There’s a lot of differences between the Star Trek canon and the Babylon 5 series. I’m using my extensive knowledge of the Star Trek series* to compare to what I’ve seen from (3) episodes of drunken Babylon 5 review.
In Star Trek the Ferengi are a ethically aloof race of super-capitalists who sometimes where an occipital dew rag kind of thing:
Whereas in Babylon 5 the “Ferengi” are badass soul bounty hunters who also wear an occipital dew rag thing:
This has been, based on my (3) episode drunken assessment, the only difference between Star Trek and Babylon 5.
It’s that time of year again for me. I’m filled with guarded pessimism in the face of hopeful news that floods out preceding the release of another EA Sports NCAA College Football title.
Panther scouts find a DT that isn't subject to the laws of physics. Marty Hurney trades pick to Patriots for a punter with "potential".
Several years ago EA decided to build both their NCAA title and the Madden title on the same engine. Now most of America recognizes the NCAA title as what it truly is, Madden beta, and they play it as such for only weeks before actual Madden is released. While most of these fans are all a titter over who has what ratings, and which teams rank where*, I’m stuck brooding with the small minority that is very aware that ratings haven’t really mattered for years.
Every year I remain hopeful that some meaningful improvement will be made to actual gameplay. Outside of going backwards and then “improving” back to the mean, nothing substantial has been done to the most important facet of the game in over 10 years. Hyperbole you say? Here’s NCAA 2002 with a QB rolling out and throwing perfectly accurate pass, across his body, off his backfoot, and under duress.
Here’s the most cutting edge NCAA game currently on the market with a QB rolling out and throwing a perfectly accurate pass, across his body, and under duress, for 57 yards. (Sorry for the music in this video in advance, you may want to mute if possible. Remember this is in the name of serious science.)
While most game developers have implemented some form of physics engine into their games, EA’s developers have been content to stick with 90′s-cutting-edge motion capture methods. The end result is line play where the only results are total success or total failure, which is determined by whichever animation the computer assigns to your player, which is determined by a coin flip basically. Here’s more good news sports fans, EA has to decide to implement even more cartoonishly unrealistic line animation options to the coin flip decider this year.
Keep in mind this is an actual promotional video for NCAA 12 from EA.
“This is just ridiculous whining”, you say, “why would a major video game developer knowingly release a giant pile of shit every year?” Exclusivity contracts with NCAA and NFL licensing for a 100% market share, a guaranteed consumer base every year, and free marketing by a partner that’s so well versed in overhype Flava Flav and Don King think it’s excessive. The college title gets it worse than Madden because EA knows that most buyers will only be playing about a month, which isn’t enough time to uncover or care about the generous smattering of bugs and flaws that even a toddler at the controls could ferret out in testing. It also doesn’t help that marketers have assured EA and their partners that this sort of thing is entertainment enough for actual college football fans, so why bother with a finished product.
(Bit HT to EDSBS.com for making the pain go away, especially when the brown liquor and/or mute button are not within reach on game days.)
Unfortunately for me manually taking grainy pictures of PS2 renderings of the game, and being required to track stats across multiple databases while patiently waiting for a playable release of a new version has become too tedious. The “NextGen” releases of the game have what might, maybe be a better way to capture and distribute media from the game, which is essential for when I want to share my living vicariously nerdings with then world. I’ll have to hope that the new, probably half-operational at best additions to the release don’t break the tiny little bit of stable gameplay that’s left after years of neglect. I’ll have to hope the designers, that EA actually employs and pays, that think 12 carries for 331 yards is perfectly normal for a day in the life of a white running back aren’t let in or around the actual AI development.
The AI displayed in the very first play from this video of EA’s own prepared video at E3 leave me highly, highly doubtful though. (Around 1:00 on this video which I suspiciously could not embed.) I certainly hope my $60 will find me some kind of football-like substance somewhere in the game that EA has so bastardized for the kind of customer they love catering to.
