O-Line Play the Key to a Good Football Game - jmik58's Blog

jmik58's Blog

O-Line Play the Key to a Good Football Game

Posted on April 27, 2009 at 03:23 PM.

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Now that the draft is behind us and the season is in the foreground, naturally we take our attention to the upcoming seasons of college and NFL football.

With the season approaching that also means the release of the latest installments of the college and pro video games.

My excitement for the upcoming seasons continues to grow, but the next gen version of football games has done little to hold my interest.

I have yet to feel that NCAA or Madden have captured accurate gameplay on next gen. In reality, I still play Madden and NCAA on my ps2 because the extra cash for the next gen games just isn't worth it for me.

On a positive note, it sounds like NCAA 10 (and hopefully Madden) has some good upside this year in progress towards improvements to gameplay. In the past I feel that the game has been based on too many frills, bells, and whistles.

The raw, bare bones aspects of gameplay are what is flawed with these football games.

The biggest area that needs to be fixed is an improvement to the blocking schemes and blocking engine. When that day comes, then the game will truly be on its way.

But what do you expect. Offensive line play is the most under-appreciated and misunderstood aspect of the game, yet it is the most important part of the game.

Comments

# 1 rudyjuly2 @ Apr 27

I won't say the OL play is key to a good game. Of course I would like it to be good which isn't the case in last year's NCAA. But the line play was never done well on the PS2 versions either. You could get realistic outcomes but the process was flawed (too much suction blocking and Tecmo wrestling).

I do think this will be improved in NCAA 10 but how much is another question. I'm back to looking forward to this year's game.

# 2 jmik58 @ Apr 27

Good points. And for the record, I don't play ps2 versions because the OLine play is better, only because I have yet to buy a football game on next gen (at least not one that I kept). I do think that other aspects of the gameplay have come along well enough though that OLine play is the one neglected missing link that could put football gaming over the top.

# 3 rudyjuly2 @ Apr 27

It would be awful nice to have really good OL/DL interaction. I'm just not going to hold my breath for this year since I think too much work was necessary. Early impressions do sound good though.