NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

[Sting]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

You know it's pretty scary when I read some of the posts in this thread as to how daunting EA has managed to convince the community that adding hair must be. It's almost as if we are asking for something pretty much of the highest technical complexity at this point, like adding hair would take 3 months of development time of programmers working around the clock on it exclusively.

Wishing for the moon I say, the MOON! LOL...don't know whether to laugh or cry at this point. Mission accomplished EA.

This is what blows my mind.

[ODogg]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

Yeah Sting, god forbid EA would have to be tasked to come up with a game like God of War III, the opening act would take them 17 years and they'd eventually just throw up their hands in disgust and say it was impossible, LOL!

[doctorhay53]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

It's not that it's too hard, it's that it's hard enough that they would have to spend a ton of man-hours completely re-coding their player models. Call me crazy, but I just don't see how it's worth it. Would you guys complain if they re-did the players models to give you hair but they looked like the models from '06? yes. Every hour spent completely re-building the player models to allow long hair is taken away from updating stadiums, uniforms, conference logo issues, etc. Is that a worthy trade-off from a time point of view? No. I think this is really EA's point. Not that it's 'too hard', but that it's hard enough that it isn't worth the effort at this point. Note that it isn't necessarily even the fault of the people in charge right now.

I'm with others when they say 'really, you all are this ticked off about HAIR?' Especially when there are just so many more things wrong with the game.

[fcboiler87]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

It's not that it's too hard, it's that it's hard enough that they would have to spend a ton of man-hours completely re-coding their player models. Call me crazy, but I just don't see how it's worth it. Would you guys complain if they re-did the players models to give you hair but they looked like the models from '06? yes. Every hour spent completely re-building the player models to allow long hair is taken away from updating stadiums, uniforms, conference logo issues, etc. Is that a worthy trade-off from a time point of view? No. I think this is really EA's point. Not that it's 'too hard', but that it's hard enough that it isn't worth the effort at this point. Note that it isn't necessarily even the fault of the people in charge right now.

I'm with others when they say 'really, you all are this ticked off about HAIR?' Especially when there are just so many more things wrong with the game.

The thing is, they completely redo the player models every year anyway. Why? I have no idea. It seems pretty ridiculous, because as you say, it could be time much better spent. But if you go back and look at the past few games, player models are always different. For whatever reason, they feel they must make guys look new and different every year. So since we know they are already going to recreate the models, they might as well incorporate the long hair for those who are wanting it!

[coogrfan]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

The thing is, they completely redo the player models every year anyway. Why? I have no idea. It seems pretty ridiculous, because as you say, it could be time much better spent. But if you go back and look at the past few games, player models are always different. For whatever reason, they feel they must make guys look new and different every year. So since we know they are already going to recreate the models, they might as well incorporate the long hair for those who are wanting it!

I don't believe this is correct. They may well make subtle tweaks here and there, but if memory serves the current player models debuted in NCAA 09. The fact that the player models were unchanged enabled EA to add a large number of additional alternate uni's to NCAA 10.

EDIT: straight from the horses mouth (no offense, Adam :wink: )

07 were the player models from Madden 06. They were exagerated and very large. On 08, our Art Director had the models changed to more represent college football players. On 09, we used body scan technology for the player models to make them as realistic as possible. The player models on 10 are unchanged.<!-- / message --><!-- sig -->

[moylan1234]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

I don't believe this is correct. They may well make subtle tweaks here and there, but if memory serves the current player models debuted in NCAA 09. The fact that the player models were unchanged enabled EA to add a large number of additional alternate uni's to NCAA 10.

That kind of begs the question then why didn't they add different hair options in '09 since they were changing player models anyway?

[coogrfan]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

If I had to guess I would say long hair didn't make the cut due to the cost effectivness test I spoke of previously (amount of time and effort required vs the number of gamers likely to care, or some other variation on that theme).

The fact that there are basically two people beating the drum for this here at OS tells me that hair just ain't a major concern for most NCAA fans.

[dmick4324]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

You know it's pretty scary when I read some of the posts in this thread as to how daunting EA has managed to convince the community that adding hair must be. It's almost as if we are asking for something pretty much of the highest technical complexity at this point, like adding hair would take 3 months of development time of programmers working around the clock on it exclusively.

Wishing for the moon I say, the MOON! LOL...don't know whether to laugh or cry at this point. Mission accomplished EA.

It's not that EA has convinced us, the truth of the matter is having long hair doesn't compare to most of the problems in the game. Maybe after they fix the invisible wall Shonn Greene runs into when trying to hit the hole I'll jump on the long hair bandwagon.

[Hova57]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

Hova57 - it's not just the hair, it's the fact that having no hair makes everyone look the same. It really serves to give the game a very generic, everyone is interchangeable, robot look. Go look at Madden and see how much hair can add to how unique it makes a team look. I'm sick of hearing folks saying "it's just hair". Hair is part of what makes people individuals in real life and dismissing it as such is part of the problem with this game and it's overall philosophy.

First off i think the hair hanging out of the helmets have gone way too far in real life. secondly I have none lol so its real life for me. and Lastly i think the physics , presentation of stats and team. and overall gameplay is way better than the look of hair flowing out the back of the helmet. I get what your saying but its just not something i saw in the game i would be like now we are playing football

[ODogg]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

It's not just two people, it's two people that you see in this thread. Everytime I have buddies over to play the game they always notice it. And yes I agree that there are major issues that need fixed but that doesn't excuse everything else.

And again, the common theme I hear about this game is how the players look so generic and the game just looks so awful, this and other details like it would go a long ways towards fixing that. Just take one look at Madden and then look at NCAA and that is apparent.

[coogrfan]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

1. I don't think the game looks awful. Far from it, in point of fact;
2. From a purely selfish pov it's a non-issue, as I don't believe my Coogs have a single player with hair that is long enough to be seen outside his helmet. :wink:

[RynoAid]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

yea... hair priority seems kinda like this to me..

1. Gameplay functionality (blocking logic, locomotion etc)
2. Online Dynasty enhancements (more teams per dynasty and web enabled stats
3. Playbooks and Packages (custom playbooks and mods to the playcalliing screen.
4. Game saving options (allow disconnected Dynasty games to be restarted at the point it disconnected etc..)
.
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100. Dreadlocks and Mullets.

[ODogg]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

And some people enjoy playing text sims too, what's your point?

[RynoAid]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

And some people enjoy playing text sims too, what's your point?

i think the point is, the majority of NCAA gamers would like to see more "core" game issues resolved before addressing cosmetic issues.

[ODogg]

Re: NCAA Football 11 Blog: A New Game Plan

How about EA fixing the core game while at the same time addressing the way the game looks? Frankly i'm kind of surprised EA hasn't spruced up the cosmetics before the other stuff considering that is usually their style. I'm not really huge on graphics and issues like this so much as I want the game to be less stale. Seeing everyone look the same is a big part of that.

And besides the hair, everyone mostly looks the same in other ways, unlike Madden. It's a whole issue they really need to address. College football is, if anything, more unique in how the players look than the NFL. The NFL is much more uniform in how they enforce uniform codes and look so I find it ironic that the Madden game is wildly more unique looking in how the players appear vs. NCAA.

Quite frankly i've been patient and so have a lot of folks but there is no excuse for this going on as long as it has and it has got to stop. Regardless of what you may think of hair, everyone here should hold EA accountable for the overall generic look the game has now. It's unacceptable to me.