AFL LIVE 2011 - 360, PS3 & PC - Part 12 - READ FAQ BEFORE POSTING

[HBK619]

Quick question to Ross/guys that have played the game, do the umpires have a noticeable presence in the game? Because a lot of free kicks paid in the AFL seem to be the high tackles/hands in the back/holding off the ball ie things that wouldn't really be controllable in game. So are these style of decisions been left out or is it random when they'll be paid?

Cos I could see myself getting very frustrated at random hands in the back frees, much the same as i get incredibly angry at the holding, block in the back and clipping penalties in madden.

The umpiring is pretty good. It's generally more black and white this time around. There was the odd seeming off decision, but there wasn't anything as blatantly bad as in the previous AFL games.

Almost every free kick given away would definitely be what YOU have done as well, rarely do you feel like you've tried to do the right thing and the random mechanics have just decided that this time it's in the back or too high. There's a lot of risk and reward to the controls that play into the free kicks, which I won't go into, but that stuff all plays into the fairness of a free kick.

The only thing, which has been mentioned in the XBW article, is that the umps blow their whistle quite fast in a held up situation. Whether that results in a holding the ball decision or a ball up comes down to the situation of the play. The flow isn't really broken up though as the play gets back on fast whether it's a ball up or the free kick.

One thing I've just thought of, and I don't think it's been asked yet, are the flanks/wing positions useless like in the old games, where playing straight down the guts was the only way to play?

Tactically the wings and flanks will do you all kinds of good to get out of a sticky situation. The middle will be relatively clogged so you might just have to go out wide.

Again a lot of it comes down to a risk and reward type of gameplay. You can risk a long bomb down the middle where you'll come up to a 50/50 type of contest with a number of players, or go out wide to a more solid option and play it a bit safer.

A lot of the gametime we played was a good amount of wing and flank play.

 

[purpleblood29]

Where is the trailer????

Read the thread title and you will find your answer....

But to save you time.

[YOUTUBE]bG6TlOyHQzU[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Alan_Didak_4]

Whoa! 10 Pages of negative comments! Ross will be rapt! Seriously does EVERYONE who watched the trailer today have something bad to say about it? I thought it was very well done, everything looked as good as it possibly can when its taken from replay cameras and is zoomed in. I thought almost every player was recognisable and enjoyed the Sydney snap goal.......good to see the new possibilities in this game.

HOWEVER, lol lets all be honest and agree that there is NO chance Daniel Jackson could ever take a speccy! Ha! Still cant wait for AFL Live 2011!

 

[bradwellcrows]

I cant beleive people are bagging this game, u can say all u like about how much better this game would be if another company made it, without bigant there wouldnt be any bloody game so shut the hell up and give them a chance!

 

[kreuze_missile]

Even if this game is shithouse i'll still buy it, gotta support any producer willing to try making an AFL game because I'd really love a good one to come out someday.

Expectations are SUPER low. As long as it matches AFL 99 for gameplay i'll be happy, anything more is a bonus.

 

[Freo16]

Just wondering if before a match in season mode do we get to see what the weather will be. Not only if it will be raining or sunny but also what the temperature will be. If so does playing in the heat affect the fatigue more than a game in the rain would ?

 

[BomberJosh]

TO ROSS AND THE TEAM - My thoughts and some questions!

Hey guys, Unlike some of you on here who don't really seem to get trailers, or may not watch games much, I am quite a gamer, I love my games...

This game looked FANTASTIC, The trailer was pretty good, The graphics are decent, The problem is, It's a trailer... and not a "gameplay trailer", So it only shows us replays etc, Which I'm completely fine of, I would have rathered the camera to be further back, and for there to be actual in game footage with commentary instead of a song over a bunch of clips butchered together.

The animations look great, The game seems to run really smoothly, Ross and his team have done a brilliant job, and has built what seems to be a perfect foundation for a REALLY decent AFL Games in the years to come, I personally don't think EA could have done a better first job than this.

Congratulations Ross, and thank's for allowing us to see the trailer "even though we had to work with it"

That being said, I do have a couple of things I want to ask -

1. To people who played the game, Speccies happen in real life maybe once a game if you're lucky, How common are they actually in the game? I truly hope it's not something you can just spam like the older AFL Games when you get to know how too.. I really hope it's something that when you pull it off you actually feel happy and shocked at, I want it to give me the same feeling as when you kick a goal in FIFA 11 from way outside the box, curving around players and owning the goal keeper for a spectacular goal. I don't want it to be commonplace, It's something that if it's done too often, WILL make the gameplay boring for me, It won't feel special when I do succeed doing them. I find speccies are something that should really come down to ONLY skill, and something that will not happen often, Maybe attempts, but not successful marks.

2. We all know there will be game stats in the season mode that will advance through each new season, But how in depth will this be ? Will we be able to see every player from every team and see how many goals and marks and there averages ? In a sports game, stats is one of the biggest things that interest me, I like to watch players on other teams perform etc, I hope the likes of buddy franklin doesn't ALWAYS stay near the top of the goal scoarers list, I hope that sometimes he will have a "bad" season and only do "decently"... It will be pretty redundent and get really boring if the same players every year will be winning / having roughly the same stats every year.

3. There's other things I'm wondering about too, like the post from freo above, But I won't worry about asking them and I'll just keep lerking these posts every night.

All in all, I congratulate Ross, You have done a fantastic job, And I ****ing love you with all of my heart, Will you marry me ?

Edit: Wtf? .. was that Scott Gumbleton kicking a goal? Wow, this games more unrealistic than Halo...

 

[Gd Ol Collingwd]

Ross I used the blue to grab your attention. Just wondering will there be a demo/beta coming out. And if there is when will it be released.

 

[BomberJosh]

No beta as the games pretty much gone gold and finished, and no demo.

 

[Marc24]

I thought the trailor was good, i can't wait for the game to come out so excited for it. Good job to the team who made it

 

[richomania]

looks good, but honestly I dont give a **** as long as the gameplay is good.

I get that its a start to a developing series and all that, but just a few concerns..

to the blokes that got a chance to play the game, in the trailer it looks like when a player kicks the ball, the ball pretty much hits the ground, much like a drop kick in rugby.... which makes me think that the engine used in this game is the same one in rugby league..

hope its not because that game was god awful!

also all the speccy animations look the same, e.g both knees in an angle, high on the other players shoulders, hope there's some variation and that it doesn't happen regularly and is super easy to do...

anyways will defiantly be buying it even if its worse than black ops!

 

[Call Me Cake]

Whoa! 10 Pages of negative comments!

There have actually been plenty of positive reactions to the trailer. It's just that most people (including you) will pay the most attention to the negative ones.

The negativity wears off anyway. Trailers are meant to be criticised. So while I loved the trailer (but also because I've read plenty of background on it prior), that doesn't mean people won't have opinions different to mine.

Either way, a trailer is an aesthetic thing. It's a visual thing. People will hold onto that until they either see the mechanics of it, understand the background, and play it themselves.

And I'll tell you what, any publicity, is good publicity. Whatever people's opinions are of the Trailer (heck, most of the negative ones are based on the fact that there was only 1 minute!), people will know it exists. The trailer's main objective is to just let people know it's there. Those who love their footy will buy it regardless. It's no surprise that we're footy game starved, and we'll all get a chance to experience it ourselves.

Best AFL game to date, and all at the risk of Tru Blu, in the hopes that a steady franchise will kick off, paving for more improvements down the track - I'm more than happy.

Playing it will take care of the rest.

 

[Beloved]

I honestly won't give a flying f*ck about the errors that everyone picks out when I'm playing the game.

It's funny, everyone begs for an AFL game and then pays it out. The game's sales go downhill, the development is stopped, people start begging again.

 

[JADED]

Pretty happy with what I saw.
Looks better once buffered properly and certainly looks better now than when I watched it at work.
Paused & got a nice JPEG screen capture of the eagles running on to the ground as it is only up for 1/4 of a second.

The Sydney goal from the pocket seems fine @ 720p and curves in ok. Certainly not as unrealistic as some made it out to be.
Love the stadium change in the background at the start (more so than the team change)
The stadiums look awesome.
Cannot wait to play the game. (and for the actual press release)

 

[JordanWCE]

Just thought I'd post a picture directed at those complaining about the clipping issues in the trailer.

I took this just a short while ago on NBA 2K11, one of the best sports games available.

Now, you can clearly see the ball is going through the hand of Chris Kaman (No. 9). What I'm trying to get through to some of you is the kind of stuff similar in the trailer won't be seen in full motion, as this moment in the picture wasn't seen in full motion either. You can't criticise the gameplay just from looking at slow motion replays in a trailer, it's the actual gameplay itself in motion that we need to see and analyse to make a proper judgment, this means viewing it from its proper camera angle not close up footage as seen in the trailer (or in my picture above). This clipping issue is present in all sports games, and if developers chose to focus solely on removing it the fluidity of the game in question would be weakened, resulting in a poorer product.

I do hope some of you begin to understand and cease nitpicking at such irrelevant things.

 

[Ed_Gein]

Kind of disgusting really that the people that have been begging for an AFL game for years are finally getting one and all they can whinge about is the sock height, hair colour, missing sponsor logos and the likes....

We're finally getting an AFL game. It will be a good basis in which they can make improvements on to add into future versions.

As long as it's not glitchy and plays well, i'm not bothered graphical imperfections etc. I'll support it and buy a copy and hope it spawns a series of AFL games well into the future. Because i know from here, they will only get better.

I hope you lot arent as shallow over the game as you are over the trailor when it came out. It's exactly the reason why developers won't touch AFL, it's not a huge market like the FIFA's and NBA's, so when it finally comes out, be thankful TruBlu bothered.

 

[dhuman82]

Being that its March 1st now, this game comes out next month!! Getting closer!!

 

[DanDemon09]

Got up early here in London this morning just to see if the Tru Blu facebook page had reached 500 likes and I was so excited to see the trailer. I will admit that this morning when I first watched it, I was slightly underwhelmed. But tonight when I got home from work I jumped on to watch it again and in HD. And I have to say I did so after reading 30 pages of different opinions both positive and negative. I sat and watched for all the nitpickings that people were pointing out but was so blown away tonight by the detail and smoothness in the graphics that I found it hard to concentrate on the nitpicks. I even slowed down at some moments to really take a close look and for up close, zoomed in footage I was highly impressed hence changing my mood from underwhelmed to pumped (again). I am so pumped for this game and being able to play the best sport in the world right in my lounge room, in HD, on my plasma TV with a cold Aussie beer will be awesome (take that soccer)!

Thank you BIG ANT for your awesome effort!! This game is going to be amazing. Ross, it is super that you actually give up your time to come on here and keep us all salivating. You know you have us all eating out of the palm of your hand don't you? This is why there are so many opinions, we all care so much!!

Let's get pumped and thanks again for the trailer.

 

[BigAntStudios]

Just landed in SFO.... First and foremost, everyone is entitled to their opinion and I will certainly take all constructive criticism on board, I am passionate about this game and I want to improve it wherever possible.

The thing to remember is that this trailer is taken from the Replay System. The replay system, like those in other sports games, streams the most relevant information about players and positions into memory so that it can be Rendered back from different angles. This means it is not a Recording of the footage as played, a recording would look a lot better but would only give you one angle. A further issue is that there is a risk of running out of memory, so the information used to Render the replayis clipped and compressed to save space. I hope that all makes sense!!

The next thing to remember is that this footage is for marketing purposes. I think the majority of the guys here are really well past that, you want to see gameplay, and I completely understand that, however we only have a 30 second and 60 second timeline to enthuse and get the person in the street interested in buying the game. When you see an add on the television for an upcoming AFL fixture, what do you see? (Zoomed in highlights mostly )

I understood that this is where this would lead and have tried to invite press I don't know and people from here in to play the game to negate the issues raised - most issues do not appear in the regular gameplay, they appear in the replay system (and only when the camera is changed and speed slowed so as to make a trailer!)

Was it just me or was the cocky bulldog player knocking someone over and slamming home a goal not in that clip?

Unfortuantely Baz's footage got cut We have developer diaries and all sorts of stuff, I will see if we can add the "cut footage" to that.

This is basically a new generation of AFL game, so for a full press release trailer I'd love to see Big Ant put something together with a voice over like Rockstar have been doing lately with Red Dead Redemption and the new L.A Noire. It lets you show off all angles of gameplay and many of the new features while having a vocal explanation to go along with things, so there's nothing to get misunderstood about.

Here's one of the RDR trailers so you can see what I mean:

[youtube]ImwR0apkuzA[/youtube]

Obviously not as dramatic or detailed as that, but you get the idea. I can just imagine it starting with "Big Ant Studios have set out to create a new generation of AFL video game that aims to be the most realistic and enjoyable AFL experience to date.", continuing with footage of gameplay explaining the new features and how they work (such as the game flow, the 360° stick thing or the ruck dynamics), explaining what modes are available as well as maybe showing off some of the photo mapping & motion capture technologies that were used to give the game that realistic edge. You could even get someone like Dennis Cometti to do the voice over like Martin Tyler does on the FIFA gameplay tutorials. It would only need to be about 3-4 minutes in length and would answer a lot of questions rather than raise new ones, while showing off the gameplay in all forms so there's nothing to create confusion.

It won't happen, but I think it's a great idea. Perhaps we'll see something similar with the next iteration?

Awesome idea. It should be a comedy - mockumentary maybe? - anyone want to write a script.

No, generally they will go "hey there's some clipping and janky animations in our trailer" "well why not CGI it then, we'll give away nothing on the game and it will look awesome too".

I'd definitely take the real look over something completely pre-rendered and fake as ****.

I get what you mean about maybe zooming it out, but no matter who it is looking at the video there will always be a nitpick at these moments.IIRC I believe Ross said that they had planned Barry Hall doing that but had to take it out. Can't remember the reason given though.

That is my opinion too - I am a gamer too and have been on the receiving end of far to many CGI trailers where the game is rubbish, for me that is false advertising - every trailer we have ever done is real footage from the engine. You know the game is going to look that good, or better, but certainly not worse.

This excuse is wearing thin. To not fix something that's obvious in replays because you may not notice it while playing seems silly. The problem is still there, this should've been addressed. It will need to be if we have the ability to save replays in future versions.

See above. Even a game with a budget of US$45 Million and in it's 5th engine generation cannot get it right. This comment is just a lack of undertanding of how replay systems work, which is understandable as you almost have to be in the industry to know it.

 

[doggies ftw]

I cant wait, it looks great!

The ONLY other thing that I want now is BigAnt to continue to back it up after release by releasing patches, fixings bugs, etc!

 

[XPISTO]

Awesome responses, thank you!! I don't know about you but EA don't give it's potential customers this much 'love' so thank you!!

 

[DanDemon09]

Awesome responses, thank you!! I don't know about you but EA don't give it's potential customers this much 'love' so thank you!!

Yep it's all about the love... amazing isn't it. As I said before so pumped!

 

[TMS]

I see all the teams got a look in. Though Freos was only two of their players getting bowled over.... lol

Cats didn't fare much better - Scarlett tackled by a Blue and Taylor pushed over by some Gold Coast player . I guess we at least had a nano-second of Pods(?) taking a one-hander.

Still, looks alright to me. Will no doubt head into a store for a pre-order some time this month.

Edit
I do have one issue with the trailer though, but it's a very subjective issue... with apologies to the people that supplied the music: the trailer is 100x better to watch with the sound off.

 

[Alan_Didak_4]

Still trying to work out who the Collingwood player that took a speccie was........guernsey started with 2 all I can guess is Wellingham or Sidebottom, going by the dark hair.

 

[Mitho]

Posted by Tru Blu Ent On facebook :

Thanks for your support in getting us past 500! We really want to spread the word so once we pass 2000 'likes' we will release some more exlusive information.

Whaaaaaaat?