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[Lonestar]

Tonight's LOST episode is going to be a heavy hitter. I've seen the promo pics for this episode, shit's about to get real.

Yeah, I'm getting loads of work done by thinking about the episode. LOADS.

 

[AstroLad]

Actually since I'm gonna be out until Sunday vancin late is way better for me in terms of being able to play that game two games from now (as long as I can play FMT right when we vance tomorrow night).

Carry on daw's wife!

 

[daw840]

Actually since I'm gonna be out until Sunday vancin late is way better for me in terms of being able to play that game two games from now (as long as I can play FMT right when we vance tomorrow night).

Carry on daw's wife!

Hey now, I don't know what I would do if I couldn't eat dinner and watch back to back episodes of King of the Hill and Family Guy on Adult Swim.

 

[Smokey]

Yeah, I'm getting loads of work done by thinking about the episode. LOADS.

Have you caved and seen the promo pics?

 

[Wellington]

If anyone wants to play an All Madden scrim, let me know.

 

[DenogginizerOS]

If anyone wants to play an All Madden scrim, let me know.

Perhaps later tonight. If you see me on AIM after 8PM or vice-versa, and I am free, I will scrim you.

 

[Nightz]

First Madden 11 info:

First Madden NFL 11 Details and Screens
This year's passing game is being retooled. See the first steps to a better aerial attack inside.
by Nate Ahearn

March 23, 2010 - Another year and another Madden game is set to launch itself into the clutches of sports lovers and haters the world over. Whether you think Madden is nothing more than a rehashed version of its year-old self or you believe that it's the truest representation of your favorite Sunday pastime; EA Sports has one job to do when they set out to create the world's only NFL-branded title: to make the best damn football game people have ever seen.

For Madden NFL 11, the team at EA Sports' Orland-based Tiburon studio is starting the massive roll-out of improvements, tweaks and new additions by giving us a look into the re-designed catching intelligence that you'll feel and see when you get your hands on your copy in August.

As any diehard Madden fan knows, receiver artificial intelligence has been lacking for some time. Whether you're running an out route or a fade to the corner, problems popped up at every turn. For an out route, your receiver had little to no idea where the sideline was, so he'd consistently forget to get two feet inbounds or, if he did remember, he'd immediately go darting out of bounds instead of knowing to fight for extra yardage when a first down was close. As if that wasn't frustrating enough, making a pass to the deep-part of the end zone was often hit or miss. A real NFL player knows to get both feet down. Beyond that, they know the more finite rules of the game and they use those rules to make big plays. EA Sports is hoping that a new creation called the Catch Debugging Tool will help them address these issues and more.


The Catch Debugging Tool essentially allows developers to analyze and break down catch animations and the behaviors that lead to certain actions on the field. Aside from the miscues that I mentioned above, players in past Madden games seemed to have an incredible propensity for catching the ball and running the wrong way. Almost as though they were caught using turbo when running towards their own endzone. With the Catch Debugging Tool, EA Sports' Ian Cummings (creative director on Madden) told IGN that they've been able to get "frame-by-frame results of what catches best match the situation for all players involved as the ball is in the air." Cummings says that the end result for users is "a much larger variety of animations than ever before."

Not only will players recognize the boundaries of the field, but Cummings also said that they'd be fully aware of the location of first down markers. "We have specifically tuned and added support to make it so receivers wait for the ball on a curl and have awareness for the first down. Also, receivers will now be working to catch the ball in stride on crossing routes so they don't end up slowing down or losing yardage," said Cummings. He later conceded that receivers will occasionally lose yardage if it means coming back to the ball and avoiding an interception. I, for one, can live with that.

But what about defense? It seems with all this newfound firepower for the offense, the defensive guys might have fallen by the wayside. Cummings assured us that wasn't the case, saying, "We never want to make it so the offense is too powerful, so we have really focused on giving the defenders the ability to go up and also knock the ball out in mid-air. We've added all new animations for mid-air collisions so defenders have an even better ability to get up with a receiver and fight for the ball. With recent changes, players will definitely play the ball more aggressively, but the elite guys are the ones who are going to be able to hang on to it." So while you'll see wide receivers like Larry Fitzgerald going up in traffic and coming down with an astounding grab, there's certainly the opportunity for defenders like Ed Reed to make you sorry you ever tried working the ball into the middle of the field.

It's always exciting when we first start hearing about new features and improvements to the classic Madden formula, and while better catching is something that we've heard before from EA Sports, it sounds as though they're finally putting an adequate amount of development resources behind one of finer points of football. We'll have much more on Madden NFL 11 as soon as EA Sports further removes the veil of secrecy. Until then, be sure to check out Ian Cummings' post on the Madden NFL 11 blog, scheduled to hit tomorrow.

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/107/1079289p1.html

 

[LiveWire]

So basically they're going to fuck it up even worse somehow.

 

[DCX]

Love the Boldin pic which basically shows Sanders raping him mid-air :/

DCX

 

[LiveWire]

Love the Boldin pic which basically shows Sanders raping him mid-air :/

DCX

Yea, and what's worse is, that animation is already in the game. The receiver leaps well ahead of the defender, gets his hands around the ball, and then the defender leaps straight up and they sort of tango/hug/spoon in mid-air and the ball pops out. smh

 

[Wellington]

Granted, the receiver logic is a huge issue, but our scores are out of this world this season and they are improving the offense as first priority?

We'll have to wait and see I guess.

 

[DCX]

Granted, the receiver logic is a huge issue, but our scores are out of this world this season and they are improving the offense as first priority?

We'll have to wait and see I guess.

This exactly. You know how many times we all got robbed of a first down or TD when our WRs had 18 feet in bound only to have it incomplete? Or a WR screen where the receiver decides to run 5 yards towards the Qb then try to run up the field..i want to know what will counter this on the defensive side? Not by BS magnets either.

DCX

 

[CB3]

Lets not get away from the real issue right now

Bob play your fucking game.

 

[LiveWire]

Lets not get away from the real issue right now

Bob play your fucking game.

Seriously.

Somnia, if we miraculously advance tonight, I'm free anytime after 8PM Eastern to play.

 

[BigAT]

So basically every time you make a catch within ten yards of the sideline you'll go into some shitty canned toe dragging animation to show it off the new "technology".

 

[PBY]

Lets not get away from the real issue right now

Bob play your fucking game.

i thought you guys were just fucking with bob again- theres really only one game to play left and its his game? :lol :lol

Spoiler

sim it!

-not that I care that much, its just that I'm gonna be free to play tonight if we advance

 

[AstroLad]

So basically every time you make a catch within ten yards of the sideline you'll go into some shitty canned toe dragging animation to show it off the new "technology".

I hope they have a single unskippable ref cutscene to go along with all of these too!

 

[BigAT]

I hope they have a single unskippable ref cutscene to go along with all of these too!

If you're referring to the Snickers© CrunchTime Call of the Game, then yes, those will be plentiful and mandatory.

 

[DCX]

DCX

 

[Nightz]

Spoiler

sim it!

-not that I care that much, its just that I'm gonna be free to play tonight if we advance

We play tonight my friend!

Spoiler

daw's wife willing

 

[CB3]

@pastapadre "Hopefully this means the removal of the mid-air flip animation" - yep, it does.

hmm

 

[AstroLad]

I've always wanted to see mroe misthrown balls. Seems like throws are either right on target or right on target and INTs (or the occasional goofy miss by 20 yards). Not enough throws where the bell is just a bit long or a bit short or just out of bounds.

 

[Lonestar]

DSEAX

 

[DCX]

DSEAX

1*

 

[Lonestar]

1*

 

[Wellington]

I've always wanted to see mroe misthrown balls. Seems like throws are either right on target or right on target and INTs (or the occasional goofy miss by 20 yards). Not enough throws where the bell is just a bit long or a bit short or just out of bounds.

It has to be a function of something like the TOR and the combined THA stats. Say if one of us doesn't set his feet before throwing then the ball will sail, but if it's Ben Roethlisberger there's a higher chance of making the throw.

Of course, this would really fuck up Madden Nation players, so it won't be viable.

 

[Rorschach]

I've seen plenty of misthrown balls. I don't know what you folks are talking about. :| It's the only reason I moved up and picked up a QB this season. Having a good QB also decreases WR drops... which I think is bull, but it's there for you folk that want more disparity between bad and good.

Granted, the receiver logic is a huge issue, but our scores are out of this world this season and they are improving the offense as first priority?

We'll have to wait and see I guess.

Hopefully, we won't have these overrated rookies coming out. With progression and these stupid rookies, everyone now has a megastud RB, QB, and/or WR. I don't even think you could unload a 95 rated HB at this point in our league for anything worthwhile. They'd also need to fix progression since you have guys taking 1 snap all year and then being upgraded 6 points. This makes no sense. How many superstar RBs does the NFL have at any given moment? Not 40+ that's for damn sure. And how many rook HBs hit a wall and are not successful after their rookie year? Lots.

The QB one is especially bullshit because no QB is going to come out of college and look like Manning in his prime.

So basically every time you make a catch within ten yards of the sideline you'll go into some shitty canned toe dragging animation to show it off the new "technology".

They have this now. What happens is the tiptoe animation occurs like 5 yards in, but then you get the stupid fucking ref cutscene and they rule you out of bounds. It's so fucking frustrating. The sideline logic is completely busted. Also, fade routes on short and goal are next to impossible.

 

[Wellington]

Hopefully, we won't have these overrated rookies coming out. With progression and these stupid rookies, everyone now has a megastud RB, QB, and/or WR. I don't even think you could unload a 95 rated HB at this point in our league for anything worthwhile. They'd also need to fix progression since you have guys taking 1 snap all year and then being upgraded 6 points. This makes no sense. How many superstar RBs does the NFL have at any given moment? Not 40+ that's for damn sure. And how many rook HBs hit a wall and are not successful after their rookie year? Lots.

The QB one is especially bullshit because no QB is going to come out of college and look like Manning in his prime.

You're right, it's probably more a function of our crazy rooks. It's amazing how guys are giving up players like Wayne, MJD, Moss, Addai, etc. for first rounders. I couldn't unload any of my 80+ OVR RBs and Pheeniks couldn't get rid of Ronnie Brown. I hope it's toned down, but I doubt it.

 

[Lonestar]

You're right, it's probably more a function of our crazy rooks. It's amazing how guys are giving up players like Wayne, MJD, Moss, Addai, etc. for first rounders. I couldn't unload any of my 80+ OVR RBs and Pheeniks couldn't get rid of Ronnie Brown. I hope it's toned down, but I doubt it.

I don't think anyone blinked at trading for Slaton. I'd probably would have taken a 3rd or 4th rounder for him. Nothing.

But so far, I'd say it's not looking good for the new crop of Rook Uberpowered RB's. Okoye and Taylor aren't burning it up, at least so far.

 

[Wellington]

I don't think anyone blinked at trading for Slaton. I'd probably would have taken a 3rd or 4th rounder for him. Nothing.

But so far, I'd say it's not looking good for the new crop of Rook Uberpowered RB's. Okoye and Taylor aren't burning it up, at least so far.

I don't know who has Taylor, and absolutely no offense to Luke, but you can't expect to go from a team/player that doesn't run, to one that does overnight. Okoye is a different style than what he is used to with Addai/Girley. I have Brown as my #2 even though Bradshaw is the second most talented back on my roster because I can run with the same style I do with Jacobs. Not used to speed backs. I'm sure he'll get it by mid-season and start fucking people up.

 

[LJ11]

No disrespect at all, but the two rookie backs are on pass first teams. If they were on teams that loved to pound the rock, they'd be posting serious numbers. I'm sure they'll put out numbers as the season progresses, and the owners get a better feel for what they can do.

QBs will always over-perform their current potential. That's one thing the vision cone kept in check.

If EA really does follow this thread, how about some invites to Madden community day!! Sure one or two of us would make a trip to give some feedback.

Edit: Beaten by Wellie.

 

[LiveWire]

You're right, it's probably more a function of our crazy rooks. It's amazing how guys are giving up players like Wayne, MJD, Moss, Addai, etc. for first rounders. I couldn't unload any of my 80+ OVR RBs and Pheeniks couldn't get rid of Ronnie Brown. I hope it's toned down, but I doubt it.

Yea, but this is also several years in the future. We're in 2012 now, all of today's stud players are now over 30, some pushing 35 and up. In the real NFL many of the teams owning stud skill position players would be ecstatic to get a 1st round pick for them. Overpowered rookies are one problem, but so is certain stud players not declining with age. Samuels declined appropriately (perhaps, not appropriately enough given his real-life stenosis/retirement issue), but Portis hasn't aged a day. Neither has McNabb, IIRC. Ray Lewis still playing in the NFL in 2012? Child please.

If EA really does follow this thread, how about some invites to Madden community day!! Sure one or two of us would make a trip to give some feedback.

Fantastic idea.



Speaking of stud RBs though, if anyone's got an 80+ rated back they're looking to deal give the Redskins front office a call.

 

[Lonestar]

I don't know who has Taylor, and absolutely no offense to Luke, but you can't expect to go from a team/player that doesn't run, to one that does overnight. Okoye is a different style than what he is used to with Addai/Girley. I have Brown as my #2 even though Bradshaw is the second most talented back on my roster because I can run with the same style I do with Jacobs. Not used to speed backs. I'm sure he'll get it by mid-season and start fucking people up.

I have Taylor.

Most of his yards were against CPUeelers. Though, he got injured against last game about halfway through it. 7 carries for 24 yards at the time. The middle of my line is so non-running oriented, that it breaks down at handoff against DT's. Swallowed for a 1 to 2 yard loss. Best I could hope for is a 2-3 yard gain.

Outside running still seems to be hit or miss, as it seems everyone has Bob Sander's for Safeties that run at 108 SPD ratings and tackle me for negligible gain.



But I get shit for "running it up" on the CPU. I got to practice man, I'm not Allen Iverson!

 

[Mrbob]

Tell Daw's wife to take the shackles off her man so he can play around 9cst tonight, otherwise we are not vancing until 5PM CST tomorrow.

 

[AstroLad]

Threat Level Midnight.

 

[DCX]

Yea, but this is also several years in the future. We're in 2012 now, all of today's stud players are now over 30, some pushing 35 and up. In the real NFL many of the teams owning stud skill position players would be ecstatic to get a 1st round pick for them. Overpowered rookies are one problem, but so is certain stud players not declining with age. Samuels declined appropriately (perhaps, not appropriately enough given his real-life stenosis/retirement issue), but Portis hasn't aged a day. Neither has McNabb, IIRC. Ray Lewis still playing in the NFL in 2012? Child please.




Fantastic idea.



Speaking of stud RBs though, if anyone's got an 80+ rated back they're looking to deal give the Redskins front office a call.

Live speaks the truth. The problem is we all have a real sense of what trades should be and how players should progress and decline. The problem is this is Madden and the progressions are all screwed up and low level players can play at high levels due to the caliber of users behind them :/ So yes, super rooks are at a high premium due to this BS factor.

DCX

 

[LukeSmith]

I don't know who has Taylor, and absolutely no offense to Luke, but you can't expect to go from a team/player that doesn't run, to one that does overnight. Okoye is a different style than what he is used to with Addai/Girley. I have Brown as my #2 even though Bradshaw is the second most talented back on my roster because I can run with the same style I do with Jacobs. Not used to speed backs. I'm sure he'll get it by mid-season and start fucking people up.

I think of it like the foil to the Megatron deal!

 

[FrenchMovieTheme]

give us the fucking OPTION to have vision cone on. how hard is it to implement? what a great feature that was

also, i've seen plenty of overthrows, underthrows, and just plain bad throws. the problem is i see them maybe once out of every 100 throws with english. with a guy like boller it seemed like once out of every 5 throws. the variety in accuracy is there, but i think the "superstar" QB's need to be toned down a bit. its kind of unfair on how accurate english is at times

in other news, vikings vs. bears still hasn't happened? motherFUCK!

 

[Fifty]

in other news, vikings vs. bears still hasn't happened? motherFUCK!

The wife's got to watch her stories, don't be a dick!

 

[Somnia]

Seriously.

Somnia, if we miraculously advance tonight, I'm free anytime after 8PM Eastern to play.

We'll have to play tomorrow night more than likely. I'm gonna crash earlier than normal due to an early meeting tomorrow. I'll be free after 7pm cst (maybe 8pm cst...depends if the meeting runs long).

 

[LiveWire]

give us the fucking OPTION to have vision cone on. how hard is it to implement? what a great feature that was

No way. It's bad enough as it is with defensive player awareness. A big bright "LOOK WHERE I'M PASSING" bat-signal? Are you effin' kidding me? Maybe if it's Brees, Brady or Manning and it's the entire field, sure, not a giveaway. Alex Smith's little sliver

Spoiler

and tiny hands

? Good luck with that! :lol

We'll have to play tomorrow night more than likely. I'm gonna crash earlier than normal due to an early meeting tomorrow. I'll be free after 7pm cst (maybe 8pm cst...depends if the meeting runs long).

OK, I've got my other softball team tomorrow night, so I probably won't be free until about 10 East/9 Cent.

 

[CB3]

Since i have zero confidence in bob playing tonight, im gonna go ahead and assume this advances tomorrow.

we may be able to play tomorrow fifty but i wouldnt bank on it. im good all day thursday though

Passing cone was the greatest thing ever

 

[Matrix]

Passing cone was the greatest thing ever

The truth. That was also back when I could pass

 

[DMczaf]

I haven't used Freeman in over 2 weeks thanks to his injury on the first play against Rors, and then this bye week

I'm getting Freeman Withdrawls! I JUST NEED ONE MORE HIT!

 

[DCX]

Passing cone was a good idea but it was tough because it gave the D wayyy to much info. I think maybe they should have the QB head movements be controlled by the right stick to simulate the vision cone only in stat boost.

So if you see a wide open WR and you got him locked on the chances are it will complete. It can also help looking safeties off and holding that LB a little longer as you lock on to a dummy target.

DCX

 

[CB3]

I haven't used Freeman in over 2 weeks thanks to his injury on the first play against Rors, and then this bye week

I'm getting Freeman Withdrawls! I JUST NEED ONE MORE backwards bullshit throw

fixed

 

[DCX]

I haven't used Freeman in over 2 weeks thanks to his injury on the first play against Rors, and then this bye week

I'm getting Freeman Withdrawls! I JUST NEED ONE MORE HIT!

You'll get a double dose of the dirty south.

DCX

 

[DMczaf]

You'll get a double dose of the dirty south.

DCX

Falcons, Saints, Falcons, Sainrts



... :lol

 

[FrenchMovieTheme]

the cone gave away too much? how do you think real DB's/Safeties play? they read the qb's eyes/head movement. a good qb can look someone off or make him think he's throwing somewhere he isn't. that was the cool thing about vision cone. i could have it locked on a guy but looking at someone else and quickly flip through. the offense is just too overpowered right now

 

[LiveWire]

the cone gave away too much? how do you think real DB's/Safeties play? they read the qb's eyes/head movement. a good qb can look someone off or make him think he's throwing somewhere he isn't. that was the cool thing about vision cone. i could have it locked on a guy but looking at someone else and quickly flip through. the offense is just too overpowered right now

It would be fine, if throwing to a target outside the cone wasn't grossly inaccurate for anyone other than the top 3 QBs.