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Mutant Football League stretch goals added
Once Mutant Football League was able to achieve its Kickstarter goal, something that took the spiritual successor to 1993’s Mutant League Football only three days to do, developers sought feedback on potential stretch goals. By reaching additional funding targets they can deliver more features to the game targeting October for PC release and early 2018 for PS4/Xbox One. The final stretch goals have now been announced and several have already been met. Read more
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MLB The Show 17 archived live stream focused on gameplay improvements
MLB The Show 17 developers held the first live stream for the game yesterday going through the improvements coming to gameplay that were shown off in a video earlier this week. While there wasn’t much in the way of new information out of the broadcast that ran for over an hour, it did offer the first opportunity to see the game in action (both regular and Retro Mode) and that’s always valuable. Changes touched on include new ball physics, more life-like AI, adjustments to base-stealing systems and new catcher throw meter, and the new catch and throw engine.
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Madden NFL 17 final roster update details
The roster update which follows Super Bowl LI is now available to download in Madden NFL 17. Expected to be the final update of the season it delivers some ratings changes mostly affecting the New England Patriots and Atlanta Falcons while freeing up any remaining injured players.
Super Bowl MVP Tom Brady has moved up a point to 96 Overall for his peak rating of the season. He now stands alone as the second highest rated quarterback in the game trailing only Aaron Rodgers. The other big star was James White who had 3 touchdowns, caught 14 passes, and scored a two-point conversion. He has been bumped up a couple points to 80 Overall.
Other notable players on the move include Julian Edelman (+1 to 89), DeMarco Murray (+1 to 87), Melvin Gordon (+2 to 85), Matt Forte (-2 to 84), Alan Branch (+3 to 82), Trey Flowers (+1 to 81), Deion Jones (+2 to 80), and Robert Alford (+1 to 80). Check out all the changes and final ratings for players across the league through this form.
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NBA to run eSports league with 2K Sports
The NBA and 2K Sports today announced an unprecedented partnership with the hopes of creating the next big eSport. NBA 2K eLeague will launch in 2018 and eventually every NBA team will run one of the eSport franchises within a professional sports league structure.
It’ll be important for money not to be a factor in shaping the characters utilized in the NBA 2K eLeague. Competitive balance will be key as currently the competitions with the game involve characters that have been built up through both extreme amount of time playing the game and money spent to boost attributes and abilities. For several years now 2K has implemented a number of avenues to try and drive the purchase of Virtual Currency aka VC. Tempting people into participating in qualification for a tournament using their created players is one of them.
The other big concern relates to online reliability. Even still with NBA 2K17 the online Pro-Am mode has serious issues, with participants all too frequently being booted which leaves the inferior CPU to take their place. Unless teams will be traveling to play locally the risk of that happening and unfortunately ruining games will remain. The majority of responses on social media to this news reference issues with the servers.
This is a big opportunity for both the NBA and 2K though should they figure out solutions to those challenges. Having a full league season rather than basic tournament structure could result in a real fan following, which will be further assisted by having the NBA teams involved creating another potential rooting interest for spectators.
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EA Sports responds to controversy over social media conduct from eSports competitors
Rather than being about the series of entertaining Madden NFL 17 games in an eSports setting where viewership numbers are slowly on the rise, the big story coming out of the Madden Bowl late last week related to the conduct of the winner on social media. The situation has been problematic for EA Sports which is still trying to find its way in the competitive scene and has now faced a number of growing pains along the way.
The circumstances necessitated a response from the company which was just published, and naturally that was done through social media. Read more
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Post-Super Bowl LI commentary update is out now in Madden NFL 17
The 23rd and possibly final commentary update for Madden NFL 17 has gone out with the broadcast team of Brandon Gaudin and Charles Davis reflecting on the events that took place and storylines that emerged out of a dramatic Super Bowl 51.
Madden received these real-world commentary updates regularly throughout the year which apply to Play Now and Online games. The duo also recorded additional audio for Franchise and Ultimate Team. The updates won the 2016 Community Award for Best New Feature.
While it would be interesting if the commentary updates continued over the offseason, with references made to the Combine, free agency, trades, and NFL Draft, it’s unclear whether EA desires – or would even be allowed – to address any new league-year actions.
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MLB The Show 17 video highlights the improvements coming to gameplay
The promotional schedule for MLB The Show 17 begins today with the first look at gameplay-related improvements and additions. The video goes over changes to expect out of the game that include new ball physics, AI that should play more life-like, changes to base-stealing systems with a look at the catcher throw meter, new catch and throw engine to hopefully eliminate the lack of urgency in making plays, and enhanced personality.
Please enable Javascript to watch this videoMLB The Show 17 will release on March 28 with Ken Griffey Jr. on the cover and also found in-game as one of the new legends. Amazon is offering pre-orders at a discount of 20% to Prime members. The standard edition goes for $48 and the MVP Edition for $56. The latter includes 5K Stubs, Gold Season Starter Pack, Sponsor Pack, 10 Standard Packs, limited edition steel book, and PS4 themes for every team in the league.
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The Golf Club 2 first trailer and feature details
The Golf Club was one of the most pleasant sports gaming surprises of recent years, even managing to win the Community Award for Best New/Non-Yearly Game in 2014. The sequel from HB Studios will release this spring on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC. Today the developer released the first trailer for The Golf Club 2 along with a preview of some big features and improvements to expect from the game. Read more
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