Fixing the kicking game

[BezO]

Quote: Originally Posted by dave374

I don't wanna miss a gimme FG because I suck with a controller.

What makes you think meter-less kicking would be harder? Difficulty level or sliders could make kicking as hard or easy as you need it to be. If you suck with a controller, what difference would a meter make any way?

But do you not want any user control? Do you want your RB juking defenders despite you sucking with a controller? Do you want your LBs not getting juked despite you sucking with a controller? Or is it just kicking?

[NuJoiseySoulja]

Quote:

I agree the kicking should be harder, but if they make it too hard, people will just go for it on 4th down online instead of trying the field goal.

FAIR PLAY ON so they cant go for it on 4th down.

[BezO]

Quote: Originally Posted by NuJoiseySoulja

FAIR PLAY ON so they cant go for it on 4th down.

I'm not sure I've ever played online. Does fair play have exceptions? For example, if someone was on the opposing 30 yard line, 4th & inches, would fair play allow you to go for it?

I never liked the idea of not allowing a user to do something. NFL teams do things once thought to be crazy. I remember when folks didn't like being able to put players "out of position". Then New England puts a WR at DB, successfuly; plays 1-5 defense; runs 4-5 WRs all game, ect. I think anything should be possible. Just make the ratings accurate.

[DaNextPhenom25]

If ratings made more of a difference, I think the kicking game would be alot better. A kicker with 79 accuracy should not be able to make a FG in 10-15 MPH winds against him from 56 yards away unless he is Sebastian Janakowski(sp?).

[quagga]

I've always thought that the kicking game does not reflect the fact that kickers have more problems with accuracy as the field goal distance increases.

For example, David Akers is very accurate - until around 49-50 yds plus, where he is poor. A system is required to reflect the fact that as a kicker tries to make his longest possible distance, his technique is likely to suffer, resulting in more inaccurate kicks.

I think it would be a good idea to retain a similar system to what is currently in place with the analogue stick, but use the R2/RT button as a modifier.

The more depressed the button/trigger, the harder/longer the kicker is trying to kick.

As you try for a longer kick, the slice of the meter that will result in an accurate kick becomes thinner, making it much easier for short FG and PATs, and much harder for 50 yds plus (hopefully that makes sense to people).

This system could also be made to allow for effective difficulty levels, by changing the overall thickness of slice relative to difficulty (The scale could even be proportional in order to ensure that PATs are still easy even on the hardest difficulty level).

I also think that this removes the need for the old NFL 2k5 'swinging directional arrow' system, which always seemed a little absurd to me (surely I should be able to simply decide which direction I want to kick).

[Rashad19]

I think in order to make the kicking game more accurate we need to incorporate the basic things that must be completed in order to get a kick off.

1)Snap/Hold- This needs to be varied. Not all snaps are perfect so their should be some high snap animations,low snap animations, wide left/rt,etc..This would represent timing. Once the ball is snapped the user should have to press a button to tell the kicker to start his approach to the ball.

2. Power- At the snap a power meter begins simultaneously and if the snap/hold was perfect then you would be able to achieve maximum power. A poor snap/hold would throw off timing of the kick making the power meter either speed up or slow down adjusting to the situation. Also, kickers should be given accurate power ratings. Ex. Janikowski would be 99 power(0-60yds) while Akers would be 80 power (0-49yds). Power should be affected by weather(rain/snow=less distance because of footing, wind at your back= slight increase in distance,wind in your face= less distance)

3. Accuracy-Should be determined by the kickers overall career accuracy percentages broken down into distances(0-10yds,10-20,20-35,35-48,48-beyond). Kicking arrow should begin moving at the snap of the ball with the power meter inside of it. Speed of the arrow is determined by career accuracy percentages and weather)

FG Block Kick Formations should have these 3 options to choose from (push up the middle,block right, or block left). This way the USER can determine whether he wants to attempt to focus his attention on getting a strong push up the middle by sending tall high jumpers up the middle or by sending pressure off the edges.

Just my 2 cents on how to improve the kicking game.

[DrewBledsoe]

No-one discussed a couple of obvious things to me. The casual user and people with larger / smaller hands. The sticks on the original Xbox controller were perfect for me, but when they made a smaller controller, they were too cramped. On the 360 controller, to push straight down and then straight up, I actually have to push at an angle (the natural curves of your thumbs make you shank everything right). or get hand cramp from holding the damn thing in an unnatural manner for hours

Yes practicing lots and lots of kicks helps, but Its different in actual gameplay, when your thumbs are on the sticks all the time, you kinda compensate, but suddenly you have to make the stick go precisely up and down, which I still find tough.

And the casual user would also be put off by anything more complicated (they may even think the current method is way too hard)..

So maybe a dual method - a tricky one using sticks and pressure sensitive triggers, and another simple one, more akin to to the old Golf games..eg. timing a couple of button presses for aim and power.

Cos the huge majority of FG's are pretty automatic, when you think about it......

[green94]

Good idea.