Do You Think EA Developers Actually Play EA Football Games?

[roadman]

Quote: Originally Posted by cuttingteeth

Read the interview about the Vita version. It reveals that they didn't even take a full cycle to give us M13.

So, are the reports inaccurate that it took two years to develop CCM? Is Josh Looman lying about that?

[N51_rob]

I think Devs play games, they probably go online with them too, but don't announce their gamertags/PSN because no one likes to be verbally abused while trying to have fun.

That said, if you watch the Hesiman Challenge playbook video the lead dev that played that game, picked the easiest level and used the "Bullet Time" every single play. That to me is no fun at all, but that might be how he likes to play the game, which can explain a lot or a little. He may have done that just for show to show off the mode and rack up stats.

I do think the Devs play the game, but they clearly are not as critical as the majority of the consumers here at OS.

[Daniels2386]

I start off every post like this lol but its only so people understand where Im coming from and that Im not some newb that started playing 3 years ago.

Ive been buying and playing NCAA & Madden since playstation 1. Every year, so I can see and tell you that obviously the games came a LONG ways. Theres your credit EA.

How ever seeing the problems myself and agreeing with everything the OP said, I believe the devs do play, but dont play long enough to find a high percentage of the bugs/glitches. Take this years NCAA game for perfect example.

http://www.operationsports.com/forum...-od-check.html

^ Check that link. I even posted pics to show you what I mean ^

NCAA 12 came out on July 12th. I made that post on July 27th. The game had been out 2 weeks and I dont know how long it took them to fix it the problem. Me and my friend both quit playing, because it was un-playable for what we're trying to do.

That was in something simple as "Online Dynasty". So for everyone taking up for EA explain this to me: All the time leading up to release + at LEAST a month after release and still not fixed. EA's been doing this for HOW long now?

EA is nothing short of a monopoly and they know it. Why go 'above and beyond' when you can break records with mediocrity? The less they do = the less they spend, which in return = more revenue. There better at strategy/marketing than they are at developing video games, thats for sure!

:EDIT: For some reason its saying page not found on the link, but I just got through reading it. Hmmm? try searching for "Dynasty failed OD " on the college forum.

:EDIT 2: https://www.google.com/#hl=en&sclien...w=1600&bih=775
Click the 2nd link

[KingV2k3]

Quote: Originally Posted by N51_rob

I do think the Devs play the game, but they clearly are not as critical as the majority of the consumers here at OS.

I have wondered since the old MM / old skool OS days why oh why, they refuse to use the "Usual Suspects" on the forums to test this stuff for them...

I'm sure they'd get an informed and insightful breakdown of what's lacking (and how to fix it) FOR FREE IN A WEEKEND...

As a business decision, failure to exploit that resource is baffling...

I can name multiple "football guys" "roster gurus" "sim engine freaks" "sliderologists" "hard core gamers" and yes "PROGRAMMERS" around here that'd be happy to test this stuff on time and on our dime...

???

Oh well!

[DirkJesusNowitzki]

I am sure they play and are well aware of these issues that we complain about. But you only have so much time to work on games every cycle. Madden used to be in a situation where the gameplay itself was so solid, the franchise logic and progression so perfect, that the developers had time to really mess around with the features and deeper elements of the game and imho the result was the best span of Madden games we've ever seen, maybe the 05, 06, and 07 games.

They are yet to reach that level this generation though and when you have to release a game every year and you're under pressure to somehow make it different enough to put something on the back of the box, you are programmed to care less about the smaller things, including something like progression/CPU logic being broken.

[StrawHat Patriot]

Quote: Originally Posted by T-Moar

I think the guys in charge of creative development (Looman, Moore, et al.) probably do. They seem to have at least a passing knowledge of how it's played in webcasts and on Twitter. But the people actually programming the game? Absolutely not. And honestly, if it were my job to code the game, I probably wouldn't play it either. Furthermore, even if nobody involved in the game's development ever actually played the release version, I'm not sure that I'd attribute the lack of bug fixes to that fact. I think we all underestimate how much work EA absolutely HAS to do in a given year to get this game on the market. They have to touch up the graphics, add any new uniforms/stadiums/whatever else, update the rosters, and at the same time, include a few new "back of the box" features to keep the casual crowd coming back, all the while making sure that the game's features work on a fundamental level. It may not sound like a lot, but that is a TON of work. And on top of all that, you want them to go back through the entire game, identify what is causing the bug in question, and then fix it entirely? Do you realize how difficult that would be? I think we, as sports gamers, need to accept the fact that a yearly development cycle isn't really conducive to fixing problems that aren't exactly egregious. On a tangentially related note, does anybody remember "Developer Night," or whatever it was called, when the devs sat in the lobby and played the random people that challenged them? I remember that I was on Wii back then, and one of the devs cheesed the hell out of me with Adrian Peterson, who was unstoppable at the time.

But they have a lot of money, so can't they just use two teams?

Also, other games are you usually acclaimed for they're realism, so why is it so hard for Madden?

[PVarck31]

I know for a fact Ian played Madden online with guys like us, and randoms to see exploits and how he could fix them.

We also have to realize that the Madden team is large. Its not just the guys we hear about. Watch the credits. I am sure some of them play the game after release.

Another thing, we will be playing 13 from, say...August to December or January. They will be playing 14 from around August to July. So really when you look at it they play it a ton. Yeah it might be their job, but like others have said, I doubt they will put in the time we do with the game when we get home at night.

Last night at 2:30 am Josh Looman tweeted that he was working on progression in CC. This is 2:30am when he should have been in bed and home with his family. If anyone wants to call the devs lazy refer to that., Oh, and he even answered a question I tweeted him.

Make no mistake, I am not using any of this as an excuse for gameplay issues. Its just that I think there are many other factors that effect gameplay problems than whether the devs play the game outside of work or not.

[mrprice33]

Quote: Originally Posted by StrawHat Patriot

But they have a lot of money, so can't they just use two teams? Also, other games are you usually acclaimed for they're realism, so why is it so hard for Madden?

You do realize EA lost about 300 million dollars last year, right?