EA SPORTS NHL Producers Talk NHL 10

Fly on the Wall at EAC

A Classic Returns

After all the speculation over the past month over a 102-character tweet I made in the beginning of December, EA SPORTS today announced the return of 90's arcade classic NBA JAM to put an end to the rumours and put the excitement back into 2-on-2 basketball. It was definitely pretty tough keeping the secret in the box as a huge fan of the game myself. I recall my favourite duo of Shawn Kemp and Gary Payton occupying my time back in the day on one of the limited-edition machines. I remember me and a buddy running this one machine on many nights as line-ups of challengers placed their two-bits on the glass only to get their butts handed to them in the ensuing onslaught of rainmakers and clutch treys. Some of the best games we had were against the Lakers with Vlade Divac and James Worthy or the Jazz who delivered with Karl Malone and the very reliable shot of John Stockton. Sometimes I wondered if there was code in the game where if Stockton had the ball in the last few seconds down by one, he'd always hit his shot. It drove me nuts losing last shot games!

So with the official announcement the team will be polling NBA fans on which players they want to see in the game. The first round of player voting is now open for the Sacramento Kings, LA Clippers, and Oklahoma Thunder. Make sure you check out the official NBA JAM website to and check back weekly for new teams to vote on!

FIGHT NIGHT Round 4 Champions Pack II (XBOX 360) and Title Update #4 Available Next Week

While PlayStation 3 owners have been enjoying the latest downloadable content for the past few weeks, XBOX 360 owners have been patiently waiting for the re-release of Champions Pack II which I'm being told is now scheduled to be released on XBOX Marketplace on January 18th. Along with the downloadable content for the 360, a title update to address some issues will be released on both consoles.

Following the release of the new content, on January 27th from 3PM-8PM PST we will be hosting a live XBOX LIVE Community Playdate with the developers of the game. Along with the chance to knockout one of the producers, gamers will also have the opportunity to provide the team with their feedback of the game if they happen to get paired up with a developer or through the Cover-It-Live event that I will be hosting during the session. So if you can't find your way into a match against one of the developers or fansite leaders that will also be joining the Community Playdate or are a PlayStation 3 gamer, feel free to join us in the side-discussion we have planned as well.

Last Week to Qualify for the Knockout Round in the Gillette Champions of Gaming

After weeks of qualifying, we are now down to the final opportunity for gamers to qualify for the Knockout Round and a chance to play the pros in the Gillette Champions of Gaming. Weekly qualifiers for Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 10, Madden NFL 10, NHL 10, NBA LIVE 10, FIGHT NIGHT Round 4, and FIFA 10 have been excitedly waiting for the next round to begin and with the last chance for entrants to battle their way in, it's going to be a dog fight right until the final minute of play on January 17th.

It's not too late for a shot to play some of the best athletes in the world in Orlando so don't miss your chance! Go to your in-game tournament menu and go FTW this week with your favourite EA SPORTS title! There's no fee to enter and today is the first day of the last round which ends Sunday night.

NHL 10 Team Fixes Exploit, Prepares to Release Tuner Set 1.03 and Updated National Team Rosters

Over the holiday break a few of the NHL 10 developers were notified of an exploit in the game that some were using to avoid getting losses when playing EASHL games. Many thanks to those in the community that assisted with re-creating the issue. However, shame on those that would take advantage of such bugs in the game! Yes, I know, these should've been found before the game is shipped though I've never been a fan of people who would exploit such issues in games instead of taking a loss like man. Anyhow, the team was able to identify the root cause of the bug and have since deployed a server-side fix to address the issue. Producer Matt Mahar made this statement on the NHL 10 forums late last week:

There have been many posts about a "pause glitch" that has been happening to teams. We tracked this down and figured it out, thanks to help from the community. Really appreciate you guys bringing it to our attention. It was not actually a "pause glitch" in that it had to do more with privacy settings and when/if a user exited the game.

The adjustment of the privacy settings was causing inconsistencies with the game reports that we produce at the end of each game and the game would be thrown out. Meaning, no loss to a team when one should have been counted. This was used by only a few teams and did not result in any major point adjustments.

We have fixed the issue and pushed the server side fix up last night. This should no longer be occurring.

Thanks again to the community members that gave us valuable insight.

Enjoy the game!

Matt

Furthermore, the team has also been working on some tweaks for the next Tuner Set scheduled for release within the next two weeks. Matt and others on the team have been lurking in the NHL 10 and other hockey gaming forums for gameplay feedback and have spent some time working on further improvements to the game.

Add the work the Rosters team has been continually providing since launch and it's no wonder they have once again received kudos throughout the industry as one of the strongest game teams around. The latest from Producers Andy Agostini and Gurn Sumal is that fans can expect to see National Teams updated before the beginning of the Olympics answering the call put out by the community to skate as their favorite countrymen.

FTW - Hockey Time

September is one of my favourite months of the year, not only because I get a year older (or despite it, that is) but the presents I receive are usually in the form of one of my all-time favorite games, NHL 10. This year NHL 10 hits the streets next week on Tuesday the 15th and for the first time we will be hosting a couple of midnight releases at Future Shops in Toronto and Vancouver. With President Obama welcoming the Pens to the White House today and team prospects hitting the ice this week, it's officially time to think hockey.

Growing up in Vancouver I've been a fan of the Canucks since I was allowed as a kid to stay up late in '82 to watch their magical first run into the Stanley Cup Finals against the New York Islanders. The series didn't go the way Canucks fans wanted it to, but it was a great run and a great year for the guys who wore the Flying V's. At seven years old I was hooked on the game and the team, and over the years as the jerseys and the team changed, I longed for them to return to the finals for another chance at their first Cup.

Then came '94 and that chance against the other New York team, the Rangers. In a battle where players on both teams left it all on the ice, the series would go seven games and the Rangers would win the Cup by a goal. One of the most memorable pictures is of the team's captain Trevor Linden leaning his head on goaltender Kirk McLean's mask after the loss. It signified all the sweat and tears and eventual heartache that came with coming so close to capturing the holy grail of hockey.

Back then while at UBC, my buddies and I relived the series looking for different outcomes on the SNES with NHL 95 and spent more hours playing the video game than I should have. We'd set up tournaments and battle throughout the school year and I even remembered playing games to simulate what we thought would happen in games to come. We didn't care that the game wasn't as authentic as it is today, we only cared that we could be play as our favorite team and feel the rush of scoring the game winner (most of the time with the dreaded one-timer goals). We always wondered, "Could it get any better than this???"

Your damn right it could and next week the series that has received the Sports Game of the Year nod for the past two years isn't holding back with NHL 10. The team followed up '09 with 3-on-3 NHL Arcade and still managed to put in over 200 gameplay improvements to kick it up a notch for this year's game. The producers have been providing the community with regular blogs and videos and screenshots to whet gamers' appetites. Even the demo was one like none other giving NHL fans new and old to the series a taste of the new Battle for the Cup and Be a Pro modes.

And so with Linden retired, there's time for him to take up gaming and what better game to do so than with NHL 10 where he can don the '94 uni's or, better yet, go old skool with the Flying V's in this year's game. Recreate those Stanley Cup Finals and hope for a different outcome in the new Battle for the Cup mode which has been implemented into the game very nicely. Or just jump into Season Mode and play with Luongo fresh off one of the most lucrative contracts ever for a Canuck (is Gillis a genius or what?). A whole other blog there in itself but something that I may look into with some of my own players with the new Be a GM mode.

Like most hockey fans, I'm excited at this time of year as the release of the game next week means that the season is right around the corner. Can this be the year my 'nucks go FTW and finally put it together? Again, another blog for another time.

Next week however, join Trevor Linden along with me and the game producers at Future Shop on Granville & Robson Monday night for the Midnight Release event. Be first to pick up a copy and see if you have the stick skills to bring home the Cup yourself. And for those of you in Toronto (boooo! Lol), you can join other NHL producers along with former captain Wendel Clark and current Leaf Ian White at the Toronto Life Square Future Shop. It's time to go FTW with one of the Best Titles of The Year!

Monday FTW - Weekend of Champions

It was a weekend of winners as the NBA and NHL crowned new champions over the weekend while at the same time EA SPORTS looks at crowning some gaming winners over the next few weeks as well.

Congratulations go out to Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins as they overcame a 3-2 series deficit to go FTW in the final two games and earn the right to hoist Lord Stanley’s Cup in Detroit, winning only their second game in Hockeytown in the last two years.

After being chased out of game 5, Marc-Andre Fleury came up with two career games and received a little help from the crossbar near the end of game seven letting in only two goals in game six and seven to backstop the Pens to the Cup. With Sid injuring his knee in the first period of game seven, the team rallied behind their captain as Maxime Talbot scored two of his biggest goals to give the Pens the scoring needed to win.

It was quite the moment for Sid the Kid as he shared the ice with owner Mario Lemiuex who hadn’t hoisted the cup since ’92 when he won his second in a row as a player. Sid was so much into the moment that he almost forgot about shaking the hands of last year’s champions leaving some of the Red Wings to patiently wait for him to shake his hand. Did he snub the team or was he just into the moment? I’ll say that patience is a virtue and even for the Wings, though it had to be bitter watching the Kid celebrate, those are the breaks when it comes to winning a championship.

Kobe can now remove the kryptonite from his shorts as he shook a monkey off his back (or a gorilla named “Shaq”) winning his fourth Larry O’Brien Trophy and confidently leading the LA Lakers to the NBA Championship over NBA LIVE 10 cover athlete Dwight “Superman” Howard and the Orlando Magic.

The Black Mamba was double-teamed throughout game five which left other Lakers shooters open. The team delivered hitting 50% of their shots from the arc and hitting 75% from the line to disappoint the home side looking to extend the series to a sixth game. It was a big 16-0 run following a confrontation between Trevor Ariza and Hedo Turkoglu that was the difference in the game.

The championship was also head coach Phil Jackson’s tenth and there was no shortage of celebration as he remains undefeated when his teams win the first game of a championship series.

With these championships in the book, EA SPORTS looks to crown its own champions as we kick off the NHL 09 EASHL Invitational in a couple of weeks. For months, the EASHL has been running strong and hundreds of teams have played thousands of games and have climbed the leaderboards to earn the right to be invited to our first post-season tournament.

Congratulations go out to the two regular season console champions: Shammers United who finished the season playing 3235 games and amassing 8234 points on the Xbox 360 while the No CryBabys played 1278 games and earned 7135 points to clinch first place on the PlayStation 3. These are the first teams that have received invites to the tournament and we will announce the other seven teams per console this Wednesday.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, you have to see the EA SPORTS ‘Joy’ commercial that aired at the NBA Finals last week. Coinciding with the commercial is our Welcome to the Win webpage from EA SPORTS Beta highlighting athletes’ wins in their respective sports. We will also be sharing our gamers’ wins as well so stay tuned to the site and look for new areas to unlock in the near future.

To close, congrats go to local swimmer Brent Hayden of Vancouver who went FTW and defeated Olympic Gold Champion Michel Phelps during the Santa Clara International Grand Prix swim meet over the weekend. Hayden swam a personal best of 48.44 seconds in the 100-metre freestyle to edge Phelps who clocked in at the finish at 48.87 seconds.

Ask these guys if every second counts, and you’ll appreciate what it takes to be a champion.

will ea sports go ftw at e3?

After weeks of preparing to show off their studio’s best, developers from around the world descent on Los Angeles for this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo, where gaming press will be ready to share with the public the latest news at a moment’s notice. Teams at EA SPORTS have put together videos, gamed hours on demos, and are ready for the massive questions that are bound to come from the hungry appetites of those lucky enough to get an invite to the expo.

The EA SPORTS stable will be in full force at E3 this year but not every game there will be fully accessible to those in attendance. EA Canada’s NHL 09, the winner of no less than twelve Sports Game of the Year Awards, will be inviting an even luckier few press inside closed doors with Producer David Littman and the upcoming NHL 10 game. For the rest of us, we’ll have to keep our eyes peeled for an upcoming blog on physical play from Producer Sean Ramjagsingh and new news about the upcoming EA SPORTS Hockey League Invitational Tournament to that will start later in June. Follow @NHL10 and myself, @sk88z, for when the latest news drops.

There will be many channels for our community to follow us at E3. I’ll be working with fellow EA SPORTS Community Managers @easports @raczilla, @dochowser, @dewiel, and @EARom relaying video, pics, and stories from our team of @The_Eric_Gray and @CLOSPHOTO on the ground at the LA Convention Center. I just hope the two Magic fans aren’t going to get themselves into any trouble running around downtown LA with their Orlando jerseys on. Also down there from our team will be @Active_Girl who will be busy getting people Active and started on the 30-Day Challenge that many are starting today.

I’m not going to let anything out of the bag before Peter Moore gets on stage Monday, though I will let you know that if you’re a Fight Night Round 4 fan, you’re going to want to tune in to http://ea.com/e3 at 2PM PST. Along with some news about one of the most anticipated games of the year, there will also be a few surprises and special guests.

We will also be posting video from press conferences and surrounding mayhem on http://insideblog.easports.com and don’t forget to tune in everyday at 12PM PST to EA SPORTS Live with the Thompson Brothers @PrimeTimeSA and @mamboking to get the latest sports gaming news from E3.

On the heels of this year’s biggest upset in the French Open as Rafael Nadal loses his first sets since 2007 and first match ever in Roland Garros, EA SPORTS will be hitting some hard baseline shots of its own with the launch of EA SPORTS Grand Slam Tennis later this week. Check out a recent blog and video from Producer Thomas Singleton talking about all four Grand Slam venues including the French Open’s Roland Garros and the historic Wimbledon, making its first ever appearance in a tennis video game.

Not to be outdone, EA Tiburon will be rolling out the red carpet putting the driver in the hands of the press in Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 10. Along with Grand Slam Tennis, the Wii version will be compatible with the new Wii Motion Plus and will be really taking the game to the next level. On the PC side, check out Peter Moore’s most recent blog on Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online that will allow gamers to pick up and play anytime they’ve got to get their swing on.

With football season right around the corner, mainstays Madden NFL 10 and NCAA Football 10 will be put through the paces in the hands of the press. Check out one of the latest NCAA Football 10 videos with Producer Ben Haumiller and Game Designer Russ Kiniry on the game’s Season Showdown feature. For you looking to see more on the senior title, watch and listen to Producer Phil Frazier and other devs talk about Online Co-Op, new to the game and something the community has been craving for years, in this installment of the Developer Series.

So you’ve noticed those videos on the new EA SPORTS Beta site? Just this past week, the online web teams from both studios have launched a new look for EA SPORTS fans which now incorporates a freshly skinned EA SPORTS World to match into the new EA SPORTS Beta site. Check out the EA SPORTS Beta FAQ here and feel free to leave your feedback on the site in our forums.

Over the past six months as an EA SPORTS Community Manager here at EA Canada, it’s been a pleasure to bring our fans behind the scenes action from producer blogs and Q&A’s to athlete interviews to the ultimate in community participation hosting game fans at our Community Events. We’ve made some huge strides not only listening to the EA SPORTS community but bringing you into the mix and having you all take part in the design and creation of our titles. Check out last week’s FIFA 10 Community Day hosted by Rom Broad and our other FIFA Community Managers from around the world.

I recall a time when I started at EA Canada over five years ago as QA Tester and I made a comment on the forums that was taken down because it came from someone within the company and wasn’t an ‘official comment’ on the game. I am glad to say, those days are no longer as we continue to thin the veil between our fans and the developers. Over the next months we’ll continue to try new things and continue to break down the barriers with hopes of involving our community, and of improving and making better titles year in and year out.

Here’s hoping EA SPORTS goes FTW at E3 this week!

Busy first week back at EAC - sk88z's Blog - Operation Sports

Originally Posted on Operation Sports

Talk about a crazy first week back at work here at EA Canada. As a first blog post here in OS, I wanted to share a little of what I do in my day-to-day as a Community Manager. I really do think I have one of the sweetest gigs around and I consider myself pretty lucky to work with the talented people that I do.

Fight Night Round 4 - I'm in the midst of putting together our Community Day event near the end of February and putting out invites to EA Fight Night fans. I'm a huge fan of the game myself and really excited about having some of the community come on in and check out what's in store.

If you haven't yet chimed in on the Ali vs Tyson debate, check it out on the official website: Fight Night Round 4 and talk about it in our forums (as well as on the OS ones of course). I'm looking for an OS representative as well (non-editor) so if anyone is interested have one of the OS editors here send me your info.

NBA LIVE - I've been working with the NBA LIVE team who I know are present on these boards quite a bit. I think it's great that they are out in the community talking and listening to the fans and from what I can tell from their planning, the game is going to, once again, make some huge strides.

We've just launched our NBA LIVE Staff Group Page where, along with here, I've asked them to talk about their behind the scenes look at the game as well as talk about who they are in general. Check out Jeff Antwi’s look at some of the talent from a recent Motion Capture session, Ryan Santos’ Sneak Peek at some of new kicks that will be in the game, Marcus Stephenson with another look at Dynamic DNA, and Gameplay Designer Mike Wang tells us about his holiday break.



NHL - On behalf of the team, I'm excited that OS has recognized the hard work that the team has done over the past year(s), and thank the editors for work they've done. Being recognized by the gang here for the SPOY is some huge recognition and I know the team will be pleased to hear that they're the recipients of this year's award.

For those of you that are interested, there were also a couple of Q&A's on the upcoming 3 on 3 NHL Arcade game soon-to-be released. Check out my Q&A with Matt Mahar and ESPN's Jon Robinson's Q&A with Matt and David Littman.

I've also began to Simulate NHL Games of the Week and you can check out our first round of sims to see if you agree with what NHL 09 predicts.

NCAA Basketball - Looks like the voting is just about all counted up for the EA SPORTS Toughest Places to Play contest and if you haven't had a chance to vote yet, I'm told they'll be shutting it down this weekend. I've also been told that I may have a chance to visit a couple of the schools to write about it so I'm personally really excited about that! Take me to UCLA!!!

Make sure you also check out Producer Novel Thomas' handy work in his Hoops 101 videos that give you the edge in the game. I'm working with them as well to get their Staff Group page up, though I know that the team has a lot of presence on these boards as well and I know they've had a lot of interaction with you folks already.

I'll come back from time to time to share my thoughts & rants with you as I know that the hardest core fans are here at Operation Sports and I wanted to acknowledge that and share a little of what goes on here at EAC. Feel free to message me directly or leave me comments and I'll do my best to respond to them. In the meantime, I'm prepping for a trip to Orlando next week to meet up with my fellow Community Managers from around the world and plan our ideas for the upcoming quarter.

I can't wait to get out of the snow and into some warm Florida sun!!!