EA Fumbles Online League Support Again!

[B. Gumbel]

Quote: Originally Posted by humpdump66

ESPN Leagues were excellent. I am a Commish of a good ESPN league and a league's success is based on who you allow to join. I targeted the 30+ crowd (although I have guys younger than that) and came up with a pretty good core of guys. Has it been perfect? No. People have dropped and we've had a few instances of cheese as well. But overall, since I've become a Commish three seasons ago, online league play has been a rewarding experience and is the only reason I play ESPN now. If it was just a game that focused on franchise or single player, I would have traded it long ago. Also in ESPN, most of the good leagues are invite only. You will never hear about them nor wil they be public. If you are out there randomly searching for a league, you probably are going to get an unrewarding experience. In the league I commish, we had a great referral system as well as an "interview" process to try to get good members. Like I said, you cannot create a perfect League because people have lives aside from gaming. People change jobs, move, have kids, etc. That caused people to have to move on sometimes. But I've always been able to get another SIM guy. Now, in beginning a 4th season, I've got a great strategy for success. I really cannot see people being greatly satisfied with just a franchise mode experience. Yes, Madden is deeper than ESPN so franchise mode might generate longer interese, but in the end it becomes rather stale. You can change sliders, AI, teams and players, but the AI stays the same and pretty soon you know the drill. That is why people want head to head action. I really hope to see EA to step up and offer a good League format for the next gen. Madden 2006 for the XBOX & PS2 is pretty much just a game to hold us over until the XBOX 360 version. Maybe they are just not offering much in terms of radical change so we all are wowed by the nextgen. If they make the regular version too good, it might hurt sales of the nextgen version. At least I hope that is the case. But the reason they remain mum is a mystery. It can't be cost since their current set-up does half of what ESPN's does. EA is smart enough to know the future is online gaming as more and more people get broadband connectivity every day. If their competitors are truly the Halo's and GTA's of the world (and GTA is rumored to be online for their NYC version in 2007), EA can't afford to not give the online community what they desire. Madden is the ultimate head-to-head game. In dorms, bars, barbershops, apartments, people are playing against HUMAN opponents not the CPU. As a whole generation of gamers gets older and can't hang with the fellas but still want to play- - online satisfies that need. And Leagues give us a reason stay interested. I hope EA get's it right!

I'm sure your league was great but your league is not the NORM as MOST ESPN leaguies are either dead or polluted with deadbeats..The feature is beatiful but its not a cost effective thing for EA to offer because its really wasteful...Don't get me wrong..I love it but I can also understand the practical side of it..Just go look at the leagues for yourself...You will find a ton of Garbage, under-used leagues...Its a wasted feature

[B. Gumbel]

Quote: Originally Posted by tmac2k3

I'll hold my breath for 2K Legends before I start looking forward to online leagues in ea sports games. They seem totally against this for some reason. Even going back to PC Madden where they actually REMOVED the feature. I'll never understand that to this day. EA can go ahead and neglect the hardcore gamer all they want, but if Madden's sales start declining and the money spent on the nfl license starts kicking their @ss, they'll only be able to blame themselves.

They are far from against a league feature..They simply realize that they do not need it to be the number 1 selling sports sim on the market...Plus as I've said over and over its a wasted feature...Most people do not use the league feature as it should be to be wortyh the time and effort that it takes to create and maintain it.

[B. Gumbel]

Quote: Originally Posted by jrivera34

Maintaining servers, using hard drive space, and creating the websites all cost money. Nothing that EA would even notice, but there are still costs involved. I agree with your statement about online play being the future, but I don't think EA has bought into this yet. Yeah, they offer us online play, but they give us the minimum and nothing else. They really need to step up to the plate for online players.

Online play IMO appears to be important to EA..Its simply that they are not willing to waste time on a league feature that would quite frankly be under utilized. The only way I would like to see EA put their hat in the ONLINE League arena would be if they offered it as a pay service..That alone would weed out the deadbeats and bums.

But as I said EA still has the best selling games w/o a league feature so as great as the 2K sports league features are they don't give those games an edge...I do like them tho but as stated..they are clearly under utilized and wasteful...Go surf threw them..You'll find likely a large % of leagues that are dead or under utilized.

[B. Gumbel]

Quote: Originally Posted by wwharton

they said at E3 that they are not concerned with online play... not this generation, not next generation. don't hold your breath, bro.

They are not concerned because they know it will not stop ballers from running successful leagues...EA does not need to create a 2k Sports league site because it makes no difference from the perspective that you will buy the game based on its playability and gameplay.

[heelsman22]

What do you really expect? EA's first priority isnt to cater to all the people with online's needs. The percentage of people without online is greater that the people with it, so obviously the offline game comes first, as logic would suggest. I'm dissappointed too, but didnt expect anything much different.

[B. Gumbel]

Quote: Originally Posted by heelsman22

What do you really expect? EA's first priority isnt to cater to all the people with online's needs. The percentage of people without online is greater that the people with it, so obviously the offline game comes first, as logic would suggest. I'm dissappointed too, but didnt expect anything much different.

exactly!...If online leagues an essential from a large majority of EA consumers..They would do it in a minute.

personally tho, I'd rather see EA spend time on perfecting the gameplay and other aspects of the game rather than folling with online leagues and other things that would be wasted energies. Oh..and I'm a complete online whore..I love online play but ya gotta understand the whole picture to realize why EA doesn't create an online league feature..Its certainly not because they don't care...Its all about cost effectiveness and demand...Those two elements do not exist to a level that would force EA to jump into online league support.

[GTheorenHobbes]

No matter what spin you guys want to put on the situation, there's really no excuse for EA not to have AT LEAST the same kind of online leagues, living rosters, etc. that ESPN had.

VC made a great, 11 on 11 football game online and made it playable over a 56k modem when EA said it couldn't be done. I remember firing up 2K online back in the dreamcast days, and wondering how EA could get by without taking their game online. Here we are, almost 6 years later, and EA is still showing their attitude hasn't changed toward the online gamers.

Like I said, there's really no excuse. Not from where I'm sitting, anyways. Then again, it's been awhile since I've had any of that EA Kool-aid.

[spankdatazz22]

Quote: Originally Posted by heelsman22

I'm dissappointed too, but didnt expect anything much different.

Perhaps that's part of the problem - expectations. Why should they do anything when there isn't much demanded of them in the first place.

I just can't buy the "it's not cost effective" excuse. And yes, it's an excuse. Just about every game that's released now has some online component that they use as a selling point - freaking Ratchet and Clank is online. For FREE. Perhaps the problem is EA is trying to figure some way to squeeze even more money out of it's adoring public, maybe they aren't. Doesn't matter one way or the other. The thing is, don't make excuses for them - just view it for what it is.