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Posted
Aug 13 2009, 01:30 PM
As excited as we all are about the launch of Madden at midnight tonight, I'm actually thousands of miles away in the UK, where I gave a keynote this morning at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival. My speech focused on the evolution of EA SPORTS over the past two years, while I also participated in an entertaining Oxford-style debate in the afternoon about the power of blockbuster games in our industry. With Madden in stores Friday and FIFA not far behind in October, you can guess which side I was on.
As for Edinburgh, this is my first time in this beautiful city, and in addition to the Interactive Festival, there are a myriad of other celebratory events taking place during the month of August. Most prominent is the Military Tattoo, which takes place in the evenings against the backdrop of the 14th century castle which still dominates the city skyline today. I was fortunate to be able attend the event on Tuesday evening, and what a spectacle it was...
Next week, I'll be at GamesCom in Cologne, where we'll be showing a number of our upcoming fall titles, including NBA LIVE 10, Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online and NHL 10. FIFA is obviously our headliner for the show, and we'll have a number of announcements about both FIFA as well as EA SPORTS Active next week.
Even from across the pond, I've enjoyed following all the anticipation for our 21st Madden launch. I'll be in bed and won't be able to watch tonight's preseason game with the Steelers and Cardinals, but I've read plenty of commentary the past few days on the product. I loved GameDaily's, "If you're a football fan and you don't have this game, well, guess what? You're not a football fan.", and I'd encourage you to let me know what you think.
Of course, the conversations will be happening across various pages on the new easports.com, where you can talk to development team members and ask questions as you play, get tips and tricks from the dev team, check the online play and online franchise FAQ and even post your favorite highlights. Enjoy the game...
Cheers,
Peter
Posted
Aug 05 2009, 03:54 PM
August is certainly a great time of the year, as NFL Training Camps open and we near the launch of Madden. On Aug. 14, Madden hits stores, and you may have started seeing some of our TV advertising as we approach launch.
As I wrote yesterday on the PlayStation.blog, I love to see how "training" for Madden launch has become just as important to gamers as NFL Training Camps are for NFL players. These great new TV spots, created in collaboration with our good partners at PlayStation, clearly make that point!
Hope you're ready for Aug. 14. Be sure to download your
Madden demo today if you haven't yet done so...
Cheers,
Peter
Posted
Jun 10 2009, 11:07 AM
I'm back from a great week at E3 in Los Angeles and pleased to see the feedback we got on our product lineup at the show. As you might have seen this week, Madden NFL 10 won The Technical Achievement - Software Award from G4 and Sports Game of the Show 1Up. Fight Night Round 4 also received Best Sports Game of the Show from G4.
We went from workouts to tap-outs last Monday at EA's press conference - with news about EA SPORTS Active, a great live demo of Fight Night Round 4, and of course the announcement of EA SPORTS MMA in development at Tiburon. With top fighters and fighting styles from around the world, and our typical authenticity to the real sport, I'm telling you this will be the most intense MMA game to date.
It was also quite a thrill to spend time with Pete Sampras as part of our Grand Slam Tennis demo. Pete was a blast onstage, and even more fun down in the Green Room, where he and Alison Sweeney battled it out on Grand Slam Tennis for a good hour before the show started. Once Pistol Pete got the hang of the Wii Motion Plus controls, that serve and volley game kicked in for him just like the old days...
When you add in our announcements of TeamBuilder in NCAA Football (which has now spawned more than 55,000 created teams since last Monday) and Online Franchise in Madden, I think you got a good sense why I'm so excited about this year's new games and think fans will share my optimism when they get their hands on our new titles over the coming months. And of course we're off to a great start with the recent launch of EA SPORTS Active and this week's Grand Slam Tennis and Tiger Woods PGA TOUR launches. 2009 is shaping up to be a great year for EA SPORTS, driven in no small part by the feedback we receive from you our core customers.
Finally, I was glad to be a part of the "new and improved E3", a show that felt like it had the excitement of years past and provided a perfect platform for showcasing the great work of this industry without the unmanageable crowds and booths that had begun to overrun the show and left us with the underwhelming E3s of the past two years. Both Sony and Microsoft shared exciting news about their respective motion control technologies, something that we at EA SPORTS believe can be a major driving force towards mass market adoption.
Cheers,
Peter
Posted
Apr 24 2009, 07:35 AM
It is a big day for EA SPORTS football franchises on both sides of the Atlantic. In the UK, at Arsenal's Emirates stadium, I took a few moments to speak to Stevie Morgan (if you haven't heard his FIFA podcasts go here).
In New York, we've just announced not one, but two cover athletes (
Larry Fitzgerald and Troy Polamalu) for Madden NFL 10 along with a whole host of other
news.
It's already been a busy day and I've still got several hours of questions from the UK games press to field, but I look forward to hearing your opinions on the latest EA SPORTS news!
Cheers,
Peter
Posted
Apr 16 2009, 04:18 PM
As football fans across the country were greeted with the news this morning of John Madden's retirement from broadcasting, I was struck by just how big an impact John has made on the sport for more than four decades. We all obviously knew this day would one day come, when John would walk away from the booth, but he certainly leaves a lasting legacy that we're proud to be able to carry on through our Madden NFL videogame franchise for years to come.
As you can imagine, we've had dozens of questions today about what impact John's retirement from NBC will have on EA SPORTS. I'm pleased that we continue our strong relationship with John and will continue to produce new versions Madden NFL football with his collaboration, including this August with Madden NFL 10.
John is a true sports icon who has made an indelible impact on the sport of football which will be felt forever. His prolific coaching and broadcasting careers, as well as his distinct role in shaping the EA SPORTS football experience have redefined how multiple generations have come to know and love the sport with unrivaled passion. We're excited to see his legacy live on in the 21st year of Madden NFL football, and well beyond. And how about this for a fun stat? Our dev team at Tiburon estimates that John has recorded roughly 30,000 lines of commentary for the game over the years.
In other news .... It's Round 2 for Geoff Keighley and I on Round 4. That's right, for those of you who remember me taking it to Geoff on FaceBreaker last fall, he was back for more recently here at EA, where he and I did battle on Fight Night Round 4. The episode airs tonight at 12:30 a.m, on SpikeTV and SpikeHD and will feature the first look at gameplay from one of the most anticipated games of the year. We also went deep on all kinds of other new content in FNR4, which hits stores in just a couple more months. Anyone want to guess who won?
A final point on the concept of communication via this blog. I cannot and will not respond to individual questions that ask for information on titles ahead of when we are ready or able to talk publicly. For the reasoning behind this, I will refer you back to my recent post regarding the complexity of announcing licensed games in development. I will also urge you to visit the individual development team blogs for the most up-to-date information on all of our franchises. This is clearly a source of frustration for at least a couple of you, but I will beg your indulgence and understanding that we are running a complex business that has a myriad of stakeholders, all of whom need to be in agreement before we discuss certain parts of our business publicly.
Peter
Posted
Mar 25 2009, 12:13 PM
It was great to see the passion and level of detail in your comments on Monday's post featuring the first screenshot of Madden NFL 10. Rest assured that the development team reads every one of these posts, and while we can't guarantee we can integrate all of your requests into the game each year, we really appreciate the feedback. Keep it coming. For more detail, I'd invite you to read the detailed new blog post from art director Mike Young with more details about this screenshot and more about the visual presentation in this year's Madden.
I also want to tip my hat to my friend Curt Schilling, who announced his retirement from baseball yesterday after 23 spectacular years. He now becomes a rookie again, this time in the video game business, as he and his team at 38 Studios continue to build their impressive MMO, codenamed Project Copernicus.
Finally we have another videoblog segment to share. Below is more from my conversation with Nate Lundy a couple of weeks ago before our Season Opener.
Posted
Mar 23 2009, 09:40 AM
For several weeks now, we've been getting a great response for our Madden NFL 10 producer blogs, where the development team has been going deep on things like procedural awareness, improvements to the QB, tuning being done to the wide receivers and DBs, and more. I hope you've been enjoying the level of engagement the team is offering up. If you're a Madden fan, and have any questions about the game in development, I urge you to visit the blogs and engage with the team.
For those following along, hopefully it's already apparent that as we close the books on an incredible two decades of Madden NFL football that we're ushering in an exciting new era for the game with the most detailed and comprehensive edition of Madden in the history of the franchise. We're hitting the real sweet spot of development for this generation of consoles as the team is really hitting its stride in squeezing every ounce of power and capability from the hardware. In fact, the Madden team is taking such dramatic strides this year that we're in the position to go deep on features and details earlier than we've ever done before.
While we have a number of announcements and updates to come over the next several weeks leading up to next month's NFL Draft, I'm excited to debut the first screenshot from this year's game right here this week. The old adage says, "A picture is worth a thousand words", and that is certainly true in this fantastic shot. How many improvements can you pick out? The Madden dev team will call each one out in their blog later this week.
Over the next several weeks you're going to be hearing more about how this year's game is going to continue to push the boundaries of authenticity in gameplay, presentation, and art style. It's the fight for every yard in the NFL that makes the battles playing out on Sundays throughout the fall and winter so compelling. From everything I have seen in Madden NFL 10 so far this year, the authenticity of gameplay is showing striking improvement in physics, realism and responsiveness. Having recently sat through a full product review from our team in Orlando, it's abundantly clear that this could be the deepest, most graphically-rich Madden ever, and a stunning testament to the talented development team who have had a maniacal focus delivering a landmark title to Madden Nation in 2009.
Of course, now's usually a good time of year for the debate to begin raging about who will be on the cover of this year's game. I've probably been asked a couple of dozen times already over the past month in interviews. You're not going to get any hints here from me (or are you?), but soon we'll begin highlighting a number of fine candidates who represent that fight for every yard as we build up to late April's announcement.
I know who I want to see...but who would you choose?
Cheers,
Peter
PS...spectacular win for Liverpool yesterday versus Aston Villa, on the heels of Man Utd's debacle at Fulham on Saturday. Too little too late, or are Man Utd about to implode? Either way, the Premier League is going down to the wire, and squad depth and injuries will ultimately be the deciding factor.
NCAA bracket? Like my Golden Bears, I went down in the first round and now I am staving off being once again in the bottom spot in the EA SPORTS bracket.