Gamasutra interview with Mark Turmell

[davjaffe]

This was posted on Ian Cummings' Twitter account today: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/2...essibility.php

A lot of the article is about Turmell's history in the business, as well as the upcoming Wii NBA Jam. However, he does make some statements about the Tiburon football games.

As a player who desires a sim-type experience, some of his statements concern me:

And he hopes his learnings in the world of sports titles will help him in his new mission: Help make EA Sports games like Madden more accessible. "When you try to pick up a game like Madden, some people are immediately uneasy because it's so complex and so deep, and they're perhaps not sure they want to make that investment," Turmell explains.

"As successful as Madden is, I think that there's an even larger untapped market of potential buyers that we can tap into," he says. "My mission really is to make those players feel welcomed, to make them feel successful when they pick it up."

...

"Certainly, the sim nature of the EA Sports products has been very successful, and is the hallmark... we certainly can't ignore that fact, but there are ways to attract the novice user and make him realize, 'I can get into this without all of the knowledge,'" he adds.

Is it a major challenge to balance accessibility with pleasing users who want a very rich, lifelike sports experience? "I'm kind of the rookie here," says Turmell, "but I don't think it's as challenging or as difficult as you might think -- because I go back to that moment-to-moment gameplay."

"I'm confident that we can create an easier to pick-up-and-play experience where [players] get a cool moment right away, feel they have control over that moment, and then they begin to get hooked," he states. "That's almost an arcade philosophy that I grew up with; I was in the arcade business for twenty years."

However, some of the other things he mentions sound quite promising:

Turmell says the elusive trait of "responsiveness" has to do with giving the player as much of a sense of control as possible. "A lot of games nowadays are not very responsive," he says. "Sometimes you hit a button and a long animation plays out... with a game like the WWE, Wrestlemania games, you hit a button and it might take seven, eight seconds before you regain control of the character on screen. That happens too much in most sports games."

Player-empowering, rapid-response mechanics dovetail with another area of focus for Turmell, which is entertaining on-screen action that make players "feel like they did something, and it was cool," he says. "And when you give them that first 'cool moment', that's great -- but then you have to get onto the next one."

...


Finally, Turmell says, never underestimate the importance of frame rate to immersion and engagement, something he hopes to make a priority at EA. "A lot of gameplay that feels not-responsive or sluggish is simply because they are not updating the game engine at 60 frames per second," he says. "That's really critical in my eyes," he adds. "Some people can't really quantify why a game feels better than another game, but you'll find games that run at higher frame rates do end up scoring higher or feeling better to consumers."

Has anyone else read the interview? Thoughts?

[hatisback]

Quote: Originally Posted by davjaffe

This was posted on Ian Cummings' Twitter account today: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/2...essibility.php A lot of the article is about Turmell's history in the business, as well as the upcoming Wii NBA Jam. However, he does make some statements about the Tiburon football games. As a player who desires a sim-type experience, some of his statements concern me: And he hopes his learnings in the world of sports titles will help him in his new mission: Help make EA Sports games like Madden more accessible. "When you try to pick up a game like Madden, some people are immediately uneasy because it's so complex and so deep, and they're perhaps not sure they want to make that investment," Turmell explains. "As successful as Madden is, I think that there's an even larger untapped market of potential buyers that we can tap into," he says. "My mission really is to make those players feel welcomed, to make them feel successful when they pick it up." ... "Certainly, the sim nature of the EA Sports products has been very successful, and is the hallmark... we certainly can't ignore that fact, but there are ways to attract the novice user and make him realize, 'I can get into this without all of the knowledge,'" he adds. Is it a major challenge to balance accessibility with pleasing users who want a very rich, lifelike sports experience? "I'm kind of the rookie here," says Turmell, "but I don't think it's as challenging or as difficult as you might think -- because I go back to that moment-to-moment gameplay." "I'm confident that we can create an easier to pick-up-and-play experience where [players] get a cool moment right away, feel they have control over that moment, and then they begin to get hooked," he states. "That's almost an arcade philosophy that I grew up with; I was in the arcade business for twenty years." However, some of the other things he mentions sound quite promising: Turmell says the elusive trait of "responsiveness" has to do with giving the player as much of a sense of control as possible. "A lot of games nowadays are not very responsive," he says. "Sometimes you hit a button and a long animation plays out... with a game like the WWE, Wrestlemania games, you hit a button and it might take seven, eight seconds before you regain control of the character on screen. That happens too much in most sports games." Player-empowering, rapid-response mechanics dovetail with another area of focus for Turmell, which is entertaining on-screen action that make players "feel like they did something, and it was cool," he says. "And when you give them that first 'cool moment', that's great -- but then you have to get onto the next one." ... Finally, Turmell says, never underestimate the importance of frame rate to immersion and engagement, something he hopes to make a priority at EA. "A lot of gameplay that feels not-responsive or sluggish is simply because they are not updating the game engine at 60 frames per second," he says. "That's really critical in my eyes," he adds. "Some people can't really quantify why a game feels better than another game, but you'll find games that run at higher frame rates do end up scoring higher or feeling better to consumers." Has anyone else read the interview? Thoughts?

Madden already isn't sim right now, so no worries. Ill have Backbreaker to keep me company next year with Madden 05, the best Madden ever made.

[jyoung]

Madden has never been a true sim and never will be.

If it's fun to play and properly balanced for head-to-head play, that's all I care about.

Too many people keep hoping for Madden to go in a direction that it never will unless sales numbers or outside competition force it to change.

[Tbo24]

Why in the hell would they want to make the game "more accesible to the novice user"? To me this sounds like a cop out because they know they cant make Madden a true sim experience. It just makes me sick that I cant have a decent up to date football game sitting infront of me.

[dfos81]

Let Turmell handle the arcade madden, and Ian & co. stay on the sim, everything you see on sunday.

[Flamehead]

Very discouraging. I get a little uncomfortable when someone who may have influence on the only NFL game available starts touting his arcade experience as a badge of honor.

[Icarus2k9]

What concerns me is the belief Turmell had that Madden is known as being highly sim (which enough posts and gripes have shown isn't there yet) and the idea of responsiveness being equated with the OTT dunks of yore...when a problem with countless Maddens is too many big plays, and too many of those big plays are 80 yard TD bombs and runs instead of a rumbling 15yd run or a 25 yd strike.

Plus, will "responsiveness" equate to twitch gaming rather than the need for physics and momentum? After all, the masses complained at Killzone 2's heaviness because they wanted the twitch of Cod4 on ALL their shooters. Appealing to bigger demographics isn't always the right thing to do (bad example, I know)

[adembroski]

All the new people at EA are spitting out the same crap David Ortiz did. "Responsiveness" became total lack of inertia/physics. "Accessibility" became "Eliminate as many presnap elements as possible".

My Madden-Morale is pretty low right now.