Horns11
10,000+ Posts
for the last 20 years, better get NCAA 14 right now.
It's a shame that the current climate of college sports and amateurism has come to this, but I can't say I didn't see it coming. I remember having a conversation with someone in the mid-90s while playing "Bill Walsh College Football" (on Sega Genesis, for those of you keeping score at home) about how using the teams and the numbers of the players could be construed as the "likeness" of the players, and whether or not that was good or bad for the sport. I contended that it was fine as long as they kept it at solely the numbers.
Then by 1998, they had added the race of each player.
Then by 2001, they had added home states and heights/weights of each player.
And once the XBox 360 and PS3 came out, the face likenesses and hair lengths were in full effect.
I guess it's hard to fathom what was going through EA's producers' minds when they kept upping the ante each year. Looking back, they probably should have just stuck with the player "attributes" like speed, arm strength, and tackling ability, then totally randomized the numbers/races/likenesses to allow the casual users to edit the rosters themselves. They could have solved a lot of problems that way, and users sharing rosters with their friends would have no impact on the NCAA in any way. Johnny Manziel could have been a 6'5", 230 lb. black dude wearing #18, but with whatever attributes they would have assigned to the Texas A&M starting QB in real life.
I haven't been keeping up with the series as much since about 2009, as the gameplay sucks compared to other sports games. But this is a sad chapter for sports gaming, and could have been prevented by being more honest about the intent of likenesses early on.
It's a shame that the current climate of college sports and amateurism has come to this, but I can't say I didn't see it coming. I remember having a conversation with someone in the mid-90s while playing "Bill Walsh College Football" (on Sega Genesis, for those of you keeping score at home) about how using the teams and the numbers of the players could be construed as the "likeness" of the players, and whether or not that was good or bad for the sport. I contended that it was fine as long as they kept it at solely the numbers.
Then by 1998, they had added the race of each player.
Then by 2001, they had added home states and heights/weights of each player.
And once the XBox 360 and PS3 came out, the face likenesses and hair lengths were in full effect.
I guess it's hard to fathom what was going through EA's producers' minds when they kept upping the ante each year. Looking back, they probably should have just stuck with the player "attributes" like speed, arm strength, and tackling ability, then totally randomized the numbers/races/likenesses to allow the casual users to edit the rosters themselves. They could have solved a lot of problems that way, and users sharing rosters with their friends would have no impact on the NCAA in any way. Johnny Manziel could have been a 6'5", 230 lb. black dude wearing #18, but with whatever attributes they would have assigned to the Texas A&M starting QB in real life.
I haven't been keeping up with the series as much since about 2009, as the gameplay sucks compared to other sports games. But this is a sad chapter for sports gaming, and could have been prevented by being more honest about the intent of likenesses early on.
