I was never a fan of Role Playing Games as a kid. Some people consider it sacrilege when I say that I never played and have never had an interest in Final Fantasy IV. I never played (and have never played) Dungeons and Dragons, but I would love to!
Final Fantasy 7 usually tops many lists as the best RPG ever made.
It wasn’t until I was in 9th Grade that I jumped into Final Fantasy VII. The only reason I made the plunge was because I had some extra money and picked it up at Electronics Boutique in the local mall. I was hooked from the start. Something about the story grabbed me. Was it the underlying politics or corrupt energy company (I’m looking at you AEP >:{ ) taking the life-force of the planet? Was it the ability to rename Cloud (and every other character) as I saw fit? Who knows… all I do know is that I loved the stories that all came together like Pulp Fiction. (Virtually the same thing can be said for Final Fantasy VIII in my case as well)
This brings a new conversation almost 15 years later.
Why haven’t I played/enjoyed a turn-based RPG sense FFVII and FFVIII?
Have tastes changed?
The most successful RPGs in recent history have been The Elder Scrolls and Fallout series from Bethesda Studios (at least from a sales perspective). The entire focus of gaming has gone first person. Whether it is shooters or journey games like Borderlands or the aforementioned titles from Bethesda.
Are we so obsessed with shooting things and having real-time control at all times to that we have forgotten what it is like to play a turn-based game with an amazing story?
What happened to great stories?
The downfall of Bethesda’s titles is that they are so predictable that by the time you play them for 30 minutes you can pretty much figure out how it ends.
The last game that provided me with an ending that I found satisfactory was Red Dead Redemption. While that doesn’t really fit this RPG discussion, it does add to the fact that we really don’t have a single turn-based ‘typcial’, ‘old-school’ RPG that reaches a massive market of gamers.
Any suggestions?
So, the question is out there for the NTTV readership/community. Actually, there are two questions –
What is your favorite turn-based game?
What are the best turn-based RPGs out on current gen systems (360, PS3 and PC)?
When you are shooting people online it is a great feeling. When you are getting shot by other people online it is almost enough to make you scream and rage quit (not that I have ever been guilty of that…ahem, anyway…).
If you take a look at the status of gaming and the draw for people to play multi-player games online it is almost the sole marketing campaign for every developer and publisher. This pushes people to level up, buy add-ons, sequels and other accessories all in the name of digital violence.
It seems that Call of Duty is the audio version of what used to be chat-rooms back in the mid/late 1990s. You have all the same characters. The racist, the homophobe(s), the ethnic stereotypes, the wanna-be rappers, the random ‘real girl’ and then the completely silent gamer.
The silent gamer is actually becoming the most common character you will come across in most online multi-player console games. It is interesting because multi-player in its essence gives the impression that there is some sort of socializing. There is in-fact very little socializing in multi-player games and even less team-work. That is when the silent gamer is at his/her most annoying.
Dear Silent Gamer,
We don’t need to know anything personal about you but it would be awesome if you could help your team out instead of camping on a mountain with a sniper rifle. Not to mention, you are kinda bad at your chosen ‘strategy’ and we could use you as support.
All Major Rookies (This list will be updated as we get closer and into camp for the 2012 Season)
Undrafted Free Agents such as (Case Keenum, JB (Jeff on the Browns Roster) Shugarts and many more!) – Please send requests in our comments section below or to officialnoobtubetv@gmail.com
Retired Players (Rated down to 12 OVR in order to render a retirement after your first year of Franchise Mode, not just moved to Punter or Kicker (for the most part))
Re-Rated Players (Sparingly performed, this is always a subjective issue anyway)
Depth Chart Changes (this is subject to major changes as we approach team camps)
***IN ORDER TO DOWNLOAD AND USE THIS ROSTER (AND FUTURE FILES) ON THE XBOX 360!!!***
Please go to this link at Operation Sports for a complete walkthrough. These programs may not work with Linux or Mac, so be fore-warned!
Madden 13’s Roster Update is going to be live for you on XBox 360 soon… in the form of a Madden 12 Roster Overhaul!
Browns fans should be excited to use Trent Richardson! He will be an absolute BEAST!
If you have been looking for updated Rosters for Madden 12 will all Rookies and Roster Moves – you are in luck.
There are rosters currently under development with cross-referenced information to make sure all players are correctly listed on Madden 12.
Also, there are efforts being made to find a workaround to mod the entire list of players in Madden as well. As it is currently, EA seems to have put major encryptions within their roster files to protect them from universal edits, etc. Basically, this means that they want to force you to buy their annual roster update for $60+ if you want the new players on your favorite teams.
The first edition will be posted in the next few days. Please be patient as it isa lot of work and tends to be time-consuming. We would appreciate donations as you download these files as well.
Many ratings will be coming from the good people at FBGRatings.com and any other ratings will be strictly from NoobTubeTV.
If you have questions or player requests, please let us know.
Yesterday was a great day for gaming. 100+ degree heat advisories outside and wonderful air conditioning inside after a morning jog.
A full day of recording footage was on the horizon and nothing was going to ruin that.
After joining up in a squad with a couple of fellow gamers from 2old2play.com (a great site for gamers that are 25+ years of age) we went to work as a team and our scores were showing exactly that. It wasn’t until over 30 minutes in the game that I was booted.
Has this ever happened to you? Which server/admin was it? Put them on blast so other gamers can avoid the same fate of wasted time while playing legitimately. Keep in mind, we weren’t nor do we support spawn camping in any game. So, if you have been booted or banned for doing that – we support the Admins for doing it. Otherwise, shoot us a comment!
While there have been a lot of detractors (yours truly included) coming out against EA’s decision to keep roster editing out of Madden 13’s Connected Careers Mode, there are some things to consider before you decide to hate it entirely.
There is something behind not having control of every aspect of rosters once you start a franchise mode or dynasty. The biggest (most obvious) downfall is if the coding for progression and regression is bad (see Madden 09, 10, 11, etc.). However, if the coding and player development is good (see the possibilities for Madden 13’s new XP system) you might have one heck of a deep career mode that will allow you to truly develop players and teams as you feel they should.
If you edit Phil Dawson to have 99 Kick Power and Accuracy you should have to pay for it. In Madden 13 you have to earn it rather than change it.
In Madden 12, they opened up player editing during Franchise Mode and it was/is awesome. However, the downfall is that you have to really find a way to be honest about your edits and then make sure that you do the same thing for other players and teams across the board. If your player did well but didn’t progress as you feel he should have, you had the ability to make sure his ratings went up as they’should have’. The problem with this is that it can ruin the longevity of a Franchise Mode when you have a team that becomes too good either because you edited them that way or you are just great at using the fastest players in the game.
It is nice to develop a great team, but it is even nicer when you have to spend points and be honest with how you go about it. If you want to make Brandon Weeden have 99 SPD, you will have to spend a ton of points to do so. While this seems unrealistic, ask yourself how much more realistic it would be if you simply went in and edited him to be that way. It wouldn’t be realistic at all and you are now stuck looking at Madden 13’s lack of player editing from a more honest perspective.
The main problem with Madden’s Franchise Mode in-particular has never really been in progression/regression anyway. The issue that is the most obvious is the way players and draft picks are valued. A player might come in and do an amazing job out of the blue (Matt Cassel for Tom Brady in 2009 is one example). He then went on to get a big contract offer from the Chiefs where he has been average/above average at best. The moral of the story is that Madden hasn’t ever really taken this into account. The player’s value has always been based around his ratings (OVR mostly) and that isn’t how business is always done in the NFL (unless your name is Al Davis (RIP)).
For Connected Careers to work as it should, there needs to be a better value system for players that forces teams to have to make decisions on whether or not the player will work in their Franchise and system.
This is the next aspect that has never been in Madden…. Do players FIT THE SYSTEM?
Stop wondering why the Browns seem so slow, even on the line. Granted, they are supposed to fit the system… although, they don’t seem to know what system it is. (Go Browns!)
More goes into how a player is chosen for a team other than ‘Is he qualified?’
The Patriots and Bill Belichick drafted a player out of Ohio State that played more rugby than football. They also picked up Danny Woodhead and made him into a valuable part of their team (and he is only 5’8″ 195lbs).
Woodhead is small, but he works for their system.
There are other examples such as different defensive schemes such as the 3-4 and 4-3 that require different styles, sizes and speeds for defensive linemen and linebackers. There are certain offensive schemes that don’t require a receiver to be fast as long as he can run good routes and catch the ball (West Coast).
Do you think someone like Tim Tebow would succeed outside of Denver if he had to take every snap from the center rather than playing college-style?
If you run a 3-4 offense and need fast, athletic linebackers the last person you want to look for is going to be an average speed 6’5″ 270 lbs… you will most likely want to look for a fast and lean 6’3″ 240 lb mean S.O.B. that doesn’t care about anything other than ripping faces off of QBs.
Every position is important, but in Madden that doesn’t seem to be the case. Again, say what you want about real-time physics and other improvements. Those are needed and extremely valuable, but when it comes down to longevity for their most vaunted mode and biggest overhaul in years EA needs to make sure that more than just ratings truly matter.
If you aren’t football savvy here is a quick example:
Two people are applying for a car sales job.
The first person is fresh out of college with a degree in marketing and experience working a retail sales job part-time. They have a good, confident attitude to eventually work at the corporate level and maybe someday head up a department or possibly their own company.
The second person graduated from high school and then spent two years at a community college. They have a strong personality and make you feel like you have known them forever. They are also from the region and have strong ties to the area.
Who gets the job? The second person gets the job. Why? Because they fit the system.
If you consider our past reviews and comments on NCAA and Madden Football you will often notice a bit of a jaded view on their development, creativity and AI (Artificial Intelligence) for the CPU controlled players. This brings something to mind that has been suggested by multitudes of unhappy sports gamers – a biennial release/development cycle.
Most people can agree that sports titles coming out every single year are often no more than roster updates and beta-tests for possible future implementations (see ProTAK in Madden or Mascot Games …smh… in NCAA Football). It isn’t really unheard of to have biennial development. Call of Duty still manages to have a new title every year, but they are actually on a two year cycle with Treyarch and Infinity Ward getting a shot every other year. You can say what you want about how good or bad those titles are, but fact of the matter is that they bring something new to the table strictly because each developer has their one small twist on how the game should play.
Madden and NCAA could use a break every other year. The fact that EA has the sole license to develop these titles doesn’t really allow for this argument to go any further than a pipe-dream. However, take a moment to imagine how much better some of these sports games would be in a two-year cycle rather than ten-month cycle.
2K Sports is a prime example of doing well with one game and AWFUL with another. Their basketball titles are among the best ever made. Unfortunately, their baseball titles are some of the most glitchy and straight up bad looking sports games out there. If they were able to jump back into the football fray it would really force EA to step up their game.
This is where the biennial release of an NFL game for each company might pay off. The downfall is that some people hate how 2K Football games play and feel. It isn’t like being able to pick up Black Ops after Modern Warfare. It is more like playing baseball and swinging the bat right-handed all season and then being told that you have to be left-handed next year.
The only other option that will allow the proper amount of improvement is to allow developers to have equal access to make officially licensed sports titles and then let the consumer decide. EA bought the rights because they knew that they couldn’t compete with some of the things that 2K was doing. It was a smart business decision, but it was a cowardly way to punk out of having any sort of competition to drive the quality of their games.
How do you feel about this? Vote in the poll or comment below and be heard!
Football is the most popular sport in the United States. The people that love the game know it and the hardcore fans of football video games know it too. So, why does it seem like EA Sports doesn’t really give a damn?
New cover athlete, same game.
If you consider the fact that the only option you have for a legitimate football title (pro or college) is limited to EA Sports, that should tell you enough. Then you get to live the annual nightmare of playing the same game with different glitches and problems.
The saddest part about NCAA Football is that for a few years it actually stepped up its game enough to be preferred over Madden. Now we are seeing it fall back into the grand old EA trap of “If it works, let’s break it!” and “If it is broken, let’s put something in slow-motion or ignore it altogether.”
NCAA Football 13 relies heavily on Dynasty Mode for the bulk of its players. One thing that had been part of NCAA Football for over a decade was being able to export your draft classes to Madden after each year of college football. While this transition often translated to poorly rated NFL Draft Counter-Parts and other problems (every black player having dreadlocks back in Madden 08, for example) – it was still one heck of a cool feature to have.
Now it is gone.
You have a ‘new’ scouting system and some new ways to sell recruits, but what it all really boils down to is – nothing has really changed. It has either been tweaked or taken away.
You will (supposedly) notice players have to ‘see’ the ball to make a play on it, but that won’t last long as EA has never had anything like this in a football title and likely will find a way to screw this up like they did with ‘Rocket Catching’ and Linebackers that compensate for bad AI with the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound.
You might look at this as a harsh criticism, but what it really boils down to is the fact that EA Sports’ football titles are like settling for White Castle’s Sliders. You may like it at first, but you will pay the price later.
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