Madden NFL 10 Blog - Improvements to QB Position

[Ian_Cummings]

Check out the new Madden NFL 10 blog, which talks about improvements to the QB position.

Quote:

"I'm back again folks, bringing you some more additions and improvements that you can expect to see in Madden NFL 10. This week, I'm going to focus primarily on the QB position and show some of the improvements we've made for this year. First off, I'm going to talk about a new animation technology that we can call "layered blending". Layered Blending "Layered blending? I thought you were going to talk about quarterbacks?" You'll see shortly how this works for QB's. First, a quick lesson on what blending is. Anytime a player transitions from one animation to another, he will use a 'blend' of his previous animation into the next animation. When you don't have a nice smooth blend, you'll get poppy / hitching animations. If you make blends that are too long, you can easily not have the correct amount of control over your player (he can feel very 'sluggish' or unresponsive). The most common types of blends are linear, ease in, and ease out. Those just refer to how many frames of either the previous or current animation you use while blending. For Madden NFL 10 though, we've added something new - the ability to actually separate the blends out between different parts of the body. We call this layered blending because it allows us to create different layered animation by blending one part of the body out quicker or slower based on the needs of the game. So how does it relate to QB's? Well, how often has this happened to you?"

[tyler289]

New QB ratings is something everyone has wanted for years. This sounds great.

As for the questions at the bottom, I can't really say, but I know Big Ben should have one of the highest ratings for throwing on the run.

[06woz]

Sweet! Sounds great to get rid of the "suction sack" and the risk reward behind that sounds awesome, also the qb ratings should make the passing game WAY more realistic.

[WDOgF0reL1fe]

I love love LOVE the new animation of the QB getting hit and throwing, wow. You guys are unstoppable right now

[Chargersa7x]

Funny.... This is the best news I've read about madden in a long time, and its not a new "big feature." Its just a great improvement to gameplay.

Keep up the great news and good work!

[Guillotine 1]

I love it...absolutely love it.

Ian- Some QB's throw better on the run like Jeff Garcia, Mike Vick etc...will you accont for these types of athletes?

[monkeybutlerz]

I'm not sure if I completely understood, but is the Layered Blending (and the return to lower throwing speeds) also a fix on the robo-QB problem of 09 or is it mainly the elimination of the suction sack? I know robo-QB is an AI problem (I'm assuming), so I'm wondering if the lowered throwing speeds will affect this.

[mgkibbles]

Good stuff, the Qb's still look a bit robotic, but they definitely look better than past versions.