NCAA Football 09 Postmortem

[bangpow]

Quote: Originally Posted by StormJH1

MMChris had a pretty good analysis of this as a "B" game. The things that are wrong with the gameplay have been so conistently wrong with EA titles for years, that to try to explain it to someone who hasn't tried an alterative approach like 2k5 or APF 2k8 is almost impossible. I'm talking about suction blocks, robo QB, and pre-canned animations during the running game. If you were able to suspend disbelief with this game, online dynasty and roster sharing were two MAJOR improvements to this franchise, and the reason that this was the first next-gen football title I bought on release date. I've had fun with it almost in spite of the gameplay b/c of those features. But to me, this franchise will not improve this generation unless they return to some of the core gameplay flaws that remain. #1 among those is the fact that you really don't control a great deal of what goes on. NCAA even lags behind Madden in the fact that you CANNOT reliably control the arc or velocity of your passes, and there's no true throw the ball 10 yards past a streaking receiver and have him run it down. Balls are thrown directly to receivers, and it's pretty much determined the moment the ball is in the air if it's going to be an INT (which becomes a pick-6 probably 80% of the time). That's a problem. So is the fact that there is no real ability to pick running lanes, or fight through contact. Fix those, and I could justify another $60 for 2010.

I actually thought they did a great job with the ball trajectory in NCAA 08 after they released a patch for it. It was great because I could actually throw a ball behind a LB and in front of a Safety.

In fact, here's a prefect example of it.

http://www.easportsworld.com/en_US/video/165167

[bangpow]

Going back on NCAA 08 for a second, they were actually a few key tweaks away from making that game awesome. I saw no need for "wide open gameplay".

I'll tell what buzz word I'm sick of hearing and that's whether or not a game is "accessible". While Nintendo sells a lot of units because of how they dumb down their games, I'm tired of all these studios using that as a reference point to make their games more "accessible".

That "accessibility" kind of gets in the way from what the community wants, I think. At least in the way that they tried to make NCAA more accessible by dumbing down the AI so we can wing the ball all over the field.

They do a better job of adding football teaching tools in Madden with the backtrack feature and what not. And it helps immerse us in the game even though Madden still needs a lot of work in that regard.

But speaking more on "accessiblity", I feel that EA hasn't taken the hardcore community seriously. Like, the "hardcore" community wants things so hardcore that it will turn off the "casual" fans. I think that also goes back to the not know how to find that balance.

Case in point, I was reading an interview with Ken Levin, who made Bioshock. He embraced the hardcore community, but found a nice balance for more of the fringe fans. Check out this quote...

""You know how there are kids who listen to music, like it, dance it and get into it, but then there's that weird kid in the back of the classroom who'll be writing all the Nirvana lyrics on his notebook," Levine asked. "That's the level of the people who get into the game that you have to support."

That's the crowd for whom the developers threw in a host of wrinkles, obscure clues, and little touches to help flesh out the story. The key, according to Levine, is that all the extra depth for the hardcore fan cannot be allowed to get in the way of the experience for the more casual player who just wants something along the lines of Madden or Halo. "

I guess that sums up what I was trying to say. They need to do a better job of finding that balance.

[rudyjuly2]

Bangpow, the cpu INT problems in NCAA '08 were just too much to bear. I personally felt NCAA '09 was a lot better. The wide open gameplay still didn't feature any deep passes so I don't even think the gameplay was that wide open. For my skill level, the sliders made the game very good and not wide open. My biggest problem was the terrible cpu running game.

[fistofrage]

Quote: Originally Posted by rudyjuly2

Bangpow, the cpu INT problems in NCAA '08 were just too much to bear. I personally felt NCAA '09 was a lot better. The wide open gameplay still didn't feature any deep passes so I don't even think the gameplay was that wide open. For my skill level, the sliders made the game very good and not wide open. My biggest problem was the terrible cpu running game.

Rudy, what were your sliders again begin I am not seeing problems(at least stat wise) with the AI running game, except when they elect to use the Cement Shoe Shuffle QB choice play with a slow QB.

[bangpow]

Again, it wasn't perfect, but I feel that I actually have to work for my yards more in NCAA 08. Oh, and it's nice being able to get some sacks and force the opposing QB's into bad throws.

NCAA 08 does have a bit of fumblitis, I will say that as well. I still like it better overall.

[bangpow]

And Wide Open Gameplay is definitely wide open. I threw nothing but deep balls one game to test the AI and it was ridiculous on how many I completed while using North Carolina.

[rudyjuly2]

Quote: Originally Posted by fistofrage

Rudy, what were your sliders again begin I am not seeing problems(at least stat wise) with the AI running game, except when they elect to use the Cement Shoe Shuffle QB choice play with a slow QB.

On anything less than Heisman I would put human defensive awareness at 0, human break block at 0, cpu run block at 100 and cpu RBA at 70. It was rare to see a 100 yard rusher against me in even matchups or where the cpu was the better team. On Heisman I would use the same settings except I had human def. awareness around 70. I know that probably hurt the running game but I did it to help stop the cpu QB from completing a ton of passes.

If I drop human break block to 0 and increase cpu run block to 100, their OL should be man handling me and they never did on any level. The fact I never saw it on Heisman was dumbfounding this year. The only real way to boost the cpu running attack was boosting the cpu RBA which would allow them to break a long run every once in awhile but I just never saw the methodical rushing attack stuff it down my throat. I've always been able to fix this in the past as the default cpu rushing attack is usually horrible but the weak sliders this year made that virtually impossible. I do play as a LB against the cpu.

[fistofrage]

Quote: Originally Posted by rudyjuly2

On anything less than Heisman I would put human defensive awareness at 0, human break block at 0, cpu run block at 100 and cpu RBA at 70. It was rare to see a 100 yard rusher against me in even matchups or where the cpu was the better team. On Heisman I would use the same settings except I had human def. awareness around 70. I know that probably hurt the running game but I did it to help stop the cpu QB from completing a ton of passes. If I drop human break block to 0 and increase cpu run block to 100, their OL should be man handling me and they never did on any level. The fact I never saw it on Heisman was dumbfounding this year. The only real way to boost the cpu running attack was boosting the cpu RBA which would allow them to break a long run every once in awhile but I just never saw the methodical rushing attack stuff it down my throat. I've always been able to fix this in the past as the default cpu rushing attack is usually horrible but the weak sliders this year made that virtually impossible. I do play as a LB against the cpu.

Yeah, you have to lower that Human awareness. I see the AI with teams like Wisconsin, Colorado State, VT and others put together some solid drives running the ball.