November 22, 2008

EA’s Moore: Accessibility Key in Sports Games

EA Sports President Peter Moore has been consistent in his statements: Sports games have occassionally been “too hard” for the mass audience.  The company is striving to grow and engage those who may not be past or current gamers.  One way they aim to do this is by making the Wii versions of popular EA Sports titles easier for new gamers to sit down and enjoy.

Moore noted EA Sports won’t be giving up on the core consumer. “We need to defend our multi-billion dollar business for the core consumer. Our licensed product business that has served us well for nearly two decades must be defended. But at the same time, we’ve got to captivate the masses,” he said, adding that EA Sports “can’t be so reliant on one market in the United States.”

Moore attributed that new success [increased sales on Wii versions of EA Sports titles] to a more genuine ground-up approach on the system, “and we also have a more casual, lighter, more approachable experience than you would get on the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3. …We’ll continue to invest…as a platform for EA Sports to take advantage of the consumer who maybe loves football but is intimidated by the menu screens and complexity we deliver on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.”

Also: Did you notice the smile on the face of every EA Sports cover athlete on the Wii versions this year?  That was by design.

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November 20, 2008

Madden 09 Roster Update #12

The latest Madden 09 roster update will go live tomorrow morning.

Continue on to read the full list of changes.

Keep reading →

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October 17, 2008

Madden Update from Phil Frazier

This year, the Madden development team (most notably producers Phil Frazier and Ian Cummings) have increased interaction with the Madden community.  While it began solely with an odd bedfellow (on the message board of a media site), they have begun posting updates and interacting where they belong - at EA sites including EA Sports World, the EA Forums, and through e-mails sent to administrators at community/fan sites.

Today, Madden Senior Producer Phil Frazier has continued that line of communication with the community by sending out what some have accurately termed a ‘State of Madden Address.’

Some of the highlights:

  • There will be no more updates to Madden 09 and previously discussed DLC will not be available.  (Expect the DLC offerings, including accelerated clock) in Madden 2010.)
  • The Madden team continues to work on weekly roster updates, aiming to get them out to the public every Friday during the season.
  • In Online mode, there is a new tournament challenge area the team is testing out.  In this area, fans can compete to win prizes and so far over 85,000 people have played in this test tournament.  Expect a high profile tournament around Halloween.
  • The team continues to look at feedback as they begin work on Madden 2010.

To read the entire statement, follow through the link.

Keep reading →

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October 16, 2008

First Week Sales of NBA Titles

With the lack of competition in several major sports gaming titles (NFL & college sports, for example), the NBA is a rare breed as it fields three competitors: Sony’s NBA 0X franchise, EA’s NBA Live franchise, and 2K Sports’ NBA 2K franchise.

NBA 2K has been the clear cut leader the last few years as EA rebuilt its engine for the next-gen consoles and Sony has lagged behind.

This year, NBA Live 09 took huge strides in gameplay and features (Dynamic DNA & Live 365), NBA 2K9 continued to tweak it’s winning formula, and NBA 09 tries to find its place in the market with an RPG storyline mode.  Each game offers something unique and better than the rest.  Unfortunately, none are considered the ‘complete’ package yet, though 2K9 is generally considered the closest.

Without further adieu, here are the first week PS3/360 US sales totals, according to vgchartz.com.  (Accuracy of these numbers cannot be verified, so use these numbers as general totals.)  Increase over 2007 sales in parenthesis.

NBA 2K9: 210,418 (+58%)

NBA Live 09: 111,696 (+17%)

NBA 09: The Inside: 12,153 [PS3 only] (+33%)

Read on for the breakdown by console.

Keep reading →

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October 15, 2008

EA Sports Gillette Champions of Gaming Tournament

EA Sports & Gillette have partnered up for the EA Sports Gillette Champions of Gaming Tournament.

The online event and tournament (only for X-Box 360 users via X-Box Live) is available for the following titles: FIFA Soccer 09, NBA Live 09, Madden NFL 09, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09, & NASCAR 09.

“Qualification Rounds” run from November through December, the “K.O. Rounds” in January 2009, and the Finals in February 2009.  In the “Qualification Rounds”, gamers can play games anytime they want during the week in the ‘Gillette Quick Match’ online area for each title.  The top players from the weekly leaderboards for each title will be qualified for the “K.O. Round” for each region.  In the “K.O. Round”, qualified players from each title will play for top spots in an attempt to make the finals where they will defend their regional title.  In the Finals, the three regional champions for each game will compete in Florida for the title of World Champion.

The live global finals will be conducted in Tampa, Florida, in January 2009, with the Global Champions in each gaming category competing against one of the Gillette Champions – Gillette’s group of global sports superstars that includes Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, Thierry Henry and Derek Jeter.

Registration begins October 31.  For more information & complete rules, visit EA Sports World, the EA Forums, or Gillette.

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October 14, 2008

The Latest on NCAA Basketball 09

Over the last week, news on NCAA Basketball 09 has started to trickle out from media outlets.

To see the Top 25 teams in the game, continue on after the jump.

Keep reading →

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October 13, 2008

2K Announces MLB Front Office Manager

Coming this winter, 2K Sports will be releasing MLB Front Office Manager.  Similar to EA Sports’ NFL Head Coach, this franchise will allow gamers to take control of their favorite team as a General Manager.  Gamers can make trades, promote or demote players, and even sign players from Japan.

From the press release:

“If you have ever dreamed of running your team or thought you could do a much better job than the actual general managers out there then you’ll love MLB Front Office Manager,” said Greg Thomas, senior vice president of sports development at 2K. “Baseball fanatics can now be in the general manager’s chair and see what it’s like to really try to build a World Series winning team.”

The game will feature Oakland Athletics GM Billy Beane.  Beane will provide guidance and instruction throughout the season.

MLB Front Office Manager will feature two game modes.  As a GM in Career Mode, users have 30 season in which they can attempt to build up their team, win the World Series, and end up in the Hall of Fame.  The second mode is Online Fantasy Mode.  This allows 30 gamers to create a league and determine who is the best.

The game will be developed by Blue Castle Games and published by 2K Sports.  It will be available this winter for the X-Box 360, Playstation 3, and PC.  Check out the official press release at this link.

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September 22, 2008

Madden 09 Patch #2 Coming Tonight/Early Morn Tues.

Madden lead producer Phil Frazier has kept the Madden community abreast of the status of the second Madden patch and we finally have an ETA for the patch.

From Phil himself:

I just received the email I had hoped to receive last Friday. The 360 and PS3 Madden patches will go live tonight/tomorrow morning @ 2:00 am PST/5:00 am EST. We can’t do it any earlier as this is the standard MS patch timing.

To keep up on the latest, visit this thread at the EA Forums.  For a list of what this patch addresses, click here.

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September 20, 2008

The Rundown

Tons of odds & ends to catch up on, so here we go:

  • Patch update: Madden patch #2 was first expected to be out tonight, but now seems most likely on Monday.  The NFL Head Coach patch should also be out on Monday for the 360, the PS3 version a week or two later.
  • Changes made in Madden roster update number four, courtesy of pastapadre.com.
  • NBA 2K9 Gameplay Footage: Hornets vs. Bulls, courtesy of gametrailers.com.
  • Recaps of the NCAA Basketball 09 Community Event from ncaaStrategies, 5w-g, & Vetzballin.
  • Love NHL 09, but struggling to score and understand the intracacies of hockey?  Review the Hockey 101 section on the NHL 09 website.

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September 17, 2008

The Man Behind NBA Live 09’s Synergy

IGN has posted an interview with Garrick Barr, CEO of Synergy Sports Technology.  Synergy is the company fueling the info that will be used with Live 09’s Dynamic DNA feature.

IGN: So how exactly does your company support the Dynamic DNA feature that’s in NBA Live? Are there mechanics or is it kind of an abbreviated format?

Garrick Barr: It is very detailed. They’re not using all of our data, but they’re using a very large amount of our data. I would say something like 60 percent of the categories and data and they’re diving pretty deep into what the various options are in each play type category such that the game has to support the actual play types, and I was amazed to find that, when I first saw the game and spoke with the folks at EA, how many of our play types were encompassed by the game. I think that they did some stuff to enhance what they did so that our data could drive additional situations, then they added defense (which was astounding to me that you couldn’t control defense up until this time), so it just seems like a real quantum leap in how the games are designed.

Also worth noting is that EA has already looked at using this same technology within the NCAA Basketball franchise.  At this time, 30 college teams are clients of Synergy Sports Technology, but the company has just been approved by the NCAA Compliance Committee and will be releasing a product for college use for the first time this year.

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