I'm back!

[TheDutchDad]

LOL poor guy...he's not back more than a few hours and he's being blasted with tons of bugs.

[chickenhed]

Quote: Originally Posted by Mercurial23

LOL poor guy...he's not back more than a few hours and he's being blasted with tons of bugs.

I think that also shows people's love for the game. If they didn't enjoy playing it so much, they certainly would not bother reporting any issues/bugs.

Glad you are back Josh! Still loving the game and am very glad you are continuing to support it.

[delusional]

Quote: Originally Posted by steelraccoon

Two things that i think need to be looked at still involve the CPU AI. The CPU (opposing) teams defenses are still very very tought o run against. It's a combination of the defensive players knowing exactly what the play is and the Offensive (player controlled) linemen not sticking to the correct blocking assignments. Many players on the forums are still posting that they are having to use "trick" plays just to get decent yards per carry for their HB/FB.

Yes i have noticed this lately. Counters, screens are sometimes impossible to run, it seems the playbook knowledge is playing too much of a part into some plays.

[Brassman]

Hi Josh,

Congratulations on your wedding and here’s to you for some well earned R & R. I guess you can see by the growing number of posts that the honeymoon is over but I’m sure I can speak for everyone here in saying that we’re glad to have you back. Forgive us if we sometimes sound impatient or critical. It’s just it’s been a long time since we’ve actually had the chance to interact with a games designer or his development team. Our collective hope is that we can help you make HC 09 better and HC 10 the game we’ve been waiting years to play. That said, could you give us some design background and maybe add a few suggestions as to how we may influence the game to play better in a couple critical areas? First, Josh the line play seems to be completely broken. I know coaching skills and playbook knowledge play a big part but this seems to be affecting everyone to a certain extent. Despite the highly detailed player attributes included in the game most running plays are blown up in the backfield by a super penetrating front 7. This is greatly affecting running plays and drastically reducing rushing yardage. Yet there is a noticeable lack of penetration on passing plays along with an unnatural amount of pancakes. (Except during screen passes which the CPU seems to regard as running plays) This lack of pressure is leading to higher than average passer ratings and inflated passing yardage. What can be done to allow players attributes to be more of a factor and make the defense front 7 less aggressive on running plays and more aggressive on passing plays? Is this a “feature” of the Madden game engine or is this something that can be corrected by slider adjustments or in a possible patch? Next, HC 09 is a highly detailed strategy game and yet there is little, if any, information available during a game on your opponents’ personal. As we can’t always see players’ numbers we don’t know which players are on the field, what packages their running, who’s been injured, etc. Some kind of substitution notification along with an on field roster or huddle diagram would be a great addition. And last, during a game when I make a play adjustment from the clipboard the screen changes to the overhead camera angle. Why? This is very annoying. Can something be done so it stays with the currently selected camera angle?

Thanks for allowing us a place to vent. Hopefully these are useful observations that can help you make HC 10 the perfect football coaching game.

PS. I can’t believe that there is no visual notification that a play has been challenged? Other than the instant replay popping up you’d never know. With the attention given to detailed sideline cut scenes and coach/player reactions I’d have thought that seeing your opponent toss a challenge flag would have been included.

[sixtydashone]

Might want to get somebody to look at the playbook server for 360. As far as I know it has not been working properly for at least a week or two, although I have not tried it recently.

[DLaren]

Welcome back Josh and congrats on the wedding!

The patch addressed the issues that I was having with the game, but ultimately there are certain things that were carried over from Madden'08 that made me move on from HeadCoach'09.

Thanks for you and your teams continued support this many weeks after release and if EA greenlights another HC game, hopefully the community here will have an opportunity to positively impact it's developement.

[claystone]

Welcome back Josh. Congrats on your wedding.

Here are the issues I've found.

1. Personnel
(The AI is not reading the personnel coming out. On the play screen it says 2HB with 2WR, but when my opponents comes out on the field, they are in a 4WR set. I can't nor my DC call the right personnel. We are always at a mismatch. It seems the AI is going by tendencies instead of personnel. This is a game killer because you can't have a fair game. Most of our personnel is not matching.)

2. O-Line Blocking:
(I was playing around and I put my QB at center and my HB at LG and WR at RG, and they were able to block D-Lineman?!?!? I was able to drive down the field 70yards and score a TD. It seems the AI is not taking players ratings into affect. Also my QB playing center should not be able to snap the ball let alone snap the ball in shotgun. I did this test to see if any player can play on o-line.)

(There must be a program error with the O-Line and Dline which is why there really is no pass rush. Our D-Line is always being knocked down or cut down all the time.)

Edit:
3. Coaches:
(It seems the coaches make our players too good too fast when we apply points. The game is becoming too easy. People are winning the superbowl or going to the superbowl their first year with weaker teams. Can the coaches affect be toned down to prevent this? Alot of us our not appling any points at all to prevent our team from becoming a superbowl team. We want to rebuild our team from scratch and see the progression take place with the personnel we bring in through draft, trade or FA.)

These 3 items are game killers for me. I'm using my "House Rules" to make this game as hard as possible, hopfully it works, but it would be nice if this could be addressed for HC09. The "Personnel & O-Line has no house rule for it.

Thanks

[delusional]

The O line blocking is a tricky thing. They seem to block the wrong assignments on run plays, which is leading to D players being in the back field before my RB even gets the ball. I can not average more then 3ypc a game yet.

As for pass rush, its odd too. Like suction blocking again. I noticed my DEs rushing the QB and getting sucked into a block by a tackle, where as when it happens to me, their DEs just rush right in alot or something comes through the hole unblocked.


Another thing...the chop/cut blocks by the CPU O line are a bit off the scale. Seems every play I have 2 players laying on the ground after getting their knees taken out. I can understand this with RBs blocking but not with centers, tackles and guards.