Football Gaming and Me

You probably know about what happened with EA and the NFL. They bought exclusive rights to all players teams and stadiums from the NFL. Meaning they are the only game in town which sucks. I know most people buy the name and the product. I just hope people can overlook the player names and teams this upcoming year.

I don't understand why the NFL even allows this, they did it with Direct TV and now they have done it with Video Games. Football games are a dying breed I can remember a time when I had a hard time choosing which games to buy but now all that is gone.

I personally prefer to play on the PC and slowly that market has been going away with Madden being the only game in town for PC's. I know the games for the consoles are still alive and kicking but I'm sure that will change somewhat in the Future. There's no word from Microsoft wether they will continue to make NFL Fever or not.

A very popular football game that gained some loyal fans was the Front Page Sports Football Pro series for the PC. Because it allowed you start online leagues wether it was head 2 head or a Sim league everyone could play with there own created plays and gameplans and team logic. It made me want to buy a computer when I read what it can do. The main reason it caught my eye was because it had Barry Sanders on the cover. Barry is my favorite football player of all time.

I started Fbpro when Front Page Sports Football Pro 95 came out. I fell in love instantly because you could create players create your own team and start your own league. Once you start playing with Custom teams you can't go back and i don't care what anybody else says because it's true well in my part atleast. Because when you go back to playing with NFL teams it just doesn't feel the same anymore.

I skipped the 96 edition because I didn't have a CD-ROM at the time (Yes there was a time when Computers didn't come with CD-ROMS) and by the time I did get one the fbpro97 was out, and so I went ahead and bought that one instead. I then bought fbpro98 and successfully transferred my league over to it without a hitch. When 98 came out they dropped Barry Sanders from the cover and Put Dan Marino in. Not much changed between 96, 97, and 98. The graphics didn't change but looked neater and the interface looked nice and they added small stuff here and there, kinda how Madden does it nowadays but they would not put things in and then take them out.

The Screenshot above shows an instant replay in action I was able to copy this frame by frame with the greatest of ease and this game also lets you watch from every angle imaginable. The game runs a little faster than what is shown above obcourse.

The game also had a bunch nice utilities that made online play go a little smoother. Like Virtual Stadium which would let multiple people connect to one game to watch a game as it played out. Alot of leagues would use this utility so that other people can connect and watch the championship game play out. Also they had a utility that would let you realign/add/or drop teams on the fly without losing any of your teams history. This game had utilities for almost everything. They even had a utility that would let you track knocked down passes and a utility that let you unretire players if they retired too soon. Back then it looked like football games we're really gonna take off in the PC market. At the time I had stopped playing consoles alltogether when I started gaming online and football made it happen even more so.

Then the big announcement came for Football pro 99, it was set to be the best football game of all time I swear. Don't get me wrong Madden is the best one on one game ever made hands down (Well this year is up in the air cuz ESPN 2k5 was also good) but it lacks some of the depth that PC sports gamers appreciate and so does ESPN2k5 as well. But it's completely understandable because those are really built for consoles. Anyway FBpro99 was gonna be made and I was definitely hyped.

First of all it was gonna have 3d graphics which is something they avoided thus making them fall dangerously behind in the graphics department. When I read about the features in a magazine I nearly peed in my pants. You get to make your uniforms from scratch including Endzone and Midfield art. A Finacial model so you can set Ticket Prices and a salary cap which was the first of it's kind at the time it would also let you play online head 2 head vs another opponent. Not just coach mode like the past games but full control which was also the first of it's kind. The game was scheduled to be released in the fall of 98. Snother game that also was gonna be made was Basketball game with Simulation and league play which was unheard of at that time. Basketball Pro 99 was set to be released around that time also. This was perfect timing in my opinion because NBA Live was the only Basketball game available on PC and PC Football games we're slowly begining to fade away. I was hoping that this game would bring people back and PCfootball would once again be put back in it's place.

Basketball Pro 99 would've been the first basketball simulation game in the Market but the game got scrapped by Sierra

Both games we're pushed back but I wasn't worried just a little more eager to get my hands on both games. I thought maybe it would be released sometime before Christmas but Christmas came and went and it was now 1999. Somewhere in Between that time Sierra (The Publisher of the FBpro series and Basketball Pro 99) was bought by a French Water company known as Vivendi. They cancelled all the sports games except for there very popular Nascar Series and Football Pro 99 which was nearing completion. Basketball Pro 99 was cancelled but I was still okay but somewhat in shock. It wasn't only those games the Leisure Suit Larry series was killed as well. Also a Lord of the Rings RPG game that was highly anticipated at the time. That day was known as Black Monday to Sierra Employees because they just came in to work and they we're told to go home cuz they had no job.

So I was still okay because fbpro99 was still in production and it survived that terrible lay off. The game was pushed back again and people we're definitely getting restless. I don't remember when exactly but i think it was February of 99 when the game finally got released. The game was unplayable and Sierra was under alot of pressure to release the game and so it resulted in an extremely bug ridden game. People we're pissed off and some of the programmers set up a chatroom so that people could give them feedback on what bugs they found in the game. 2 patches we're released if I remember correctly and the game was still unplayable to most people.

Sierra gave up and cut the cord on the game and issued a callback and the game was removed from the shelves. That was all she wrote and since then Football games on the PC died alltogether.

The Stage was set for fbpro99 to become one of the best football game ever made but Everything Crumbled and it marked the end of PC Football games and the fbpro series forever.

Madden 2002 was probably the one game that came close to fbpro for online league play of the Madden games and for while it looked like it was on it's way to becoming a beefed up version of fbpro. The play Editor was not as advanced as the one for fbpro because wide receivers and runningbacks had predefined routes so you couldn't make your own from scratch. But it still had alot of promise. But it actually got worse from there cuz they took out the play editor in the 2003 version and in the 2004 version they took out Online Franchise which is something that had alot of promise definitely. I never bought Madden 2005 but I'm told that alot of the customization options we're crippled. ESPN2k5 from what I'm told kicked Madden's ass in both playability and sales as well.

When Madden 2002 came out it had alot of potential and was slowly becoming a beefed up version of fbpro but when 2003 came out they backtracked and started taking content out. Obcourse the PCversion didn't look half as good as the Console but hopes we're riding high.

Madden then struck back and bought Exclusive rights to NFL teams Stadiums and player names not too long ago. I believe it was December 13th or 14th of this year 2004 but unsure( I should've paid attention). I tried to fill that empty void with other games, I Bought NFL Gameday 99 for the PC which was 989 Sports first venture into the PC world and it was pretty good but it only allowed you to use NFL teams and only one season of play. I was thinking of purchasing Madden and read the back of the cover to see what features it had and it didn't catch my eye. After that I just gave up on Football games alltogether. My friend gave me his copy of Madden 2002 when he bought the 2003 version on the PC. I went and installed it I played it for little less than a season. I never bothered to play it online it bothered me that but I did feel it had some promise because you can start online leagues with it but I didn't bother to play it but felt it had potential. Other games here and there came out for the PC that caught my eye but they we're only text simulators and eventually I tried Football Mogul and Season Ticket Football and neither could fill that empty void. Season Ticket Football had a very confusable and plain looking interface while Football Mogul didn't have any online league play and it wasn't heavy on the stats.

I continued on playing games like Diablo 2 and Quake 3 without knowing what the future had in store. For some reason sometime in April of 2003 I stumbled unto an old fbpro site when I started deleting some of my old favorites. Remarkably it still worked and somehow wound up in the fbpro united forums. They we're still alive and active and leagues we're still in existance to my amazement.

Then I saw links to 2 football games Maximum Football and Division Rivals both games look like they will be great for online leagues. I read up on both games and absolutely fell in love with football gaming all over again. It's sad that we have to heavily rely on the small guy to create a great football game but I know they will do a good job. Both games allow for full customization of your leagues structure and your teams uniforms.

Both games allow you edit the stadium art and allow you start a college league with 200+ teams if you so desired.

Maximum Football will allow you customize rules play on a Canadian Football field with American rules or play with 12 or 11 men. You will also be able to play Arena Football but without the rebound nets because those are copyrighted aparently. At first his game was geared towards canadian football but then Dave Winter creator of the game decided to expand by adding American Football in as well. Later on he decided to add Arena Football. You can mix rules and start a league that has a little bit of all 3 leagues and truly make it a unique league. You can also change rules on the fly if you choose to.

With Maximum Football you will be able to play Arena Football and also Canadian style football when it hits the shelf on Super Bowl Week.

You can add teams as well or take some out without starting the league over. You would have to wait til the end of the season obcourse to avoid any schedule conflicts. You can even play with a blue Boise State like Field or any color you desire to make your league or team truly unique. You will also be able to create an entire playbook from scratch and build your own unique plays.

The only bummer about this game is no career stats and no head 2 head play unless your both on the same computer playing with 2 joysticks.

Division Rivals will be geared towards player development and will allow you to fully customize your team's uniform as well from the ground up. League size is up to 200 teams according to game creators and they plan on expanding it some more. You can also restructure your league add or subtract teams on the fly as well. You can play all three levels of Football High School, College, and the Pros. As you play your league you will notice that players will develop all the way back to High School as your league plays on year after year or you can setup your own development league to draft players from.

You will also be able to import your old fbpro league into Division Rivals although I'm not completely sure about that one cuz it is rarely discussed. Joystick, Coach, and sim modes supported according to the DR website. You will be able to hire and fire Coaches and scouts as well if they just don't cut it. It will also allow you to edit or even create stadiums if you so desire or if your up to the task of creating a 3 dimensional stadium. They also have the 3d Play editor that will let try your plays as you build it. You will also be able to create plays plans and profiles for your team. Quick Sim, Regular Sim and Full Sim Season options will be available as well as Game Logs and Game Films.

Teams will have there own practice facilities and it will viewable when using the 3d play editor

I helped out a little with Division Rivals for a couple of months and I learned alot from Michael Bjourstrum, the head guy over at DR and I'm sure this game will be good.

Division Rivals is still in it's early stages but hopefully we'll see a playable version sometime next year A new uniform Editor is in the works and the DR guys plan to release the 3d play editor before the game comes out as well. There will also be a stadium editor but not sure if that one will be released before the game gets released.

There was another game that caught my eye it was Total Pro Football which was a Text simulator which would've atleast satisfied half of my needs. It was okay for a while but it was released with a boatload of bugs and it suffered the same fate that FBpro99 did. It was released too soon and it was full of bugs. It was supposed to be released Halloween day 2003 but it got pushed back to sometime before Christmas. The game was released on the 21st of Christmas I believe and it had a ton of bugs. The bugs we're eventually fixed but it was too late the games popularity died down. A big thing that really hurt this game as well was that it only allowed you to have a 32 team league. Making it virtually impossible to fill leagues up human players. The NAFL league which runs has about 15 players right now. As far as I know this game only has 2 leagues that are operational right now.

I liked the way that Total Pro Football made the team pages. It made them look pretty awesome, just check out my armageddon page and lookup the boxscores that will give you an idea. But alas that game died out and Arlie Rahn left .400 software studios to create greydog software along with Gary Gorski creator of Total Pro Basketball. Total Pro Basketball had a sequel released just recently but no word on a Total Pro Football sequel.

So that is where I'm at today and hopefully both Maximum Football and Division Rivals or atleast make an impact in the football gaming community because that is all we PC football gamers are getting. There's always EA sports but the game keeps getting more and crippled despite the Purty graphics.

I think both Maximum Football and Division Rivals have to be good because they will not compete with Madden in the Graphics department so they have to make it up elsewhere by allowing full customization, if Maximum Football fails upon it's release the fbpro and PC football community will continue to crumble and people will become wrestless and pin there hopes on Division Rivals and add some more undeserved pressure unto Mike and his crew will evolve. I just hope it doesn't get as bad as it did when Fbpro99 was about to be released which is what Dave Winter is getting right now for the numerous delays he has had in the past. It's been long and coming.

Also don't go out buy fbpro98 the last known good version of the fbpro series because you'll be dissapointed because the game is outdated and it will make me look like I overly hyped the game. The game is buggy on the newer systems that are out there. You had to be around when the game was hot in order to understand the hype and what it was all about. I never played in any online leagues back then because leagues would fill up and I ended up on waiting lists back then. But I did join the MLF in 2003. The league will no longer use Fbpro tho and use Maximum Football instead when it comes out.

For more information on FBpro here are some sites that can help you out on how the game is played and give you some tips and help you find some old utilities and to find out how many leagues are still around.

fbprounited

FBpro world

Obcourse for information on the other games just go to the main sites and then go to their forums.

 

So in general Football games on the PC have potential to be alot better because you can edit things on the fly and games can be enhanced by third party developers just like the fbpro series was. Online league play would be much better as well and you can fully customize your teams. Yes Computers are more expensive but it's getting to the point where every family will need a computer little by little and computers nowadays are dropping in price and come with better parts. I have not touch a console since I went to computers back in 95 and don't plan on going back anytime soon. I do however play Football when I go to a freinds house and challenge them 1 on 1, but i can't handle the Joystick shaking and button mashing sometimes even i occassionally manage to win.