NCAA Football 09 Patch #2 Out Now
August 21, 2008 by pastapadre · 22 Comments
The second (and final) patch for NCAA Football 09 has gone live for the Xbox 360 and should be following for the PS3 in the near future. This patch addresses some gameplay improvements, fixes to different areas of the game such as the sliders, and the addition of being able to view online dynasties on EA Sports World.
Continue on to view the full list of what is included in the patch. Be sure to leave your thoughts on how the patch affects the game in the comments.
Importing Plays In Madden from Head Coach
August 17, 2008 by pastapadre · 14 Comments
The integration between NFL Head Coach 09 and Madden 09 is limited to the exporting of plays from Head Coach to Madden. I wanted to try this out in an effort to see how easily it can be done and how well it works. What I found is that it’s relatively easy but doesn’t work exactly as expected.
I’ve put together a video going through the entire process, from the creation and exporting of a play in Head Coach to the importing and usage of a play in Madden. Continue on to watch it as well as read my thoughts on the feature.
NCAA Football 09 Sales Numbers
August 16, 2008 by pastapadre · 21 Comments
Official NPD sales numbers for July have been released and offer the first opportunity to compare year over year how NCAA Football 09 is faring.
Sales on the 360 were nearly identical to last year. Despite gaining significant user base EA was unable to increase sales at all there. 397,000 this year just as it was with 08. Over with the PS3 however there was a pickup of 86,000 units going from 156,000 to 242,000. With the PS3 playing catch up to the 360 we’ve seen sales increasing there at a higher rate than the user base gained by the 360 in the same time. Meanwhile it is no surprise to see that the Wii version didn’t make it into the top 10 in software sales for the month.
In the previous generation NCAA 06 saw the highest number with 611,000 on the PS2 and 332,000 on the Xbox. Combining the 360 & PS3 with 09 we now have a total that outreaches that of 639,000. That still leaves a difference of 304,000. Last year the PS2 version sold 236,000 in the month, that number is probably about half that this year. Counting in the PS2 and Wii the total number of sales would look to fall short of 06, but it is important to note that even though there may have been less sales the 360 and PS3 versions are bringing in $10 more per copy.
The hardcore crowd seems to be almost fully realized in this generation, with the Wii having the most potential to see a surge. If sub-par releases like NCAA 09 continue on the Wii though that isn’t going to happen. The 360 and PS3 would seem to have marginal room for improvement, with the PS3 likely to close the gap some in coming years.
Madden 09 sales have reportedly been comparable to last year, this after hearing that pre-orders had been down. Analysts are attributing that to the quality of the game as it has been the best received in years.
First Patch for Madden 09 Out Now
August 15, 2008 by pastapadre · 125 Comments
The patch that was expected around release time for Madden 09 has now gone out for both the 360 and PS3. The 360 received the patch early this morning while the PS3 has had it for the last couple days. The list of what was addressed in this patch can be found below.
1. Changed default quarter length of online leagues to 5 minutes.
2. Solved a very rare stability issue that occurred when using a couple of playbooks.
3. Eliminated a button mashing glitch during high latency online games.
4. Eliminated a stability issue that sometimes occurred while viewing the player HUB in online leagues.
5. Fixed a tricky disc eject glitch that occurred at specific points of online games.
6. Kick Return Tuning - made improvements to help reduce frequent long kick returns.
7. Safety Tuning - eliminated issue where safeties in deep zone coverage would sometimes not react to a run to their side.
8. The game skill slider for interceptions was tuned to amplify it’s affect.
Be sure to leave your thoughts on any differences with the game that are noticed and could possibily be attributed to this patch. Online play stability is still a big issue and this patch hasn’t seemed to help in that regard on the PS3 side since receiving it. A second patch is still in the planning stages.
Madden 09 Fantasy Football Integration
August 14, 2008 by pastapadre · 10 Comments
One of the new aspects to using EA Sports Fantasy Football this year is the ability to import your fantasy teams in Madden 09. While I initially had an issue getting the process to work EA was able to fix it so now there shouldn’t be any trouble uploading the rosters to the locker where the game will grab it from. Anyone with an EA Fantasy Football team can seamlessly transfer them into Madden (PS3, 360) to use in play now, dynasty, or unranked online games.
I set up a fantasy league to test this out containing a total of four owners (thanks to those from the forum that helped out by signing into it) and an auto-draft that would take place immediately. That will explain the stacked roster that I had. In general just from browsing the fantasy football website it looks like it is shaping up really well as a service.
Madden 09 Online Plagued by Problems
August 13, 2008 by pastapadre · 133 Comments
After the disastrous online play of last year it was going to be important to see how Madden 09 performed right out of the gates. The only additions to online this year were the “leagues” and having random weather. So overall performance had to be a focus. While lag was an issue last year it was disconnects that caused the most headaches. In fact my first 17 attempts with 08 ended in disconnects. In regards to what EA was doing about it I was told that four engineers were dedicated to making sure online play ran well this year which represents a significant effort.
How is 09 doing so far? Disconnects are happening frequently (late game field goals seem to be the biggest culprit) and PS3 users are having their games freeze when they attempt to enter lobby rooms. Both of these issues are serious enough to really damage any enjoyment to be had with online. While the games have been relatively lag free they don’t seem to be quite as responsive as NCAA 09 and have an overriding sluggish feeling.
Feel free to leave your thoughts on how online is performing for you in the comments. While it is early in release these problems still shouldn’t be happening. I will update if I hear details on what is being done to address them.
Update: The lobby freezing issue should now be fixed.
NFL Head Coach 09 Online Play Impressions
August 12, 2008 by pastapadre · 16 Comments
NFL Head Coach 09 decided to go the unique route of using a supersim setup for online play. Thoughts on this decision seemed to be split. Most people would prefer to watch the plays and have full coach control, but in turn that would lead to a time commitment upwards of an hour.
Most of my time spent today was through online. I’ve included a video showing off a full first quarter and part of the second. Continue on to watch that as well as read my online play thoughts.
NFL Head Coach 09 Roster Update #1 Details
August 12, 2008 by pastapadre · 18 Comments
Producer Josh Looman has made the basic details of the first roster update for NFL Head Coach 09 available. As stated in the Q&A the plan is for another update during the opening week of the NFL season and then a new one every two weeks. The updates apply to anyone who starts after the draft rather than before it and for online play.
Madden 09 Coverage Wrap-Up and Your Impressions
August 11, 2008 by pastapadre · 124 Comments
Madden 09 has made its way out and with that brings an end to the prerelease coverage of the game. I still have plans to complete full online impressions, a look at fantasy football importing into Madden (which looks like it has been fixed), an EASW video highlight contest, and the setting up of the custom team online competition to look forward to in the near future. Otherwise I’ll be directing my immediate focus towards NFL Head Coach 09 which I’ll have later today.
As always I’ll be curious to see how the masses receive the game. I suspect for the head-to-head crowd it will be considered very good, while those who heavily invest in CPU offline play or online play will have mixed feelings. As I stated in my random thoughts write-up it is a huge jump forward in gameplay and presentation but the overall experience feels somewhat empty as it doesn’t have a feature or mode that can compare to NCAA Football 09’s Online Dynasty or the Online Team Play of several other EA titles.
Here are links from the prerelease coverage. Feel free to leave your impressions of Madden 09 in the comments!
Random Thoughts on Madden 09
Roster Update Details
Online League Impressions
Full Game of Madden 09: Seahawks @ Chiefs
Full Game of Madden 09: Bengals @ Colts
Full Game of Madden 09: Texans @ Titans
Full Game of Madden 09: Bills @ Jets
A Few More Videos (Madden Moments, Superstar Mode)
Community Event Impressions
Live Blog from Community Event
Brett Favre Jets Cover Now Available To Download
August 11, 2008 by pastapadre · 11 Comments
As promised EA has released the new cover art with Brett Favre as a New York Jet and it is now available to download and print off. They’ve used the same image seen on the retail cover but have gone to painstaking lengths to photoshop him into a Jets uniform.
It appears that the Wii version is being left out. Given that the image used was completely different I suppose they didn’t find it to be worth the effort that would’ve been needed.
While there is no word of future packaging runs using this cover art I still believe that it is a good possibility. Click the links below to download the covers in PDF form.
