Tiburon – Page 2 – NoobTubeTV

Should Sports Games Be A Biennial Release?

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!

Beware of Slider Nazis – Madden 13

We are only a few days from the release of NCAA 13 and just over a month from Madden 13. That being said, you can almost smell the football in the air. Unfortunately, you can also smell the elitist sports gamers over the internet. Readying their little fingers to type angry messages in response to your excited ~~Franchise Mode~~ Connected Career performance updates that may or may not include winning a Super Bowl with the Cleveland Browns in 2013.

Usually your success with a ‘weaker’ team is going to be attributed to your Slider Settings. These wonderful additions to sports games have been around for awhile. They are meant to act as a way for you (the end user) to tune the gameplay in order for you to either make the game play like your opinion of simulation (or Arcade – which Madden is usually a fine example of every year). It then becomes a war of words and Slider Settings in the messageboards and sports gaming communities.

Your typical interaction with a slider nazi could sound (read) like this.

———

You – I just won the Super Bowl with the Browns! It was amazing! We managed to sweep the AFC North behind the amazing play of Trent Richardson (led the league in rushing and TDs) and our under-rated defense! We beat the Cowboys 24-10 as Brandon Weeden connected with Josh Cribbs on a screen pass that ended up sealing the deal late in the game!

Responding (Hater) Slider Nazi – You obviously have to change your sliders! There is no way the Browns will EVER win a Super Bowl, let alone this year. You need to make sure your run blocking is tuned down if Trent Richardson is leading the league as a rookie. Not to mention the fact that the Browns are terrible… wow. big props to you on beating the weak CPU to a pulp. Did you have the difficulty set to Rookie?

———

There are two ways to look at this conversation and neither of them is necessarily wrong.

1 – If you enjoy your game, no one should be able to tell you how to enjoy it otherwise. If you truly have a good time winning the Super Bowl with ANY team, let alone a team like the Browns, Cavaliers, Kansas City Royals, Western Michigan or Columbus Blue Jackets… more power to you.

2 – There is something to be said for a game giving you a challenge. While the reactions of many sports gamers (such as the example above) are blown out of proportion, you should often consider if your sliders are providing you with the best challenge while still being fair to both sides. I have played 18 Collective Seasons in Madden 12’s Franchise Mode with teams such as the Browns, Bears and Jaguars. I won a few Super Bowls with the Browns and decided I wanted a new challenge so I switched teams and tweaked my sliders. It was three seasons before I won a Super Bowl with the Bears and the Jaguars team I inherited after leaving the Bears is going to be rough to work with.

Madden 13 – Selling Armsleeves?

Enough is enough, while there are numerous pet peeves among gamers (and sports gamers in-particular) you would think it would hinge on something that made gameplay more of the focus.

It seems that the new generation of gamers and the apparent generation of developers had decided to focus on the material aspect of the NFL and the players.

You would think that there would be more of a focus on things like Pass Interference or maybe even the terrible o-line/d-line interactions. Then again, there are other numerous problems that the hardcore fans tend to forget when they see things like… armsleeves.

Madden 13’s Fall From Grace – An Abrupt Turn For The Worst?

If you consider the way Madden was going with their announcements of Connected Careers Mode and Real Time Physics it seemed as if the sky was the limit.

Now it feels like someone has come to your 4th of July party and taken all of your fireworks.

EA Tiburon has announced many new limitations for Madden 13 since the vaunted reveal of Connected Careers.

play_madden13ts_576 — Darren McFadden should probably have an injured knee, back or right arm after this hit. However, thanks to EA and the NFL, this will most likely result in nothing more than a regular tackle and recovery… every single time.

– You can no longer play more than one game per week and it must be for only your team.

This is a big deal for people that like to play random games along the way of their season to expand their enjoyment of the league as teams evolve… or to throw games like the 1919 White Sox so their team can make the playoffs. Either way it goes, this limitation is silly and only hurts EA from the perspective of once again taking away any sort of further depth a gamer may want.

– Editing players is completely gone for Connected Careers.

Perhaps the biggest kick in the analog stick was the news that you can only edit players for Play Now games but not for your team before you start your Connected Careers Mode. So, not only can you not edit your players… but now you have to hope that you bought the game new and got the $10 Roster Update Code included with the retail release. Then you have to suffer the more unfortunate fate of having to depend on the Ratings Czar, Donny Moore.

– Madden still depends on the the ‘all-important’ Speed Rating

Please understand that this isn’t new or even an announcement. However, it is still a major issue that annoys us to no end. Football is the one game that is more than just fast guys running everything 80 yards for a TD. It is a game of strength, awareness, determination, size and motivation (of which only one is a ‘rating’, Strength). This leads us to our next limitation which is a continuation…

– Ratings still determine everything…and nothing.

Madden football has turned into a bastardized arcade version of simulation NFL Football. There are ratings (like Speed) that mean everything to a player. Then there are ratings (Awareness) that are some sort of mysterious presence that make a player’s Overall Rating but little else really comes out of it. One of the things that All Pro Football 2K8 got right was taking those number ratings away from your view and made you ask yourself…”Can this guy play football?”

That is the real question facing Madden and NCAA.

Are these games really football?

Something that has troubled many football fans lately is the constant focus on ‘safety’. If you want to be safe, play golf. Football is about blood, guts, glory, concussions, playing hurt and yes… violence. It is a game where every single play the goal is to destroy the player carrying the ball. The NFL is taking it away from the game as much as they can but EA is taking it away altogether.

There are no late hits in Madden NFL Football.

There are no real time injuries to go with real time physics.

There are no roster edits for your (or any other team) before you start a Career Mode.

Which really starts to beg the question. What exactly is in Madden outside of a couple of what now seem to be aesthetic changes to the game?

Are you angry with EA Tiburon’s approach to football games? Vent below…

Madden 13 – No Editing Players Could Destroy Much of the Hype

While it hasn’t been officially ruled out for Madden 13, it has been stated that much of editing players outside of the XP System we mentioned a few days ago isn’t going to be an option when Madden 13 is released. So, it remains to be seen if it is a certainty that it will be removed this year… however, in regards to what this means for the gaming community it is three-fold.

EA Sports has once again ‘removed’ something that was in past iterations of Madden NFL. Which baffles almost everyone that pays the slightest amount of attention to the game. The reason this is so baffling is because EA Tiburon is constantly reinventing Madden. When will they decide that this game is powered by their dedicated community and the edits they make to everything from ratings to playbooks (also not editable this year).
Relying on Donny Moore for roster updates and his subjective ratings changes that vary depending on who had a good game from week to week. The Ratings Czar is going to be on the spot this year if they don’t allow roster and ratings edits. Not to mention the fact that this once again keeps offline gamers out of the loop entirely.
A promising amount of hype is being overshadowed by what is looking more and more like regression on the part of EA and their dedication to allowing the end-user any sort of autonomy with their game.

Madden is still looking like a game to put on your ‘must have’ list in late August, but this latest news is troubling on many levels and it doesn’t bode well for this game from the perspective of roster-editing.

Madden 13 E3 Information – Connected Careers Impresses… Initially

CCdevblog_656x369 — Connected Careers… finally something to talk about with career modes… you know, instead of screaming in all caps and bold.

The Madden team has recently had it’s feet put to the fire here at NoobTubeTV for some of the improvements that should be made either this year or five years ago. Today the EA Tiburon dropped some of the best news they could have and it is connected to all career modes, literally.

Connected Careers (in short) is going to allow you to do everything you could do between Franchise Mode, Superstar and Online Franchise all in one swoop.

However, the only information missing is the actual logic in trades and how that valuation may or may not have been tweaked since last year.

Either way it goes, Madden 13 seems to have finally jumped ahead of NCAA Football for now… and it only took six years.

Madden 13 – Is It Worth $60 At This Point?

*We have had multiple posts about Madden since this article. Please check those out for more details. We will have full reviews of Madden as soon as it is released!

The improvements being made to Madden 13 are catching some eyes around the sports gaming world. The problem is that outside of some improvements being made to make the game’s eye-candy stick out we are still waiting to hear about the much needed improvements to Career Modes. They have already announced that there will be something that ties career modes to an interactive web-based experience. However, the fact that Online Franchise Mode has been bare-bones for three iterations is something that really takes away from any sort of community experience.

Madden 13 Lynch — Girls and Games Are Alike… Good looks only get you so far.

With the still struggling interactions between O-Lineman and D-Lineman rendering many plays broken (Play Action Passes, just for one example) and then coupling that with other poor AI and animations… you have many questions still left unanswered. Granted, we still have a few months until the game is released, it is worth considering whether or not Madden 13 will be something you are better off buying pre-owned rather than brand new. Rest assured that the game isn’t something you will need to pre-order in most cases as it is often readily available on launch day.

Outside of the chance that Madden 13 blows everyone away with some sort of new gimmick that EA will remove (See ProTAK, Procedural Awareness, Tuners, etc.) it will remain as a game that should be approached as nothing more than a roster update with a slight graphical facelift. You can find Madden 12 online for around $20 on Amazon right now; if you are having that football itch that requires Madden to fill the gap, you would probably be okay to spend $20 on Madden 12 before pre-ordering Madden 13 at this point.

The moments of truth will hopefully come around the time that E3 starts in June. Keep in mind that in our last brief write-up for Madden we focused on the hype machine and how it can suck people in early on in a game’s cycle. You should keep your hopes up but also keep your expectations low. Even with the reactions from EA Tiburon’s Community Days and the ‘dedicated Madden fans’ being posted, it would be a good idea to take their impressions with a grain of salt. Remember, they have to sign Non-Disclosure Agreements and you don’t often hear too much negativity coming from people that get preferential treatment (why would you bite the hand that feeds?).

Once we get to June and July there will be a lot more information out there that EA wants to release. In that case, you shouldn’t lose total hope in Madden or NCAA Football just yet; but you should also keep yourself grounded if you are hoping for groundbreaking improvements.

Da Bears Madden 12 Franchise Mode – Season 2 Highlights and Recap

As much as we like to talk about what we wish EA would put into Franchise Mode for Madden 13. As much as we might even complain about the silly nature of some of the things that happen in Madden 12… This game is almost addicting to the point that Madden 2005 was and that is a good thing if they continue to build from this solid base.

That said, this is how Season 2 panned out.

Amos High was drafted by the Bears in the first round out of Georgia Tech. He was highly rated but still managed to fall to the Bears after they traded down. That would prove to be their best decision yet… Amos High went on a tear in the second half of the 2012 season and finished with 1900+ yards and 15 TDs rushing. He would then bring home Offensive Rookie of the Year and League MVP (with RB of the Year as well).

To go along with this amazing season – Jay Cutler won QB of the Year, Mike Williams won WR of the year and Henry Melton won DLineman of the Year!

The Bears have tremendous talent on their team and are built to win and contend for the Super Bowl. The question isn’t if they can get there, because this is the second straight year they were within one game of the Super Bowl. Both years we have seen Lovie Smith’s team get outclassed late in the game and that isn’t a good sign for the Chicago’s Head Coach. It is widely speculated that 2013 might be his last if they don’t break this trend.

We will be posting recaps of the Draft and some of the off-season moves as well.

Some of the needs going into 2013 are –

#1 TE
#2 CB
#1 LG
Future MLB (Urlacher is on the decline, but will retire a Chicago Bear…. No Question About That)
Future RE (Julius Peppers is starting to age, albeit while still getting double-digit sacks at 33 years old, but the Bears need to be honest with themselves)
#1 RG

Stay Tuned! Updates Are Coming!