by allowing a user to build an entire roster of custom players to take online against fellow competition. A developer could take this route, supplement costs with DLC, micro-transactions, upgrades, etc all while placing the game in a subscription model.

[kjcheezhead]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Again, I leave for another year and come back to this.... tsk, tsk.

I still think 2K put out the best football games of our generation, period. I finally put down All Pro Football 2K8 a few months ago, not because the game is old but because the online competition simply cheats (hacking roster files to give their players a boost). To this day, there are parts of that game that still feel and play better than Madden 18 - weight distribution, OL/DL play, signature/special moves for players, etc.

I honestly think 2K (or any developer) would be better served making a generic, highly customizable football game. NCAA 14's Team Builder was a powerful tool that allowed the user to create every aspect of a team. MUT follows a similar path by allowing a user to build an entire roster of custom players to take online against fellow competition. A developer could take this route, supplement costs with DLC, micro-transactions, upgrades, etc all while placing the game in a subscription model.

The highly customizable generic game would be awesome but there has to be legal reasons that hasn’t happened. APF went out of its way not allowing 32 team franchise mode and limited logo options. Backbreaker allowed the logo creator but you couldn’t name your players any name the matched an actual NFL player including something like Rod Smith.

There has to be legal reasons or serious fear of lawsuits to explain why developers did this with the few generic games released.

Also, with a generic game, I’m not sure what dlc/micro transactions the developers could come up with. Definitely nothing like card packs with star players inside. I doubt a lot of people would pay cash for a fake player upgrade if the game is already very customizable.

Really the best hope is the mobile market. Nothing is stopping 2K from making a mobile game to get there football brand recognized again and there is no license. Joe Montana fell on its face trying this but it seems to have the most potential.

[Hooe]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Really the best hope is the mobile market. Nothing is stopping 2K from making a mobile game to get there football brand recognized again and there is no license. Joe Montana fell on its face trying this but it seems to have the most potential.

Worth noting too that the exclusive license deal between the NFLPA and EA does not apply to mobile games. There are quite a few mobile games which use real NFL players, and even games which aren't football games have licensed NFLPA player likenesses.

[Moegames]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Right. And that pretty much proves they have no interest in another company making a game. They basically have a handshake agreement with EA that whenever the license expires it's pretty much an automatic renew.

I just don't see this changing. Like, maybe ever. The only way I see them not renewing with EA would be if EA did something with Madden that made the NFL look bad. And I think we all know that's not gonna happen. And I'm not talking about gameplay. They don't care one single bit about that.

Not true! The license is available for purchase but the price is steep at $600mil


Sent from my iPhone using Operation Sports

Hey guys, i read a few replies in this thread from a few guys stating the NFL and EA keeps renewing the NFL Exclusive deal, that's not true...the deal between EA and the NFL back in 2004 was for a 15 year deal. So it ends in less than 2 years from today, which is good news because i honestly don't think the NFL will continue on with the exclusive deal as the NFL lost money because of this deal...there's no doubt about it with the amount of people into technlogy today, including the amount of people gaming these days is a multidue more than back in 2004. There is simply more money to be made by NFL not going exclusive again.

Anyways, here is an article from gamestop back from 2004 announcing the 15 year deal between the NFL and EA Sports.

Electronic Arts, ESPN ink exclusive 15-year deal
September 19, 2005

Electronic Arts broke the calm of a national holiday today by announcing a licensing deal of epic proportions. For the next 15 years, EA will be the sole licensee of the ESPN brand in the area of sports games, which will include console, handheld, PC, and wireless games.

Rest of article here https://www.gamespot.com/articles/el.../1100-6116473/

There has been some continued renewing of the license over the years though between the NFL and EA, but that was not for the base portion of the "exclusive deal" but rather adjusting some things within the deal itself. One of them being the NFL wanting to remove mobile phones out of the exclusive deal some years ago, right when the NFL finally began to see how much money they were actually losing with the deal with EA. The amount of people with smartphones that skyrocketed since 2010 onward has skyrocketed and there is a HUGE userbase of guys young and old that may not be a hardcore gamer like most of us here that still would like to play some mobile based NFL licensed games, not necessarily full fledged football videogames like Madden but the more mobile oriented football-related games like kick the football through the field goal type games,etc...the audience for such NFL licensed mobile games is HUGE to the casual/non-hardcore gamer, they dwarf the more hardcore gamers, by a long shot.

So yeah, its my opinion that the NFL will no longer go exclusive with video games starting in 2020. Doesn't mean im right and it'll happen but if i were a betting man, i'd bet on it, for sure.

[roadman]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

I am sure that has potential going forward, but I'm assuming licensing fees for mobile type games need to be much lower for indie type companies to even consider the idea. I am sure there will be fees on both ends, NFLPA and the NFL.

The benefits must outweigh the cost and if they include an addicting game with opportunities to purchase more abilities, the game will be successful.

[mestevo]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Those mobile games already exist, as has been mentioned earlier in the thread.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

[Dagio]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Hey guys, i read a few replies in this thread from a few guys stating the NFL and EA keeps renewing the NFL Exclusive deal, that's not true...the deal between EA and the NFL back in 2004 was for a 15 year deal. So it ends in less than 2 years from today, which is good news because i honestly don't think the NFL will continue on with the exclusive deal as the NFL lost money because of this deal...there's no doubt about it with the amount of people into technlogy today, including the amount of people gaming these days is a multidue more than back in 2004. There is simply more money to be made by NFL not going exclusive again.

Anyways, here is an article from gamestop back from 2004 announcing the 15 year deal between the NFL and EA Sports.


There has been some continued renewing of the license over the years though between the NFL and EA, but that was not for the base portion of the "exclusive deal" but rather adjusting some things within the deal itself. One of them being the NFL wanting to remove mobile phones out of the exclusive deal some years ago, right when the NFL finally began to see how much money they were actually losing with the deal with EA. The amount of people with smartphones that skyrocketed since 2010 onward has skyrocketed and there is a HUGE userbase of guys young and old that may not be a hardcore gamer like most of us here that still would like to play some mobile based NFL licensed games, not necessarily full fledged football videogames like Madden but the more mobile oriented football-related games like kick the football through the field goal type games,etc...the audience for such NFL licensed mobile games is HUGE to the casual/non-hardcore gamer, they dwarf the more hardcore gamers, by a long shot.

So yeah, its my opinion that the NFL will no longer go exclusive with video games starting in 2020. Doesn't mean im right and it'll happen but if i were a betting man, i'd bet on it, for sure.

I wish that were the case, but the article you linked is for EA's deal with ESPN, not the NFL. According to this article, the original exclusive deal with the NFL was for five years.

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/big-deal-ea-and-nfl-ink-exclusive-licensing-agreement/1100-6114977/

[Hooe]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Hey guys, i read a few replies in this thread from a few guys stating the NFL and EA keeps renewing the NFL Exclusive deal, that's not true...the deal between EA and the NFL back in 2004 was for a 15 year deal. So it ends in less than 2 years from today

As noted by other posters, this isn't actually true. The original deal was five years and has been renewed a few times since.

which is good news because i honestly don't think the NFL will continue on with the exclusive deal as the NFL lost money because of this deal...there's no doubt about it with the amount of people into technlogy today, including the amount of people gaming these days is a multidue more than back in 2004. There is simply more money to be made by NFL not going exclusive again.

There has been some continued renewing of the license over the years though between the NFL and EA, but that was not for the base portion of the "exclusive deal" but rather adjusting some things within the deal itself. One of them being the NFL wanting to remove mobile phones out of the exclusive deal some years ago, right when the NFL finally began to see how much money they were actually losing with the deal with EA. The amount of people with smartphones that skyrocketed since 2010 onward has skyrocketed and there is a HUGE userbase of guys young and old that may not be a hardcore gamer like most of us here that still would like to play some mobile based NFL licensed games, not necessarily full fledged football videogames like Madden but the more mobile oriented football-related games like kick the football through the field goal type games,etc...the audience for such NFL licensed mobile games is HUGE to the casual/non-hardcore gamer, they dwarf the more hardcore gamers, by a long shot.

So yeah, its my opinion that the NFL will no longer go exclusive with video games starting in 2020. Doesn't mean im right and it'll happen but if i were a betting man, i'd bet on it, for sure.

Honestly, how long before we all collectively give up the ghost?

[pietasterp]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

Honestly, how long before we all collectively give up the ghost?

Answer: never.

I don't even have anything to add anymore. I think the last salient point was made about this topic sometime back in 2007.

[gelano]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

at this point i even doubt any Ncaa game

i couild see maybe if the power 5 conf in football break off

[BlacknBlue]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

If you don't think that the NFL would prefer to stick with an exclusive deal then I don't think you have been paying attention to their contracts.

The NFL likes guaranteed money and loyalty for the longest haul possible. From their uniforms and apparel, to their television, to their advertising partners, and even their sports drinks, the league is all about raking in as much as possible from the highest bidders possible. They have been for the last 15 years now, especially under Goodell.

[zello144]

Re: 2K Making a Return?

The addition of the football in NBA 2k19 MyCareer has me wondering what this means for 2k and football going forward. You can play a game of catch with it and it's probably nothing at all but maybe they made a deal behind closed doors with the NFL to make a return? It could be an unlicensed game like APF 2k8 was, Or maybe they secured the XFL licence if everything goes right for it and begins play in 2020.