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EA Sports Family Play Makes It Easier To Play Madden, NBA Live, And FIFA
Posted by Chris Pereira Categories: Casual, Electronic Arts, Nintendo, Sports, Wii,
Most gamers that play sports games, either casually or hardcore, have certainly run into the problem of attempting to explain complex controls to a friend – which usually results in your friend QB scrambling or shooting half court jumpers each time he or she gets the ball. But the new Family Play feature, which is debuting in this year’s Wii versions of Madden 08, NBA Live 08 and FIFA 08, is aiming to make it easier for youngsters or game novices to jump in and play against friends and family who would otherwise wipe the floor with the competition.
When playing, you can choose either Advanced or Family Play. The former allows you to make use of both the Wiimote and Nunchuk, while the latter assists the player in-game and requires them to use only the Wiimote. Family Play users will control only the key actions, like shooting, passing, throwing, etc. And by simply plugging in a Nunchuk, someone playing with the Family Play style can easily try out Advanced mode.
This sounds like a truly fantastic idea – sports games have a huge market, especially Madden, and by opening the floodgates and allowing for an otherwise complicated game to be played by most anyone, EA Sports is poised to make quite a bit more money, while also allowing gamers to begin experiencing a new genre.
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This Year’s Football Offerings Run At 60 FPS on Xbox 360, 30 on PlayStation 3
Posted by Chris Pereira Categories: Electronic Arts, Microsoft, PlayStation 3, Sports, Xbox 360,
1UP is reporting there’s a pretty major discrepancy between the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of All-Pro Football 2K8, Madden NFL 08 and NCAA Football 08 – the 360 versions will run at 60 frames per second, while the PS3 versions will do just half that. Especially in a football game, that’s a major issue, as minor animations are what really make the on-screen action gel. And this isn’t just an issue one developer is having – EA Sports is the developer of Madden and NCAA, while 2K Sports is behind All-Pro 2K8; clearly, there’s some issue to be had.
“We have already proven that sports titles can run on the PlayStation 3 at true HD with 1080p output with NBA 07,” says Dave Karraker, Sony CEA’s senior director of corporate communications. “If you have questions about specific third-party games, you should speak to those publishers.”
1UP went ahead and did just that. 2K gave a “no comment,” while EA exec Todd Sitrin chose to reply.
“We want to make sure that we give the best experience we can on each platform. In designing a game, there are all sorts of tradeoffs that include frame rate, visuals, features, AI, etc. Football is an extremely challenging sport to replicate because of the number of people on the field, their interaction, and the scope of the environments. As you can see, every company making a football game this year made a decision that the best experience for the Xbox 360 included 60fps whereas the best experience for the PS3 was 30fps. We certainly believe that both the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions are our football products are outstanding experiences and recommend that each gamer look at the entire experience, not just one aspect. We think they’ll be very happy no matter which version of the game they play.”
Head over to the 1UP story for the full scoop and some further analysis on what might be behind all of this.
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Guess Who: NBA Live 07 Predicts NBA Finals
Posted by Chris Pereira Categories: Electronic Arts, PlayStation 3, Simulation, Sports, Xbox 360,
The heavily-favored San Antonio Spurs will be taking on the Cleveland Cavaliers in this year’s NBA Finals, which start Thursday night. EA simulated the series using their most recent NBA title, NBA Live 07. The results are pretty close to what most people are expecting - the Spurs win in six games, Tim Duncan earns MVP and San Antonio takes home its fourth title in nine years.
I’d have to agree with that outcome; LeBron can surely will the Cavs to at least two wins in this series. I’d run a simulation using NBA Live 07 myself to see if I could get any different results, but I don’t hate myself enough to play Live 07. And please, dear readers, don’t torture yourself by trying to be brave and do this yourself. NBA 2K7 for the win.
Game recaps after the break.
Click to continue reading Guess Who: NBA Live 07 Predicts NBA Finals
Madden NFL 08: First Video Look
Posted by Chris Pereira Categories: Electronic Arts, PlayStation 3, Sports, Trailers, Xbox 360,
Like Christmas or New Year’s Day, each year we’re presented with a new installment of Madden. Being the only NFL-branded game on the market, it’s undoubtedly going to rock the sales charts later this year. But, it’ll be facing some stiffer competition now that 2K Games is back (the team behind the, in my opinion, superior NFL 2K franchise) with All-Pro Football 2K8. Regardless, Madden is a force to be reckoned with, and just recently we got to see the first footage of the game.
Looks pretty sweet, but hopefully those one-handed receptions won’t be commonplace. It looks like EA is feeling the competition creep up on it and will be looking to really deliver a true next-gen pigskin game later this year.
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