Backbreaker football

[Stoney Mason]

Not a lot of videogame sports fans on the bore but this one interests me especially with the current stagnation of the football market since Madden has a monopoly. Has been in development seemingly forever but apparently it now has a release window. The interesting bit here is that the collisions essentially would be dyanmically generated rather than pre-canned animations like in other sports games. Will have a tough time since its not a licensed football product and it has to actually play a good game of football but I am curious to see it in real action.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NaturalMotion


[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[chronovore]

I noticed this title on the wiki when I was trying to figure out if ANYONE other than LucasArts submitted to NaturalMotion's complex requirements for middleware inclusion. Is this an in-house developed title for NaturalMotion to showcase the technology?

[Stoney Mason]

Is this an in-house developed title for NaturalMotion to showcase the technology?

I think so.

I remember this article years ago which is when I first heard about them and their animation system.

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/651/651000p1.html

The football game has always been this weird thing they would occasionally mention and then nobody would ever talk about it again. At this point for me its sort of like Duke Nukem forever. I don't actually have high hopes that it will be good but I'm just curious to see it because its been so long.

Although the core idea of a real time dynamic animation and collision system in a sports game is still a good one.

[pilonv1]

iPhone verison is really fun

[Brehvolution]

Is this an in-house developed title for NaturalMotion to showcase the technology?

The football game has always been this weird thing they would occasionally mention and then nobody would ever talk about it again. At this point for me its sort of like Duke Nukem forever. I don't actually have high hopes that it will be good but I'm just curious to see it because its been so long.

Although the core idea of a real time dynamic animation and collision system in a sports game is still a good one.

I've been following this for a while now. Too bad no one made a game with it. :/

[The Fake Shemp]

The Force Unleashed uses the tech, Zero.

[Brehvolution]

I meant a football game.

[chronovore]

Is this an in-house developed title for NaturalMotion to showcase the technology?

The football game has always been this weird thing they would occasionally mention and then nobody would ever talk about it again. At this point for me its sort of like Duke Nukem forever. I don't actually have high hopes that it will be good but I'm just curious to see it because its been so long.

Although the core idea of a real time dynamic animation and collision system in a sports game is still a good one.

I've been following this for a while now. Too bad no one made a game with it. :/

GTA IV uses it.

....Oh, I see what you did there. 

[Stoney Mason]

Funny to see brits talking about football. Also the camera angle is annoying.

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[Brehvolution]

Thanks Stoney. If anything, I hope it give EA a fire up their ass to get their physics tightened up.

[cool breeze]

This reminds me of that first person football mode from nfl 2k5.  That was one of the reasons I bought that game. 

[Stoney Mason]

There better be other camera angles. It's a question of functionality. If somebody wants to play in that view then bully for them but if they lock me in that camera view I'm complaining my ass off.

The game doesn't have to be a Madden clone but when I play a game, I want a functional view. I don't need the illusion that I'm down on the field unless I specifically go and switch to that camera angle.

At least in 2k5 the First Person thing was its own mode. It wasn't the only way you had to play the game.

[Stoney Mason]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[Brehvolution]

Thanks, Stoney. 

[Stoney Mason]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

Not exactly a glowing preview.

Backbreaker Hands-on
The long-awaited underdog football title is finally about to hit retailers.
by Nate Ahearn

March 2, 2010 - We've been hearing about Natural Motion's Backbreaker since way back in 2007. It began without a publisher and rumbled around the gaming industry for some time, popping up at trade shows like E3 for demos with little else to satiate the inquiring mind. "What's taking the game so long?" I've read on some forums. "Why haven't we seen anything from Backbreaker lately?" I've heard from other gamers. Well, finally and at long last, Backbreaker has emerged under the 505 Games label and is set to hit retailers on May 18 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

I recently had the chance to get my hands on an updated build which was my first time playing the game since back in June of last year. For those worried about Backbreaker losing its indie nature when making the switch to a formal publishing partner, don't worry, this game is about as far from EA Sports' Madden franchise as you can get.

It should be of no surprise by this point that Backbreaker does not have the NFL license. Instead players will be able to create their own squads with Natural Motion's extensive creation tool. Essentially you can combine a massive library of shapes and images into several hundred layers (500 layers for uniforms and about 1,000 for endzone designs, to be exact) to form a final logo of some sort. It's not all that dissimilar from what we've seen from the Forza Motorsport series.



Well, I was once told this creation mechanic would allow players to trade created teams back and forth over Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. Sadly, that isn't the case. Due to some sort of contractual issues, Natural Motion is being forced to only allow players to create teams on their own machine. That way we don't have people making a 49ers logo and sending it all over the world for all to use. Such is life with exclusivity contracts in sports gaming, I suppose.

I, for one, am not much of a creator, so it was a big letdown to know that I won't be able to simply download a bunch of cool uniforms and use them on the fly. Instead I'll likely use one of the more than 60 teams that ship with the game. Just about every major NFL city is represented, minus the recognizable team names, logos and players. There are 16 stadiums in all, three of which are locked at first. They're designed with a flair towards the unrealistic with the Golden Gate Bridge shooting out of the stadium in San Francisco.

The actual football itself hadn't changed all that much in the last year, which is surprising given the amount of time Backbreaker has been in hiding. The visuals have taken a more arcade-like approach with colors that really seem to pop off the screen and a bloom effect that has been ratcheted up a few levels. There are also now two modes for standard gameplay: Arcade and Pro. Arcade mode highlights certain players (like the one you're controlling, passing to, or the person you're supposed to be covering) and Pro mode is just you on the field with the camera following you as you switch players and change possession. I'd recommend most players start on the Arcade mode to get a feel for the altered camera angle, especially if you're used to the more pulled-back perspective that Madden presents.

Backbreaker is all about putting you down on the field so the camera rests nearly right behind your player. I'm told that they've actually pulled it back a bit since my play session. When I called a running play, the camera dropped so low that it was nearly impossible to see would-be tacklers coming off of the edge of the offensive line. I've been told that they've since fixed this problem, but I won't really know until I play it for myself when the game is released.

Passing seemed to work a little better in the frantic football world that Backbreaker presents. The approach is certainly different than any I've seen for hurling the pigskin. Actually passing the ball is done entirely by the right stick, while targeting a player is done by holding the left trigger and moving between receivers with the left analog. The AI is largely in charge of the strength of the pass you're throwing (something that I'm worried about) unless it's a bomb pass, in which case you can move the analog down and then up to emulate a throwing motion of sorts. Every other pass is done with a simple flick upwards. Passing didn't feel all that great when I played with rigid camera movements that strain to follow the ball down the field and some wonky physics when the ball hit either the ground or a player's hands.

Aside from standard quick play games, there's also an 8, 16, and 32 team season option and something called Road to Backbreaker which I'm guessing is designed to deliver some sort of loose tournament structure in the same vein as Mortal Kombat (escalating difficulty with meaner and meaner opponents).

There's certainly still a lot that's up in the air when it comes to Backbreaker. I'm not entirely sold on the game given my recent play time and the fact that it has been in hiding for so long right up until it's scheduled to hit store shelves is never a good sign. Rest assured, we'll have more Backbreaker coverage in the coming weeks leading up to its May 18 launch on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/107/1073474p1.html

[tiesto]

Speaking about football... well football as in Soccer... why the fuck can't we get the Inazuma 11 games over in 'murkah? Those looked interesting.

[chronovore]

Not exactly a glowing preview.

Backbreaker Hands-on
Well, I was once told this creation mechanic would allow players to trade created teams back and forth over Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. Sadly, that isn't the case. Due to some sort of contractual issues, Natural Motion is being forced to only allow players to create teams on their own machine. That way we don't have people making a 49ers logo and sending it all over the world for all to use. Such is life with exclusivity contracts in sports gaming, I suppose.

I, for one, am not much of a creator, so it was a big letdown to know that I won't be able to simply download a bunch of cool uniforms and use them on the fly. Instead I'll likely use one of the more than 60 teams that ship with the game. Just about every major NFL city is represented, minus the recognizable team names, logos and players. There are 16 stadiums in all, three of which are locked at first. They're designed with a flair towards the unrealistic with the Golden Gate Bridge shooting out of the stadium in San Francisco.

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/107/1073474p1.html

This is just about one of the most loathesome tactics in licensing today. We saw it with City of Heroes, where Marvel claimed the toolset would allow creation of characters that look like Spider-hyphen-Man and Mr. Bub-I'm-The-Best-There-Is-At-What-I-Do-And-What-I-Do-Isn't-Very-Nice. To paraphrase Cormacaroni's assessment: The last time I checked, with a little effort a pencil and paper can also be used to create facsimiles of Batman, Superman, Spider-Man, and even putting Captain James T. Kirk in bed with She-Hulk. QUICK LET'S PUT LEGAL WARNINGS ON PENCILS.

Man, I hate this ever-increasing uptight attitude about what users might do with their software.

[Stoney Mason]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[Brehvolution]

I really hope there is a demo for this.

[Stoney Mason]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[Stoney Mason]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[Stoney Mason]

Demo is up

http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/games/media/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d802464f07da/?p=1&of=1&bt=0&sb=1#offers

[Brehvolution]

In mah q