Dallas Morn. News Article on EA Quality Control

[mavfan21]

....or lack thereof:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcont...1.4d96b64.html


'Madden' and 'NCAA' comments score rebuttals from developers EA


12:00 AM CDT on Saturday, August 9, 2008


By VICTOR GODINEZ / The Dallas Morning News
Victor Godinez covers technology for The Dallas Morning News. He blogs about video games at punchbutton.wfaa.com.


You faithful readers may recall all the way back to last week when I wrote about accusations that the quality-control department at Electronic Arts has been asleep at the switch with recent versions of NCAA and Madden football.
Well, the folks at EA sure noticed.
I received notes from both the Madden designer to whom I referred in the column as well as the company's public-relations department, both of them complaining that I had been unfair to their games.
There are software patches coming for NCAA, EA said, while the complaints about the lack of traditional manual settings for computer-controlled opponents in Madden are groundless because the game automatically adjusts the skill level as needed.
So let's take those rebuttals in turn:
I think the defense that "The patches are coming" for NCAA is pretty lame.
I guess it's nice that the company is at least recognizing the flaws in the original software, but the scope of the fixes indicates the game was clearly not finished when it was rolled out to retailers.
And gamers who haven't connected their consoles to the Internet probably won't ever get the patches.
Given that the college football season hasn't even started yet, I don't think it would have killed EA to delay the launch to get these issues ironed out.
On the Madden front, I think the debate about whether manual settings are better than auto settings is a bit esoteric for most gamers, and I'm willing to cut EA some slack here.
But I've been reading through the forums where the most hard-core Madden-ites hang out, and the auto-adjustment feature doesn't seem to have mollified them. So we'll see.

[mavfan21]

His last two articles highlighted a lot of the issues we (especially Franchise/Dynasty Mode fans) had with the quality of the games. He is a regular contributer to the largest paper in DFW, good to see the word is getting out.

[rspencer86]

Quote: Originally Posted by mavfan21

His last two articles highlighted a lot of the issues we (especially Franchise/Dynasty Mode fans) had with the quality of the games. He is a regular contributer to the largest paper in DFW, good to see the word is getting out.

It's nice to see a major media outlet employs someone who actually knows about video games. Some of the "journalists" who pen articles about our hobby have no clue what they are writing about, especially when it comes to sports video games.

Edit: Guess I should have read more closely, as Ian points out below.

[av7]

Whatever happened to those guys that filed a lawsuit against EA for releasing games they knew had issues?

More media attention would help the 'cause'

[pietasterp]

Quote: Originally Posted by rspencer86

It's nice to see a major media outlet employs someone who actually knows about video games. Some of the "journalists" who pen articles about our hobby have no clue what they are writing about, especially when it comes to sports video games.

Yeah, no kidding...it's about damn time. I would say 99% of major newspapers just assign game reviews to the first hack writer they see standing in front of them at the copy desk (who probably never even plays video games), because it's a major entertainment force in the 21st century and the paper wants to "cover it"....Reading a lot of newspaper game reviews pretty much leads one to believe that they are written in about 25 minutes by playing 1 game (if that) and then copying the promotional material/back of the case. In other words, completely vacuous.

Nice to see a major paper has someone that actually knows about games and is writing insightfully and from a position of knowledge. Can you imagine if newspapers had film critics who never went to the movies, or car reviews by people who didn't drive? That's basically what we're getting with most major paper game reviews. Or major videogaming website reviews, for that matter...As countryboy said in some other post, the only review I trust is my own...Although I do take opinions here strongly under advisement.

[Ian_Cummings]

Just in the principle of fairness and to further the discussion, here is an excerpt from Victor's blog:

"I'll admit right here that I'm not a big football gamer, so I don't really have the expertise to say how critical these problems are"

I'm not saying he's right or wrong in any points he makes...I just wanted to let the folks know that we actually don't yet have a true sports gaming guy in the mass-media (I don't think).

Discuss.

[rspencer86]

Quote: Originally Posted by TheFuture15

Just in the principle of fairness and to further the discussion, here is an excerpt from Victor's blog: "I'll admit right here that I'm not a big football gamer, so I don't really have the expertise to say how critical these problems are" Discuss.

LOL, touche my friend. I guess the DMN isn't as progressive as I first thought when it comes to their video game coverage.

[jsum3]

Here's my .02. Victor mentioning he's not an avid football gamer certainly will impact his ability to form an opinion as to whether no cpu sliders will allow a gamer to try to create a "realistic" NFL experience.
Are the testers avid football gamers?
Or is their primary goal to check for stability of the code as its enacted in the game?

This pass to the flat carrying the player out of bounds is ridiculous. Maybe if I don't follow football I think this type of play is supposed to carryout in this fasion, but c'mon...if McNabb hits Westbrook in the flat is he taking a 4 yard loss consistently with no threat of a defender?