The Blog for the Sports Gamer

See, I took “put the kids to bed early” as a euphamism for other things, but all it meant was put the kids to bed early.

Needless to say, I drove to GameStop. I was expecting it to be dead. Was I wrong. It was mobbed. Talk about a sausage fest. Anyway, wearing my GameRankings Tshirt got me in and out in about 40 seconds, beating the line ;).

I’m home and playing. Quick hits:
1. Wow, it’s gorgeous. I mean it makes NCAA 360 look like Xbox. The ticker has too many flashing lights though. Tough to read the playclock and I don’t see time outs left anywhere.
2. Why is the NE coach listed as “NE Coach” and now Bill B?
3. EA Radio is back. No Madden unless you ask Madden.
4. PA announcer sounds like the NCAA guy.
5. Already too easy to see when a run audible is called. Butt tap = switching run sides.
6. Yay! You can challenge!
7. When Brady audibles, it sounds like Brady.
8. Refs have the new uniforms.
9. Some guy named “Sharper” has the Pats #55. Junior Seau is #55. Come on EA that roster was updated Friday.
10. Highlight Stick has potential.
11. Controls are similar to NCAA.
12. No Momentum meter! Yay!
13. Despite using sprint on every play, no one is fatigued. Boo!
14. There’s no way to know how many time outs your opponent has. If you can figure it out, please let me know.
15. The shadows really affect the game. I guess that’s a good thing, I’m not sure.
16. Most acheievements have been “EA’d” so instead of “score a TD” you get “achieve Madden gamer level 2″ Yuck. Leave it to EA to ruin a great system like GamerScore and replace it with their own. There are still some acheivements like break the record for interceptions in a game, but they went from the lamest achievements to some of the most difficult.
17. The manual is a laugh out loud eight pages. Way to do the documentation, EA!

There’s 1:20 left in the half and it’s tied 7-7. I don’t hate it yet

Update: Troy Brown just picked up the ball from the goal line, fumbled at the 30 and Heath Evans ran it in for the TD, making it 14-7. Wow. That was fun.

Update: Final score is NE 28 BUF 21. BUF got two cheese TDs. Not a bad game. Wish I could see how many TO’s BUF had during the game. It’s on the scoreboard, but you don’t see the scoreboard, which is weird.

After my first game, I jumped to Madden gamer level 2, and it says “Attention: You’ve unlocked some Hall of Fame Players! These players will be added to your my madden - rosters free agent list.” So they did do this from the start.

Okay, I got one game in ,it’s now 1:07 am and I need sleep. Work tomorrow.

All of the major sites have not yet posted a review of Madden yet. IGN says it’s due to an EA embargo.

An embargo is a deal basically that says, in return for us giving you this game early, you can’t post a review until such and such a time and day. Most make the embargo expire close to release day. 9 times out of 10 a big site violates the embargo so they’ll be first.

However, the big two, GameSpot and IGN have both caved to the EA embargo. Apparently not getting the game next year may weigh heavily on them :).

But, after 10+ years of not having such a strict embargo I have to wonder: is the embargo there becuase they know the game is that bad?

After all, one guy at Operation Sports has it and pretty much everything posted to the forum there has been negative. This guy seems reasonable to me, and also seems to have a very good connection with the game producers but yet calls to our attention multiple problems with the 360 game that either their QA failed to observe or observed and ignored it. This is a big deal to me. The only reason why you embargo before release is if it’s not good. Don’t you think any company in their right mind that thinks their game is good would make the press review it ahead of time so you can generate buzz?

Madden always has buzz, even if it’s a roster update and they just make up shit (see “cone passing”) to get you to buy it…so maybe they figure they don’t need it. I’ll tell ya though, if anyting the OS forum has made me think twice about this game.

As I talked to Craig about this we both went out about how we did this when we owned/ran OS back in the day. It’s the same routine, every year. You’d think after 10+ years, we’d say enough, but I still buy it and bitch. Talk about a loser.

IGN (via You Tube) has posted the PS3 interface. The narrator reminds me of that Entourage guy. Is the UI clean? If I were to tell you that the UI was clean, would that be something you would be interested in? To me it looks like shit. Very small text, the background can render the foreground illegible, but hey it’s your $600. Enjoy by clicking here.

Well, let me make this clear: I didn’t forget, but today is my wedding anniversary. When I told the Mrs. of my plans to go pick up Madden at midnight tonight, let’s just say that didn’t go over too well and that any wedding anniversary celebrating would not happen.

So, I guess I will pick up Madden tomorrow morning. Given the choices, I think I made the right one, don’t you? After all, if Madden already needs to be patched…..

According to this Operation Sports post, a patch will be released for the Xbox 360 so that the game will indeed have fatigue. Apparently their in-depth QA missed that one.

I wonder if this patch will be done around the same time the PSP NCAA patch is done. (ie never).

I’m still playing NCAA for the 360, but yet again someone on the OS board has found a gimme play. I’ve tried it myself, and it’s amazing how they all bite on the movement of the QB. I’m not sure if this is ok, or if they should bite on the QB running. It smells of an AI that does If/Then code…as in, If the QB moves up two steps then activate run defense. My last game was a 42-7 blowout of Wake Forest, and it was easy using that play.

1. Wow I thought the Orioles had it bad, but this weekend’s Sox-Yankees series proves that the Sox are in very rough shape. Still, that Ortiz home run last night was amazing.

2. Under duress, I had to watch the Teen Choice awards. K-Fed (Britney’s husband) wasn’t great, but could easily pass for what passes as music these days. Although, I kept waiting for him to say “Yo, VIP, let’s kick it” and “Word to your mother.”

3. All of my smoke detectors are hard wired, so when one goes off they all go off. That’s how I woke up this morning, but try as I might I couldn’t find any smoke anywhere…so not sure why they went off. Any thoughts?

The fantasy league is full. Draft right now is set for Labor Day at 10AM. Good luck!

1. League is now half-full, six slots left.

2. Never mind ESPN 360, as Portsmouth NH is looking like the Red Sox today.

Last night’s Little League game was rained out, so the game is on today, but only on ESPN 360. Thankfully since I have Verizon DSL I can view the game for free. Yay!

Not many comments regarding Fantasy Football, so let’s go ahead and give it a whirl on Fox. You do need an MSN Passport (ie Hotmail) to sign up.

First come, first served, 12 teams (well now there are only 10 slots), so get in there. Winner gets title of “Winner of Blog Football 2007,” which is a huge award, just ask the 2006 winner…uhhh…who won, I forgot.

Click here to sign up (and use theblog as your magical password. Again, our league ID is 71418 and the league password is theblog.

Draft is scheduled for work hours. Some complained and would rather do it at night. So I can either do it on my lunch hour Eastern Time or later in the evening (10pm) eastern. What’s your pleasure. Scoring is Simmons rules to the best I could do.

Those of you idiots (like me) that pre-bought at GameStop for $59.99, bring your Circuit City circular with you because they are offering the Xbox 360 version of Madden for $47.99. $12 is a chuck o change so make them price match. I don’t know if they do or not, but you better ask!

If you have BBC America, make sure you check out the Kumars at No. 42 (great comedy), and Life On Mars (awesome drama). Mars is a great idea about a detective that gets into an accident and wakes up in 1973. It’s an interesting gimmick, but it works. Think of it like the Anti-CSI. No cell phones, no computers, no DNA..it’s pretty compelling.

And the weird BBC TV Test pattern that comes to life. That is freaking bizarre.

If you haven’t been watching Rescue Me, you are missing a great show.

America’s Got Talent sucked. Oh what a surprise, a singer won. Who would have thought :).

Come October 5th, what’s the difference between the Orioles and the Red Sox?

A. Nothing. They will both be home watching the playoffs!

Looks like I’ll be getting a look at the Alpha build of NBA Live 07 for the PC. I’m not going to offer up a blog review because I’m reviewing it elsewhere when it’s ready, and this is unfinished code, but I’ll try to offer a few thoughts on how the game is shaping up on the PC. I should have it early to mid week.

Head over to Wolverine Studios’ website for the details. I have a copy of it and will be hashing over it here in the coming days.