NCAA Football 10 Blog: The Rebirth of the Flexbone Offense

[Squeezee12]

Quote: Originally Posted by Solidice

the Flexbone offense really needed the upgrade, it was terrible.

Ya def!!! I love the formation because I used to run it in high school. But I just couldnt use it in the game because it was so bad.

[jdrhammer]

Quote: Originally Posted by Squeezee12

Let the "This is useless to me...." "I will never use this..." ect. start... I can already see people upset... I think this is awesome. Being someone that TRIED using FlexBone in the game as well as ran it in high school it needed some work done.

I won't use it but it is a huge addition IMO. I want the college feel and every type of Offense should be available, and I want to have to defend each type of O as well. I want it to be as true to form as possible.

[stylee]

Quick thoughts:

The motion is much improved. It's nice to see the slots running fast through their option motion so that the pitches can be on time.

Midline with the motion SB lead? Sweet.

The trap option play is cool, though I sort of remember it being in last-gen - minus the actual trap/log by the pulling guard. BUT..that guard runs right into the center and can't effectively get there even in the demo video?????

Thanks for the correct sweep action. Nice to see the B-Back go away from the play, just like in real life.

60 Choice is awesome. Thanks for bringing the Run and Shoot into the flexbone. God, I hope it works smoothly. Three thumbs up.


But, for all the great stuff, there's still the problem that they still are not optioning anyone.

Maybe it's just because they're just going up against air, but the linemen are still doing "walk straight ahead."


Look at the playside guard on Midline Option. He's supposed to ignore the DT and get to the MLB and the QB can option off of that DT. His animation looks identical to that of the playside tackle next to him, whose job it is to base block the DE.

Again, I might be mistaken because they're not actually blocking anyone BUT from everything I've heard, there's still not going to be unblocked defenders to read off of in this game. Disappointing.

I'd really appreciate a developer confirming or denying this. PLEASE???

[jdrhammer]

Quote: Originally Posted by rollinphat

is it against the rules for someone to cut & paste the blog for us blocked at work?

See how this works.

The Rebirth of the Flexbone Offense in NCAA Football 10

Posted On: May. 8, 2009 7:10 AM EST By: raczilla 1 Comments
Hello all, my name is Anthony White and I’m here to share with you all what work we did this year for the Flexbone offense. Going into our current development cycle for NCAA Football 10 our top playbook priority was making sure our version of the Flexbone offense is a more accurate representation of its real life counterpart. We didn’t necessarily want to just take what’s already in place on the Gen 2 versions of NCAA Football. Our goal was to take it above and beyond anything that had been done previously with the Flexbone offense on any platform.
Last summer we were able to acquire the actual coach’s game film of the Navy Flexbone offense. Having access to this valuable resource really gave us an advantage when it was time to identify what new formations that we needed to create, what plays did we need for those formations, and most importantly what new player animations we needed to mo-cap in order to get those plays working properly in our game. The results of our efforts produced eight new formations and over 200 new plays.
Here’s a look at the new formations that we created based on our film study.

Flexbone Twins Over


Flexbone Slit Wing Z


Flexbone Spit Wing X


Flexbone Close


Flexbone Slot Right


Flexbone Trips Right


Flexbone Trio Right


Flexbone Tackle Over


Running Game:
The running attack from this unique offensive system is what it’s most known for, and it’s not all about the triple option. There are numerous things that can be done with the running game out of the Flexbone. Some of the new plays that we were able create this year thanks to the new animations include Wingback Toss both weak and strong with a play action pass to compliment it, Midline QB Iso which is a double option scheme where the quarterback can either handoff to the fullback or duck inside the playside B gap following the lead blocks of the two wingbacks, FB and Wingback Load Option plays which also include play action compliments, and the Wingback Jet Sweep.


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Those are just a few of the new plays we were able to add for the Flexbone offense, but the most unique one of all we added in my opinion is the Trap Option. The Trap Option calls for the quarterback to open up to one side of the formation where he then fakes it to the fullback before he pivots and rotates counter clockwise and runs the option in the opposite direction with the backside wingback being his pitch man. It gets its name Trap Option due to the fact that the backside guard pulls and “trap blocks” the play side defensive end.
This play to the defense starts out looking like our normal Triple Option play to the defense, but it attacks the opposite side of the field instead. Before we could get this play up and running in game we needed to capture new player animations featuring the quarterback and fullback. What generally happens is we identify on film what we want and we in turn communicate that to our mo-cap talent so that they can go out and execute what we’re looking for. It’s very similar to coaching where you introduce a new scheme to your players and during its installation you walk through each of the finer points of the scheme with each player so that he knows exactly what he needs to do within the play.
Here’s the mo-cap video of the quarterback and fullback carrying out the first phase of the Flexbone Trap option play.

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Here’s that same animation in NCAA Football 2010.

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Passing Game:
Much attention was also paid to the passing game portion of the Flexbone offense. When you open up the playbook you’ll notice that most of the running plays have some sort of play action compliment that starts out looking like that run play. Many of these new plays are a both your more traditional play action passes along with the option passes. One of the new pass plays are PA Switch in which the outside receiver runs a post route and the wingback to the side runs a wheel route up the sidelines. This is a common scheme in the Flexbone offense.

We also wanted to bring some new fresh ideas to the drop back passing portion of the Flexbone offense. As many of you know this style of offense has the reputation of being a bad offense to run when you’re trailing in the game and need to throw the ball. Some of the new passing plays we added actually take a page from the Run & Shoot offense. Two run & shoot pass concepts we added are “60 Go” and “60 Choice”. In these two plays the left wingback goes in motion to the right slot which forms a trips alignment. On 60 Go the outside receiver on the now trips side runs a streak route, the motion wingback runs an option route where he can take it to the post or he can go straight up field, and the right wingback runs to the flat. The goal is to read the curl/flat defender. If he jumps the flat route, the quarterback should be able to make a quick throw to the option route, if said defender jumps the option route, then the quarterback makes a quick throw to the flat.

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We also included Four Verticals and WR Middle Screen out of Flexbone Trips Right, Left, and Trio Right. The goal of any offense is to be balanced and that holds true with this style of offense. If you’re playing with one of the Flexbone offense playbooks and your opponent is loading up to stop the run, you’ll have a multitude of viable passing plays at your disposal to keep your opponent honest.

Playbooks:
The team playbooks that feature the Flexbone offense prominently are Army, Georgia Tech, and Navy. Air Force also has multiple Flexbone formations in their playbook along with other more traditional formations. Here’s a look at the formations and sets that make up our Flexbone playbooks.


Even the Goal Line formation for Army, Georgia Tech, and Navy Is a Flexbone formation.


It was fun seeing the Flexbone offense through the design phase from concept to its implementation into the game. There's a perception right or wrong that we can just draw up a play and it magically appears in game working the same as it does in real life. There's a lot of planning that goes on amongst the design staff, software engineers, animators, and mo-cap talent to make it all work. It’s our hope that you guys will enjoy what we now have to offer with the Flexbone offense in NCAA Football 10.

Anthony White, Assistant Designer, EA SPORTS

Tagged: NCAA Football, Gameplay, videos, Anthony White, playbooks, flexbone

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Comments

[stylee]

On the trap option vid, I can see the linemen turning/zoning in. That's cool and hopefully will be done on regular triple option

but that won't matter if the B-Back's path is again right up the gut...unless he veers outside the playside guard and through the alleyway, it's still a busted play.

[rollinphat]

thanks jdrhammer!

i really appreciate it

[TheShizNo1]

Damnit, as a lover of the flexbone/option offense, they got me drinking the Kool-Aid again. Damn you EA!!!!

A lot of people are very hyped about Madden. Am I the only one who is anticipating NCAA more, and think it if the two fail, it won't be NCAA that takes the harder drop?

[KG]

I'm hoping that they addressed the Spread offenses, especially since only 3 teams run the flexbone.

On the last Trap Option the guard pulls too slow because he runs into the center for a split second which makes the QB way too far out in front. It still looks like the play is too slow which has always been the downfall for all inside option runs in NCAA. This blog could have been a lot better if they would have included a defense because the OL/DL interaction could have really helped answer people's questions about the AI.