A few days ago EA Sports launched the EA Football World website. If you have already registered on EA Sports World then the same log-in will access Football World. Normally I wouldn’t take much interest in a site that is dedicated to soccer games (right now it is used solely for UEFA 2008). However it actually provides a look at some of what the Sports World website will offer when it relaunches this summer.

Immediately noticeable improvements include the removal of heavy flash elements which leads to the pages loading much quicker, widgets to customize your personal page, and the addition of ratings and comments on videos.

There have been many gripes with Sports World. Log-in issues, Gamertag/PSN linking issues, slow loading times, and not being able to upload videos to popular hosting sites are the most most commonly mentioned. Certainly having embeddable videos that could be stored permanently would be desirable. It also appears Football World is still missing a much needed password reminder/reset option.

I’ve been told that feedback regarding the EA Football World website could potentially be applied to Sports World. Since the site will play a part in upcoming titles such as NCAA Football 09 and Madden 09 the community feedback could be of huge benefit. So feel free to leave your thoughts and suggestions in the comments and I’ll make sure they’re passed along.

With the release of two new screenshots from NCAA Football 09 came a description of how some of the character models have been improved. Some people have noticed differences while others have stated that they look the same.

There was a huge upgrade from 07 to 08 and because of that this year the adjustments are going to be a little more subtle. The exception might be the lineman who they’ve apparently worked on a great deal.

So using EA Sports World I went into 08 and took some screenshots of the same players in similar poses. These comparisons should accent some of the changes that have been made. Click the thumbnails below to view the images.

2007 brought a lot of developments to the world of sports gaming. From leadership changes to impactful features it certainly was never boring. Having gone back on the coverage over the last year I’ve brought together the stories that had the most impact on the community as well as others that were more controversial. They were what shaped 2007 and had an influence on the future.

Continue on to read the top 12 stories of the year.

Read the rest of this entry »

Through January 9th Utopia College Sports is running an EA Sports World photo contest. Simply take a screenshot from one of the Bowl matchups and post it in the contest thread. By doing so you are entered for a chance to win prizes which will be randomly drawn. More than one submission can be made to increase the chance of winning a prize.

You can check out the thread with the full details, view other entries, and post your own by visiting here.

I’ve been able to spend a little time with FIFA 08 in order to collect some impressions along with recording an entire game from the new Be A Pro mode.

For an in-depth look at FIFA 08 I’d highly recommend you check out the article posted by Shawn at 5w-g by clicking here.

A couple quick notes regarding online play. All the games I played have been completely lag-free with a constant frame rate so that was good to see. Interestingly there is no indicator shown above the player that your opponent is controlling which seemed to make me concentrate more on playing the game naturally instead of trying to exploit or avoid a user controlled player. The five vs five online play coming next month should be a lot of fun. Unfortunately it doesn’t appear that you can save any replays or screenshots following the completion of an online game.

The EA Sports World aspect of uploading the highlight clips is currently not working. The message “EA Sports World Football website is currently unavailable” is given. I have contacted EA in regards to this. They are aware of the problem and are working to get it functioning. Hopefully that gets going soon because it’s frustrating that the EA Sports World website would be preventing an advertised feature for yet another game from being used.

I really like the Be a Pro mode, which didn’t come as much of a surprise to me since Superstar in Madden and Campus Legend in NCAA Football are my preferred offline modes. The camera works really well for it, drawing back when out of the action and zooming in when involved in it. This mode requires a little more patience because there will be that downtime, however when you get the ball or make a play it is that much more rewarding because of it. In the game video you’ll see an opportunity I had in the 2nd half off a goalie deflection which was the most exciting moment I’ve experienced thus far with FIFA. I also like the performance indicator and how it penalizes you for making mistakes and even for simply being out of position.

Continue on to view the videos.

Read the rest of this entry »

EASportsWorld.com is apparently now operating with full functionality for all titles including Tiger Woods 08, Madden 08, and NCAA Football 08.

I have been unable to see if everything is working properly since the site was announced to have returned earlier this morning. Feel free to leave any comments about whether or not everything is up and running and functioning as intended.

Hopefully this represents the beginning of the end to the problems that have plagued the site since it launched with NCAA Football (which have been followed closely and reported on in detail here) and prevented consumers from utilizing advertised features of the games. The looming release of FIFA 08 on October 9th with its ties into the EA Sports World website will be a big test.

EA has just sent out the following statement regarding EASportsWorld.com in order to update how things are progressing with the site. The last update had stated things would be completely up and running this week however that has now been changed to a target of sometime this month.

Since the release of Tiger Woods 08 the site has been either completely non-functional or at the very the least unreliable preventing the use of the highly touted Photo Game Face feature. At the same time, the EA Sports World features for NCAA Football 08 and Madden 08 have been completely removed to help compensate for the server overload.

We are happy to be able to share with you some of the progress that has been made on the EA Sports World application in the last week.

The Sports World development team has managed to reduce the image processing time for the Tiger Photo Face images by 400% which will free up valuable bandwidth. We have also increased the number of server clusters supporting the Sports World application and we have added new image file format capabilities to the Tiger Photo Face application.

We have several development enhancements underway and we are confident that the Tiger Woods Photo Face application and Sports World BETA program will be back up and fully functioning later this month.

We will provide additional updates on our progress as soon possible and once again we wish to thank you for your continued interest in Sports World

EA Sports has released the full feature list for the upcoming FIFA 08 on the 360, PS3, and Wii. While the up to 10 individual users in online games will be a downloadable addition weeks following the release of the game (360/PS3 only) the following features will be available out of the box.

360/PS3

620 licensed teams, 30 official leagues, and more than 15,000 players.

Clinical Finishing — A true next-generation ball-striking engine calculates shot success by combining an almost infinite number of different contexts, including ball spin, pressure from defenders, player attributes, and even air pressure to recreate the drama and unpredictable nature of shooting.

Intelligent Football — Now featuring AI with a 35-point decision engine which enables players to process 1,000 potential options and reactions every second in real time — more than 60,000 options every minute — via a dynamic ‘Threat Map’ system to capture the excitement and realism of football.

Be a Pro: Offline Training — Think and react like a real professional football player. Play the entire game as a fixed player while getting real time feedback and analysis on the fly. A unique camera angle keeps both player and action in focus, zooming in when you’re on attack.

Pro Skills — A new, organic building-block system enables you to combine tricks and skill moves together to recreate signature moves from the real-world superstars or define your own style of play. Animations can be interrupted at any time to transition into a new move, just like real life.

Manual Controls — Dictate the play with new manual controls for through-passing and crossing. Now use the right-stick to quickly switch defenders and choose exactly who you want defending, when you want him.

Online Leagues – Create and organize your own multiplayer Friends Leagues and tournaments with all the tools in-game.

EA SPORTS™ Interactive Leagues: – Represent your club online against your rivals throughout the season in the F.A. Premier League, Bundesliga, French League or Mexican 1^st Division. Features weekly in-game pod casts by the development team.

Video Upload: Capture your best goals and highlights in-game and bring them online for the world to see. Upload your highlights to the FIFA 08 website to create the ultimate highlight reel to prove the stories you are telling your friends are all true. Because without the footage, it’s fiction.

Real World Football News — Receive up-to-the-minute football news and podcasts from media outlets.

Complete Authenticity — Dramatically more authentic and exhilarating with 620 licensed teams, 30 official leagues, and more than 15,000 players.

Tournament Mode – Play 60 tournaments, including 35 officially licensed ones, or create one of your own.

As to the video uploading it seems likely that EA Sports World will be used for the storage of them (in a similar fashion to NCAA Football). Hopefully by then they’ll have the site stable and working. However considering the popularity of FIFA worldwide it is hard to be optimistic about that.

Continue through to check out the list for the Wii version of the game.

Read the rest of this entry »

Updating previous articles on 8/30 and 8/28, the EA Sports World site is still not functioning thus preventing consumers from utilizing the Photo Face feature in Tiger Woods 08.

There is now a new message that states the max number of connections has been exceeded. Occasionally I have been able to log in, however the process of creating a photo face has never completed. It is amusing seeing commercials advertising the feature and Tiger Woods promoting it even though it hasn’t worked since the game has been officially released.

Making things even worse in this situation is that when the EASportsWorld site goes down it affects all other games that use the site. Those who wish to upload screenshots and video clips from NCAA Football or anyone who wants to look in on their online Madden stats and results are out of luck.

Still no word on when to expect the site to work properly. It should be a concern that NHL 08 releases in a little over a week. How much that game will use EA Sports World is unknown although it is expected to in some capacity.

As I addressed on Tuesday with this article, the EA Sports World site has not been functioning ever since the launch of Tiger Woods 08. This has meant that consumers who purchased the game have not been able to utilize advertised and highly promoted features such as Game Face.

I received word early on Wednesday that EA was aware of the problems (how could they not be) and that they were working to get them fixed. Despite that there was no indication of how long it could possibly take. Later in the day the following message was posted on the Tiger Woods 08 website and the EASportsWorld site (which has since been taken offline).

Due to overwhelming response, we are currently having issues with the EA Sports World website which is preventing customers to upload their photos for Photo Game Face in Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 08. The feature demand has exceeded our server capacity, we are in the process on fixing this issue and expect to have the site running properly very soon. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience - we will have this problem resolved as soon as possible. In the meantime, players can start a career with a regular game face golfer and still add photo face head later. Please check back for updates.

The question becomes why they were unprepared to meet the demand on this feature when there was no question it was going to be extremely popular. There are also problems such as online lag and a bug that freezes the game in career mode that they are apparently going to address in the near future.

Shawn over @ 5WG posted an article on Wednesday evening regarding the same topic I’ve addressed in recent weeks, which is the apparent inability of EA (although 2K is guilty as well when it comes to online leagues) to have all their game’s features functioning properly on and around release day. Whether it be online lag and disconnects or the disaster that has been EASportsWorld, it is completely unacceptable to have features unavailable when people get the game home. The excuses just don’t fly and they are irrelevant to the consumer who purchased in good faith expecting what was promised to be delivered.