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If you want to see a relic of sports history, dust off a copy of College Football USA '96. In its final season, the old Southwest Conference appeared for the first and only time in a video game. The next year, four members split to form the Big XII. This game is one of the last places you can still see the SWC logo.Read more...

When word passed the NCAA was pulling its name and logo off EA Sports' 21-year-old NCAA Football series, many immediately assumed it was the death of the title. Once everyone realized another entity altogether handles the 120+ teams who appear in the game, it became clear this was largely an ass-covering technicality.Read more...

FIFA 14 has locked in agreements with 19 of Brazil's top professional clubs, doubling that league's representation in the world's top selling football simulation. The deal also, interestingly, points to one of the vestiges of early licensed sports video games—ones that had permission to use players but not their teams.Read more...

The NCAA will not renew its licensing agreement with EA Sports for its 21-year-old NCAA Football series once the current deal expires in 2014, the NCAA said in a statement today. It does not necessarily mean the end of the series, only the end of a series with the NCAA's name and logo on it.Read more...

After the Super Bowl, the MVP is usually presented with some car and if he's a pitchman for another auto maker, it can be kind of awkwardly funny. But in Madden NFL 25, your quarterback will go up there and graciously accept that GMC truck, dammit.Read more...

If you've ever wanted to see one of the world's best footballers dressed up like a bad Dr. Who villain all in the name of video games, now's your chance.

Option-style offenses seem to be high-risk, high-reward, if NCAA Football 14 is to be believed. The game offers an entire Spread Option playbook that showcases the 30 option types now in the game. Running a read option offense has become my favorite way to play the game, to the point that I recruited players to my Dynasty team (Syracuse) for their explosive, option-friendly abilities.

I also fumble the ball a lot, primarily on triple option and shovel option plays where I have three choices: hand the ball off to a running back, keep it as the quarterback or pitch it to a third player. That third choice may as well be the "turnover option," as defenders converge on my player and initiate a collision so quickly that my quarterback will either fumble the ball or pitch it directly into the defender's hands.

I've found these option plays to be boom-or-bust in NCAA 14, much like the entire game.

It's your money? You want it now? Tough. Now it could be another year before some $27 million is distributed to gamers from Electronic Arts' settlement of a class-action lawsuit brought against the exclusive license its Madden NFL series held. Why? Someone's objecting to the lawyers' fees. To recap, more than five years ago Electronic Arts was sued by a man, Geoffrey Pecover, who argued that the infamous exclusive license EA Sports has to make NFL video games was illegal under antitrust law and amounted to a price-fixing scheme. The case became a class action in 2009, and almost a year ago EA settled with the plaintiffs, establishing a $27 million pool of damages while admitting no wrongdoing. EA also agreed not to hold exclusive licenses for two types of American football—college football and arena football—even though no publisher other than EA Sports has made one of those games in more than a decade. The exclusive license EA Sports has with the NFL was untouched. Originally, the payout per claimant was something like $1.95 if you bought current generation Madden, and seven bucks if you bought last-gen. That tripled in light of so few claimants emerging. Even if I think this case has been, essentially, the world's most expensive gaming forum slapfight, hell yes, I filed a claim. I'm looking at $58.29 for two copies of past-gen NCAA and some Maddens since then. For sure there are gamers who will see lots more. But that's in limbo now thanks to an objector named Aaron Miller. He objected to the size of the attorneys' fees awarded, particularly in light of the original, meager payoff. When his objection was dismissed, appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth District (this case is out in San Francisco.) While that appeal is ongoing, no distributions can be made from the settlement pool. Aaron Miller's lawyer, Steve A. Miller of Denver, appears to make this sort of thing a specialty. Steve A. Miller was called a "professional objector" by at least one person familiar with the case and his objection seems to hint at that reputation, too, complaining of other lawyers' "unwarranted criticism of objector counsel." Steve A. Miller appeared in the news three years ago representing another objector to a class-action settlement involving Fisher-Price toys and lead paint. He lost. This morning I called Miller's office, left a voice message and sent him an email to ask him to expand upon his client's interest in this case and his problem with the size of the attorneys' fees. I haven't received a reply. Meantime, a set of deadlines established by the appeals court lists Oct. 7 as the day Miller's brief is due, and opposing lawyers have a month to file their response. This thing could take another year to resolve. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

As much as I wanted to say Aaron Hernandez, the NFL star facing murder charges, is free and unlocked (heh heh)—in NCAA Football 14—that ain't the case. Some folks, however, are seeing his card pop up if they get a gold medal in one of the events of the game's new Nike Skills Trainer. Here's what's really going on, according to EA Sports. First off, this is a legitimate image, as first spied by Richard Lowe on Twitter, then retweeted by Operation Sports, Everyday Should Be Saturday, and a bunch of other folks. That said, EA Sports told me Hernandez will not be in NCAA Ultimate Team. Anyone who unlocks this reward will see him replaced with Alex Smith, a spokesman told me this morning. The reason the Hernandez card still shows up is because this message screen is a part of the code that is on the game's disc—code that was finished well before Hernandez was arrested and charged with murder. To replace that image requires a title update. "Given the requirements of submission, certification and approval we anticipate this will be accomplished in the near future," an EA Sports spokesman told me. So, yes, have your laughs if you do get this unlock, but Hernandez won't be taking the field on your TV screen any sooner than he will in real life. Unless you're playing Madden NFL 13, of course. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

Two letters and a number. That's all you need to be a household name in college football—or its video game, at least. But this year, when NCAA Football 14 hits shelves on Tuesday, South Carolina's fearsome DE#7 and Texas A&M's do-it-all QB#2 will be joined, for the first time, by active players appearing under their own names. That's thanks to the game's new Ultimate Team mode, which like its implementation in Madden, NHL and FIFA, offers a huge pool of stars for gamers to collect and assemble into their best team to take online. Under a group license granted to NCAA Football by the NFL Players Association, current NFL stars will appear in the game under their alma maters' colors. The agreement does an end run on the knottiest problem of college sports video games—how to present real players in college uniform without violating their rights or NCAA amateurism bylaws—by going to the professionals. Problem solved, right? No. Not yet. Right now, it's more like a diplomatic agreement between two sides that—on the matter of college players in video games—in fact oppose each other in court, in a case with existential ramifications for both. In February, the NFLPA, along with the NBA Players Association and the NHL Players Association—both longtime licensors of EA Sports products—and the unions for Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer, filed a joint brief opposing Electronic Arts' kitchen-sink defense in a federal lawsuit brought by the former Rutgers quarterback Ryan Hart. EA had prevailed, at the district level, on grounds that had spooked the unions. Basically, Electronic Arts asserted that its presentation of Hart—just two letters and a number—in NCAA Football 2003 to 06, was a transformed use of likeness—modified beyond recognition—and a form of protected speech under the First Amendment, the same way The Social Network's cinematic presentation of Mark Zuckerberg didn't require his permission or compensation. It's a claim that has even greater strength thanks to the 2011 Supreme Court ruling that found video games to be works of protected speech. It's also a claim that threatens the necessity for group licenses, or any licensed use of likeness, of athletes whether college or professional, household name or not. Players' unions make huge money from these licenses, which go to makers of memorabilia and authentic jerseys and commemorative DVDs, and video games. "Once EA made that argument, our alarm bells went off," Ahmad Nassar, the general counsel for NFL Players, Inc., which handles the union's licensing, told me. "That argument would apply with equal force, if accepted by the court, not just to games EA makes, but any game—Activision, 2K—that any of those guys make." An appeals court sided with Hart in May. The case been sent back to district court. His claim is similar to that of another player, former Nebraska and Arizona State quarterback Sam Keller, and has ties to a third and even more notorious lawsuit also involving EA, brought by the former UCLA standout Ed O'Bannon. A judge will now rule on whether the O'Bannon case will be given class action status; if it is, it could force the NCAA to make settlement negotiations, rather than risk a judgment that bankrupts it or destroys the way it handles billions in television revenue. So, here is why I wanted to talk to the NFLPA. If the union's business and its players' interests are so gravely threatened by Electronic Arts' legal posture on the use of likenesses—and the NFLPA's group license for Madden is probably its richest deal—why continue to do business with EA? Why do more business? "I think it's more the opposite," Nassar said. "We want the college players' likenesses to be used," and to be paid for, he said. "We think that will make a better game, we think EA will make more money, we think the NCAA would make more money. "I view that as nudging them," Nassar said. A policy of engagement, rather than isolation. "We greenlighted that [license] because we want to lead by example. We can't grant the rights to University of Michigan players because we have no rights to the University of Michigan or its players. But you want to use Denard Robinson [now an NFL pro] in a college video game? Absolutely." There is no group licensing of current NCAA players' likenesses. There is no individual licensing of player likenesses, either. This is at the heart of the Hart, Keller and O'Bannon lawsuits. In these cases EA Sports has been depicted as a co-conspirator with the NCAA to keep its own costs down by cutting players out of rightful compensation for the use of their images. My opinion is that the blame is almost exclusively on the NCAA. Its quaint, unilaterally enforced concept of amateurism amounts to shielding its virginal athletes from the corruption of big-time money by selflessly pocketing all the dough itself. What noble martyrs. If EA Sports has been operating with figleafs like numerical names and wink-and-nod features like roster sharing, it may make them liable—but it's because of the NCAA's head-up-its-ass approach to the reality of the big time athletics model it created itself. And communications churned up by these suits has shown EA agitated for the NCAA to reconsider its posture on the use of players' actual names. Now, whether the NCAA would require compensation for that use—and to whom it would go—is another hypothetical whose answer is unknowable. My opinion is if a group license for college players was available to EA Sports, I believe it would pay for it—even as an added cost—for two reasons. One, a college football game with real players returns value above that cost. Ultimate Team with Jadeveon Clowney instead of DE#07 is only part of it. Real players give designers a lot more creative freedom in how they depict the game, career modes especially. Two, that cost represents another barrier for a competitor to hurdle. Electronic Arts, however, finds itself backed against a wall by three lawsuits potentially worth billions in damages to those who have been recognizable, to any thinking person anyway, in these college video games for years. And EA's burn-the-village-to-save-it approach, theoretically, could do away with the kind of licensing that sports video games today must pay to have any chance in the marketplace. It could also kill the thing people hate the most about EA Sports—the exclusive license it holds to make an NFL video game. In light of that, why should gamers sympathize with the NFLPA—which does, after all, exclusively authorize EA Sports and only EA Sports to use its members' names and images to make video games? "Every two months we get a letter from someone pissed off that there's no NFL 2K5," Nassar conceded. "But I think it's a little shortsighted for people to think that way. It doesn't just apply to sports video games. If you take [EA's] defense to its logical conclusion, it's not just college or professional athletes. Pictures of you and me on Facebook and Twitter could be incorporated in video games without our permission. Where none of us have the right to control our likenesses and images, it's all controlled by the First Amendment and free expression." Electronic Arts hinted at this defense back in early 2012 when it was sued by the maker of a military helicopter over its appearance—"trade dress" is the legal term—in Battlefield 3. At the time, EA strongly implied it was making this matter a First Amendment question because of the 2011 Supreme Court ruling, and because prevailing could be a victory for games development on the whole, not just for the publisher. I pointed out exactly what the NFLPA did this February: that it could do away with not only the need to license Madden, NBA Live or FIFA, but also automobiles in the Need for Speed series, notably Porsche. Privately, I was told that was not the publisher's intent. I recently asked Electronic Arts if it had made any assurances to any of its licensing partners regarding the strength of their existing relationships in light of the defense it's adopted in Hart and Keller. An EA representative replied that the publisher doesn't comment on pending litigation or contract terms, and declined comment on other questions I had, too—particularly whether it would pay for any group license to use real NCAA players. Fair enough. The NFLPA received at least some kind of verbal promise EA didn't intend to nullify its license if it prevails in Hart, but that's not good enough for the union. "The knee jerk reaction of gamers, I could absolutely see what you've said," Nassar told me. "People might say, 'Well, wait, if it means I have five different games to choose from, and people can even put projects on Kickstarter, then I like this. ... But if the players are cut out of it, I think that there are some interesting things in development that are dependent on player involvement—things like headscans, or motion capture, or voices. Even if the First Amendment covers the passive use of someone's likeness, if you need Tom Brady to say something, you need to pay him. There's the chance games might take a step back from what we're accustomed to." He has a point there. For example, each year the NBA photographs all of its players in high detail—particularly to capture their tattoos close-up. The only purpose I can imagine for these visual references are their use in video games. Without the cooperation of the league or its players' association, that goes away. If paying a players' union becomes just an optional cost to be cut, what do you think a publisher would do, and what would that do to your enjoyment of a game? Before you answer, remember that some people are still furious there are no sideline chain officials in NCAA Football. These lawsuits are years from being resolved. In the end, in a perfect world, everyone would prevail but the NCAA. I think that's a cartel that has one hell of a coming-to-Jesus moment in its future. But I want EA Sports to continue to make these games. I want them to pay players to use their real images. And I want to play the game that results from it. Nassar does too. He tells me he's also a gamer. "It's like a playoff," he said. "If college football had a true playoff, it would be even more popular. To me, it's the same as a video game, if NCAA Football had all of the player names and their exact likenesses—not this halfway song-and-dance that waters down the product. Let's incorporate everybody in there." STICK JOCKEY Stick Jockey is Kotaku's column on sports video games. It appears Sundays.

One of the stranger sports stories I've reported came last year when NCAA Football 13 featured Baylor University's Heisman-winning quarterback on its cover, but not the school's fight song in the game. It was one of several songs held by a firm trying to fend off bankruptcy by jacking up the cost to use them. Well, that holdings company still ended up going clank, and all the songs it managed were sold off. So "Texas Fight," is back in NCAA Football 14. You'll hear it after you score a touchdown with the Longhorns. EA Sports reached an agreement with all the songs' new owners, except for one. Baylor. University fight songs are sometimes privately composed and owned and are not necessarily the property of the university that plays them, even if they do so with permission. ("Rocky Top" at Tennessee is a very prominent example.) "Old Fite," Baylor's song, was one of several owned by a private firm, along with a bunch of other fight songs from the old Southwest Conference—Arkansas, TCU, Texas A&M and Texas among them. None of those schools had their fight songs in NCAA Football 13. Their owner tripled its asking price on these songs in 2012 and EA Sports balked. Well, with SMG no longer in the picture, the rights to the songs went up for sale. I have been told that Texas A&M briefly had the idea of buying the rights to "Texas Fight," the song of its hated nemesis, and then forbidding anyone from using it. But then, those clever Aggie SOBs also once sued for the Texas playbook under the state's Freedom of Information Act, and this plan likewise went nowhere. Baylor's issue was a little different. They were still in the process of buying back ownership of "Old Fite" as NCAA Football 14 was finalizing its music assets. With no one to negotiate with, EA Sports had no way of securing the song's rights for use. So after a Bears touchdown you'll still hear one of the game's generic fight songs, which were performed by a Russian military band nearly a decade ago. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

The meanest thing I ever did in high school I did to a senior on the football team. His teammates were in my computer class, snickering about his hope of playing big time ACC football. I was a scrawny sophomore trying to be popular. I helped them forge some Clemson letterhead, and signed it "Head Coach Danny Ford." They made me hand-deliver it to him that period, while he was in Spanish. The ringleader of this plot, a defensive lineman, handed me a stolen hall pass. "Tell the teacher you said this came into the guidance office," he said. I did. I looked Chad dead in the eye and crapped all over his dreams. None of those big football players were around when Chad came looking for me later. The point is that practically everyone who plays high school football gets a recruiting letter. One of the numbnuts who put me up to this got one himself. From Army. So when I play NCAA Football 14's Dynasty mode and see Army and Clemson ahead of me for the attention of some one-star tight end with a peachfuzz beard, I don't bat an eye. Not only is recruiting a wider-net trawl than previously depicted in EA Sports' NCAA Football series, the reality is that a ton of prospects are more interested in a school than that school is in them. Like Chad. That's more properly represented in a tighter and yet more compelling Dynasty, the game's core career mode, thanks to an overhauled personnel management system. Other changes and inclusions, great and small, legitimately make this edition—which was in dire need of a new look after three capable but broadly repetitive entries—the best in the series' 21-year history. There are new ways to run an option offense (and read the defense against it), new means of running the ball, mildly better run blocking to support it, and a real-time physics engine that helps everything greatly. But as nine out of 10 users start a dynasty, and a lot left it early because of the time consuming process of finding new talent, I'll start with that. In previous editions, practically all contact with a prospect was deliberately initiated by the user through a time-consuming (and looking back, kinda creepy) phone call system. It matched the public's popular concept of how big time programs wooed big time blue chips. Coaches at West Virginia came in and told EA Sports, more or less, this isn't how it works. The relationship is maintained in other ways, too. Now, during the season the game has you assign points from a pool—zero to 500—to demonstrate your interest in that prospect. That stands for the ways programs stay in touch with their targets—yes, phone calls, but also letters and other mailings, asking a coach for game film, whatever. Hell, maybe it's the lease on a Dodge Charger for the guy's brother. The emergent narrative is boundless here. Following that, your school gets bonus points for a number of variables—having what the recruit wants, whether it's academic prestige or TV exposure, or just that a lot of kids from his state go there. This kind of passive aggregation of talent mimics the other end of the relationship, one not found in pro sports simulations where money and contract terms do all the talking: Some kids want to play for a school before the first letter is sent. I ran a dynasty as Kansas, a bad team in a major conference, to see how this worked. Theoretically I'd see enough interest from mid-grade prospects while still having to bust my ass for four- and five-star graded talent. Scouting, introduced last year, provides enough of a fudge factor for strivers like the Jayhawks. Some kid out in Waco is ignored as a three-star prospect, and then you send a coach to look at him and it turns out he's an 81 overall. I found such a guy, at offensive line, and he and two other all-rounders would define my season more than any game in it that I played. For players who were lesser talented, or played positions of lesser need to me, yet still interested, I was able to still recruit them while devoting most of my effort to the prize catches. Several weeks I set my point value to zero on some guys—good ones, too—and still came back No. 1 on their list. To have maintained that position in the past would have required a one-topic phone call and pretending to care about his opinion of our weight room. There are still some weird burps in the new process—like seeing a four-star guy list you as his number one choice, but he has a "dealbreaker" that won't let you add him to your list of prospects. In this case, it was "proximity to home." There's nothing I can do about that, son; we're not moving Kansas to you. On the whole, though, recruiting set up a second story that made run-of-the-mill games in past years absolutely pivotal. In week nine, not only was Kansas playing archnemesis Missouri (I realigned conferences, a feature that's been present for two years), I had nine recruits at Memorial Stadium, five of them my highest priority, including the three secret five-stars. We overcame a 14-point deficit in the fourth quarter and tied the game with a minute left. The 31-28 overtime loss was absolutely crushing. When I went back the next week, one of my golden boys had a new favorite team, and the two others still had me in a distant second place. You can get back into a recruit's kitchen if you have a perk called the "lockbreaker," which is part of a skill tree introduced this year. A head coach will have two: game management and recruiting. Coordinators have game management trees only. This system subtly extends the most value to the series of any design choice. In past years, beginning your career as an offensive or defensive coordinator meant you only played one side of the game, while still handling all recruiting. Now, if you're a coordinator, you can use all of your head coach's recruiting perks while you advance your game management tree. If you take a new job, you may re-spec your coach, including adding recruiting perks if he becomes a head coach. It makes starting out, as I did under a guy like Charlie Weis (who's still fat but goes by another name here, as everyone does) a lot more interesting and viable. As a rookie head coach—which you still have the option of being, at any school—I'd be recruiting against bigger schools and better coaches with fewer tools—like extra recruiting points at the beginning or the end of a cycle, or a last-ditch second chance with a blue-chipper who says no. If you want to go coach USC, it may not matter, as everyone wants to play there. For programs like Kansas, Illinois or State, you'll be in trouble. This is still a video game, not just a sports management simulation. NCAA Football 14 added Madden's "Infinity Engine" of realtime physics and with it, a true feeling of momentum that again makes running the ball more accessible and true-to-life. That said, if you were a heavy user of trick moves, this game will frustrate you at first. In past animation-based editions, jukes on the right stick were needed to get your defender going in the wrong direction. Now, a juke is more like shaking your ass while standing still. It needs to be followed with a spin or another move, to the point that I gave up on right-stick jukes and just made hard cuts on the left stick, for the same effect. Thanks to the reintroduction of the speed burst with the right trigger, and defenders more vulnerable to overpursuit, left-stick running works more fluidly. The right stick features a series of combinations that look like fighting game moves—juke this way, half-circle that for a juke-spin combo—but the only place the game exposes this move set is in a loading screen, which is ridiculous to me. Spins keyed by the face buttons, by the way, still take too long to initiate. The nerfed, hidden, or arbitrary speciality moves may be necessary because blocking is improved. It's a promise made every year, and like every year, it still has its flaws. Along the line of scrimmage you will see more intelligent play. Not all the time, but you will. When it works, it looks like this: Note how the center engages the linebacker, the right tackle gets his defensive lineman, the pulling guard takes out the other linebacker, and there is huge daylight for me to run through. Now, when it doesn't work, you see something more like this: The left guard at first properly double-teams the lineman, but not really. He sort of kisses the guy, then releases to go pursue the linebacker, whom I should have taken one-on-one. Either way, with a double-team on the lineman, I can still get six yards out of this. Instead I got one. This may seem like a small thing, but it adds up, and on third down in a tight game, it'll drive you nuts. The further you get from the line of scrimmage, the more unreliable your blocking becomes, regardless of position. Downfield blocking is still plagued by oblivious teammates, who either ignore a guy directly in front of them or make a beeline for someone else on the other side of the play, stumbling into you in the process. That said, what NCAA 14 has done on the offensive line at least makes standing tall in the pocket and—dare I say it, even stepping forward in it—much more viable than in the past. I took sacks only when I held the ball too long or went outside the tackles. In all of those cases, I was being dumb, not the game. The opposite of pocket passing, the spread option, which most distinguishes American football's college game from its pro version, is given much more attention this year. But it will take a lot of practice—especially in the triple option, where you're managing a lot of on-screen information. Fortunately, the game now identifies the two defenders your quarterback must read, whether handing the ball off on a read-option, or pitching the ball, or shovel-passing it. The latter, when you pull it off, will make you jump out of your chair. It's that awesome, and is sure to be a go-to play online. (As hard as running the option is, defending it, as a human player, is even harder.) But the defenders' moves—whether to attack the pitchman, the quarterback, or the handoff—are so subtle, a player needs a lot of exposure to how a team defends the option to properly exploit it. Though there's a skills trainer to help you through it, the option was still so complex that when I picked my dynasty, I went with a pro-style offense just to keep things simple. Kansas still employs a few read options, and with them I could frequently string together eight- and ten-play clock-chewing drives while getting my ass kicked by the best of the Big XII (though I did smash Nebraska, in Lincoln. Again, in my realigned reality, the Big 8 and the Southwest Conference merged after SMU got the death penalty.) My problem is that the Kansas defense is abominable. The Jayhawks went 5-7 in my first year and yes, I'll blame that on the defensive coordinator. Our top running back also was injured twice in the season. Still, with recruiting, there was something to play for every week. After the Missouri loss, I used Coach Weis' unlock skill to get back in the conversation with my top three recruits. One of them had his campus visit at our arch-rivals, those no good son-of-a-bitch bastard Kansas State Wildcats, when we met in the final week of the season. I made it my mission to ruin that visit and their year. If you don't want all of this intrigue and time management (and advancing weeks in NCAA 14, like its predecessors, still takes forever) there's a new Season mode, which strips out all of the off-the-field stuff while giving you a no-frills 11 games and a postseason, like the series' progenitor, College Football USA '96. The difference is that, once you're done with a year, that's it. You don't play a 2014 schedule with the same team. Otherwise, there's a new Ultimate Team mode that, give the devils their due, is interesting and worth a try. Based on the same model as Madden and NHL and FIFA, you assemble packs of real-world pro players based on their ratings in college. This team can play head-to-head with other Ultimate Team users, or take on offline challenges, such as beating the best team in a particular conference or, down the line, a team from the current season that had a great week. NCAA Football 14 is not a flawless game. Presentation, particularly the booth commentary, will need a lot of attention next year. I enjoyed Rece Davis' studio introductions but unless it was a rivalry game, they got repetitive in a hurry. Someone needs to cut analyst Kirk Herbstreit's mike, too; he is prone to talking over the next play as he expounds on your failure in the last. EA Sports also did nothing with the singleplayer modes Road to Glory or the Heisman Challenge from last year. That's regrettable, but they are much more playable with the new physics and option controls, though the bullet-speed "Reaction time" ability, makes you almost super-powered. For a game that badly needed more than a fresh coat of paint, NCAA 14 came through in the end—much as I did against Kansas State, where we won 17-0. I know, a shutout, from this sieve of a defense. And in the offseason, when you're given 10,000 recruiting points in a no-limit game for all the stakes, I came home with my three golden boys. It was the greatest 5-7 season I've ever had. That feeling, and not winning championship after championship, is where a great sports video game sets itself apart. At times, NCAA Football 14 can make you fight for every yard, but it still earned every inch of attention I gave it.

On Oct. 6, North Carolina's Tobacco Road triumvirate of State, Duke and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill all played home games on the same day, and all of them won. Audio from all three games wil be in NCAA Football 14, on shelves in two weeks. Some of that may come from a microphone I held. Eight months ago, EA Sports invited me along on a sound-gathering mission, to get a look at what goes into its efforts to put gameday realism into its college football title. The game's producer, Ben Haumiller, acknowledged to me that the 20-year-old series was suffering from a sameness problem—not only was the title indistinct year to year in its graphical presentation, but great games also sounded the same, whether you were playing at Michigan, USC, the Other USC, VPI or Clempson. Authentic crowd noise is one way to brighten the atmosphere. The first Saturday in October presented the first chance in nearly 20 years to see three major college football games on the same day without using aircraft. So Ben and I spent about 11 sunburned, blistered hours trying to differentiate your college football experience should you choose to play with Duke, State, or those no-good son of a bitch bastard Tar Heels. Here's what made it: Duke: "We got the 'Let's Go Devils' clap chant, and 'Let's Go Duke,' which are more upbeat offensive encouragement type chants," Ben said. These are probably mine. I was stationed beside Duke's student section the entire game; Ben was covering the Virginia fans way to the other corner of Wallace Wade Stadium. The obnoxious fan hitting on the dance team captain all game was, presumably, omitted. State: "We got the 'Wolf/Pack' call and answer chant," Ben said. Again this might be my work. I was down in the corner of State's student section at Carter-Finley Stadium, in good position to get both ends of this cheerleading staple. UNC-CH: "We got 'Let's go Tar Heels' with accompanying drum hits, and a couple versions of the 'Tar/Heels' call and answer chant." These sound like Ben's. I was in front of the end zone student section and would have only gotten one word off the Tar/Heels chant. "The biggest hurdle we are trying to overcome is getting any performance by the band cleared," Ben reminded. "There are so many chants that have the band playing along. Even if it's a chant over a fight song we have the rights to, there are questions if we have rights to the actual band performance of the song. "We had to shelve an awesome version of Seven Nation Army that we captured, where a band was playing that opening bass line with their horns section," Ben wrote. "Super fast tempo, super upbeat, but we aren't able to get it cleared yet. "The other issue that cuts into a number of good samples is that damn P.A. announcer," he added. EA Sports does not have the rights to any public address audio without a separate deal. At Kenan Stadium, the P.A. calls out a fresh set of downs by saying it's "another down for the Tar ..." and the crowd replies, "Heels." So the front end of the chant is unusable. "We went to about 30 games last year, some for the first time, like South Alabama," Haumiller said. Indeed, South Alabama's bawdy chant of "U-S-A! South in Your Mouth!" came through loud and clear—and cleared the ESRB prudes—and will be in the game. In some games they recaptured audio from a previous visit that had yielded nothing usable. EA Sports went to Penn State the day after Joe Paterno was fired, for example. NCAA Football 14 will be available on July 9. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood. Top image by Getty.

The biggest breakthrough for your running game in NCAA Football may not be smarter line blocking, the return of a speed burst, or the introduction of real-time physics. It may be as simple as a new camera angle, available today in the game's demo. You should see it. You should play with it. It's the "coordinator" angle—akin to the "all-22" view only recently made available by the NFL, though not for live broadcasts. Meaning no disrespect to this game's upgrades elsewhere, but coordinator cam is likely what will make me a better runner in NCAA 14, though other changes will certainly help anyone get a few more yards in a series that for a long time has struggled with down-at-first-contact gameplay. "Coordinator" makes players almost FIFA-small from the base camera view. With the exception of receivers in lonesome-end formations, you can see everybody, cutting down on the pre-snap zoom outs to see what the defensive backs are doing. After the handoff or pass completion, the game sensibly zooms in on the ball carrier. Even from this distance, holes in the line are much more apparent, and steering your runner through them is a lot cleaner. I teed up the demo with Ohio State and Michigan primarily to run the ball every down and judge, again, the claim of improved offensive line play. More on that in a moment. What I found, after switching the camera angle, was a better sense of where to take the play and how to follow my blocks. Offensive linemen do, as advertised, block better—especially the pulling guards—even if they still release their blocks a little early. That can be addressed later with a slider, if necessary. Still, blockers coming out of the backfield, or particularly receivers against a cornerback cannot be counted on. But with a better look at my route and a more informed police escort up front, I'll still take it. Speed burst for ballcarriers returns to the game, this time on your right trigger, and you have a finite supply of it each play (which should diminish as the game lengthens and your player tires.) You can't simply lay on it from the handoff and get results, even on runs outside the tackles. Seeing where the defender commits or is picked up by a blocker is critical to using the skill. There were many madcap dashes for the corner where I just barely squeezed by. Thanks to the inclusion of the Infinity Engine—last year's physics model for Madden NFL—if you can get a shoulder past your defender, you've got a good shot at shedding the tackle, or at least stumbling for more yards. This is much better than previous editions, where despite new animation after new animation after new animation you were still sucked into a tackle once the defense hit your collision box. NCAA Football 14 should also cope with the modern college football gameplan better than it has in the past. From the spread option, left and right shoulder buttons will either pitch the ball or shovel pass if you're a quarterback with two runners alongside in the backfield. This has enormous potential for fun, especially when the defense has the pitch option covered and is descending on the quarterback, and he hucks a shovel pass to a runner free for an eight yard gain. I'm not innately familiar with the spread's reads and backfield options, and if you aren't, either more time will be needed in the skills trainer, or in practice mode. But in the hands of a capable runner, I can see it being as unstoppable as the triple option was in the early days of this franchise. This is just a demo (one that released, ahem, kinda late today) and as such I've only finished the skills drill and one game. On offense, it definitely plays different from last year's edition. Three-minute quarters may not give a complete picture of how all facets of your offense will run once the new game arrives in a month. Clock management kind of steps in and hurries things along, for both sides. But the full-contact physics, the smarter blocking (by those who wear numbers 60 to 79, anyway), funky tricks like the shovel pass and, most importantly, the coordinator camera, definitely breathe new life into this enjoyable series.

Today, one of the year's most hotly anticipated video game releases was delayed with no word when it will come out. Frustrated gamers are spewed anger over social media, some even vowing to cancel their preorders. This afternoon after a whole nine hours, the world finally got the NCAA Football 14 Demo. That's right, a free, trial-size version of a sports video game due out next month. In my time here covering sports, I've seen neither this kind of anticipation nor this kind of fury for a delayed demo, certainly not for NCAA Football. EA Sports' college title isn't an insignificant series, but it isn't in the same tier of worldwide, trending-topic hype as NBA 2K, FIFA or Madden, and their demos come and go with relative indifference, probably because these games are taken for granted every year. You couldn't tell it by what went on today with NCAA Football 14, until the game finally showed up after 2 p.m. Eastern time. To be honest, this year's demo version doesn't even sound that special. I had to telephone someone in Florida late yesterday just to get the six teams playing in the three matchups offered, all played with 3-minute quarters. That's been the same format for the past few years. Yeah, this year's NCAA demo will offer a look at how real-time physics—introduced in last year's Madden—play out in the college game, and the offensive line blocking is said to be strongly upgraded. Well, offensive line blocking is said to be upgraded every single year. So where this bated-breath anticipation and teeth-gnashing anger came from, I have no idea. To think, the day began with such promise: ncaa 14 demo and Kanye west album released on same day. Dis gewd — Pierce Vaughn (@Listen2Pierce) June 18, 2013 Gamers were expecting the demo to arrive at 5 a.m. When it didn't, and something for Painkiller: Hell & Damnation did, people went nuts. Evidently there were folks foregoing sleep or getting up early just to see 'Bama kick the hell out of VPI in Chick-fil-A's preseason showcase. Pissed I woke up early for the NCAA demo and.. It's not even dropped yet — THE C LaFever22 (@Clafever22) June 18, 2013 Had to take my kids to the Dentist, any word on the NCAA Demo as of yet? (Xbox) Can't believe I got up at 3 this morning for this SMH — SportsGamingUniverse (@nadasfan) June 18, 2013 why the *crag* has ea sports not release the ncaa 14 demo?! — M?rlon (@_GoldenBoi_) June 18, 2013 Waddup w this NCAA Football 14 Demo though???? I'ma be late for work LMFAO #THESTRUGGLE — Edwin Colon (@mistanycee) June 18, 2013 I still can't find this NCAA 14 demo. You could say I'm a little upset. #Wow #I.Mean.Wow. — Dresden Wilbur (@DWilburr1) June 18, 2013 @EASPORTS I thought the demo to NCAA 14 was dropping today wtf? Slackers? — Tony Allen (@ttonepatrone) June 18, 2013 @seDvCen @XboxSupport Man stayed up til 3:45am for that dang thing. Now I'm going to work. Today gonna suck and still no demo!! #Ncaa14demo — The Sports Degos (@TheSportsDegos) June 18, 2013 Now, to be fair, last night many EA Sports titles began featuring in-game advertisements declaring the NCAA Football 14 demo was "out now," and clicking on it would take you to the Xbox Live Marketplace in order to download it. People were, obviously, greeted by blank screens when they did so, which helped stoke the anger. Later in the morning EA Sports tried to address the matter: For those of you asking when the Demo will be available - we've contacted Microsoft/Sony to speed up the process & will keep you posted! — EA NCAA Football (@EANCAAFootball) June 18, 2013 That didn't seem to help much. @EANCAAFootball Speed up the process? You morons were putting ads up in other EA games YESTERDAY, "NCAA Football 14 Demo Out Now"! Morons. — Jesse Schultz (@jschultz1226) June 18, 2013 Hell, this guy right here works at EA Sports' Tiburon studio, but on the Tiger Woods PGA Tour series. He also wanted to know WTF the demo is: @majornelson - Larry, NCAA FB demo should be out today. Can you help a brother? — Craig Evans (@TheCraigEvans) June 18, 2013 Meantime, this person tried to supply a lone voice of reason: Why are people flipping out over the NCAA 14 demo?its just a demo that will give a hour or 2 of entertainment!!!people need to calm down. — Emenike FTW (@xxbetterxdaysxx) June 18, 2013 But as the minutes became hours and the hours became ... well, more hours, the anger mounted: I'm waiting for these *crag*ers to put the NCAA demo out so I can see this new engine — KraigStefanowski (@Kstef13) June 18, 2013 @XboxSupport When is the ncaa football 14 demo coming, damn thing shoulda been out already! — JT.Seven™ (@seDvCen) June 18, 2013 “@ColtsSharksReds: NCAA 14 demo out at 5 AM EST!” You *crag*in LIAR! — deshilvanado (@_mcdaniels) June 18, 2013 Lest you think this is purely a Twitter phenomenon, NCAA Football's Facebook page was not spared, either. A sampling (perhaps tongue-in-cheek): Microsoft was, of course, scapegoated (never mind the demo wasn't going to hit PlayStation Network until later in the afternoon). Haha is Microsoft trying to convince us to buy a PS4? NCAA demo arriving late. — Bobtrain (@TheBobtrain) June 18, 2013 Knew MS would f up and not release the NCAA 14 Demo on time smh — Steele Clay (@Umadbro_703) June 18, 2013 Lmao! There are seriously xbox fans threatening to cancel their preorder of ncaa 14 an say they won't get an xbox one because the demos late — w-kemp15 (@wkemp15) June 18, 2013 Conspiracy theories were floated: @owengood The NSA is playing the NCAA Football 14 demo. Who is this Johnny Football anyway? — Game On (@SimonSplash) June 18, 2013 But morning turned to afternoon and afternoon to evening with no sign of the demo and no word when it would arrive. That called for an ultimatum: They bs'n with this ncaa football 14 demo... It better be up there when I get home... — ? (@Un_Franc) June 18, 2013 Don't worry, it will be. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

Pro Evo Soccer may have won next season’s foot-to-ball battle before it even begins. During an interview with Polygon, Andrew Wilson, executive vice president of EA Sports, revealed that the fancy new ball-jiggling mechanics of the Ignite engine will not be gracing the PC version of FIFA 14, which will instead be equivalent to the 360 and PS3 editions. Why? Well, PC conversion would be difficult because of the architecture of the next-gen consoles and “how the CPU, GPU and RAM work together in concert in that type of environment.” It’s like an abstract alien factory in there and the conversion wouldn’t be worthwhile because, Wilson claims, using the example of FIFA 11, “the majority of the gamer base that was playing the game on PC did not have a PC spec that would work with that”. Huh.

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NCAA Football 14 offers three different matchups—Alabama vs. Virginia Tech, Oregon vs. Texas Tech, and the Ohio State-Michigan rivalry—when the game's demo arrives on Xbox Live and Playstation Network tomorrow. Alabama-VPI will be the preseason Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game at the Georgia Dome; Oregon will play at Texas A&M and Ohio State-Michigan takes place in the Big House. All games have three-minute quarters. As in past years, EA Sports is offering incentives for downloading the demo and telling friends to go get it, too. The incentives this time are card packs in the game's new Ultimate Team mode, which whose player population is drawn from current NFL performers as they appeared in college. Card packs will be awarded for completing a game and for sharing news of the demo. Xbox 360 owners will also get a special Heisman Ultimate Team item for downloading the game. Further, the new Skills Trainer minigame suite will be available in the demo, to let players familiarize themselves with the modifications and upgrades made to this year's controls and game engine. The full title will be on shelves in exactly one month.

Few sports video games are truly timeless. Even the best—MVP Baseball 2005, NFL 2K5—show their age and shortcomings immediately, and more than their contemporaries in other genres. It's the special burden of sports titles, tasked with reflecting both the state of the art and the state of reality inside a one-year snapshot. But eight years ago, if you popped in Madden NFL 2005 for the Xbox and Madden NFL 06 for the spanking new Xbox 360, there was little question which version was out of place. Madden 06 may have looked prettier, but significant features—right down to the play-by-play announcers—were wholly absent from the game's high-definition debut. Other series took years to regain feature parity with their predecessors. Some franchises lost a fatal amount of momentum and relevance, like NHL 2K and NBA Live. It'll go down in history as a humbling era for the genre, which is why the advent of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One raises more skepticism than excitement in longtime sports gamers at this hour. Only EA Sports' NHL and 2K Sports' NBA 2K series bridged both console generations with reputations largely unsmudged—though their direct competitors both suffered setbacks in quality, and their first offerings on new hardware were hardly mindblowing. "As a company, we were kind of overconfident in our position, and I lived through that transition at that time," said Andrew Wilson, the current EA Sports boss who, before, was the executive producer of FIFA and later the label's chief of development. "We had an internal engine that was going to be our core engine; that didn't come together," Wilson said. EA Sports tried to acquire another engine. "And that did not go well," he said. "We were adamant that we would never put ourselves in that position again," Wilson said. "Our last transition at this time, we did not have a game that was playable, and Madden was in a terrible state. Today, we've had these really early wins, and we believe there's going to be a multiplier effect happening from that collective effort." For EA Sports, the lessons learned manifest themselves in something called the Ignite Engine, which has a nice logo and a nice name but, to gamers so far, a vague application to the four titles it's associated with—Madden, FIFA, NBA Live, and an upcoming UFC title. Candidly, it sounds less like a piece of proprietary technology—like Unreal, Euphoria or Frostbite—and more like a set of sensible business practices. When I asked Wilson what was so special about Ignite, he didn't ramble off a bunch of engineering jargon that neither of us would have understood anyway. Basically, Ignite draws on the work everyone already is doing and unifies it under something all parties can use. That's not the sexiest marketing proposition, but the collaboration means that "The work we're doing today is now on a feature level, rather than at a lower level of development," Wilson said. In short, things are further along in June 2013 for these titles than they were in June 2005. FIFA, widely seen as the world-beater among sports titles, was in a lot poorer shape during the last console transition, when that team was working alone. Thanks to Ignite, "We have FIFA running at 60 frames per second, playable, today, on generation-four consoles" said Matt Bilbey, the general manager of football. "At the last transition we weren't at that level until a month before launch. Madden was in the same crunch eight years ago. "That was a case of an attempt to completely rewrite a bunch of technology that didn't turn out too well," said Cam Weber, EA Sports' general manager for American football. "We're starting the transition at the end of this console generation, not only with a more solid set of technology, but if you look back a year ago, we were already rewriting game modes, developing core gameplay built on runtime physics. Those are systems we started building two years ago." Weber came aboard in mid-2011 and implemented a three-year plan for development, which at the time sounded like so many other plans before it for Madden, all of which sought to give the product some coherent vision beyond being a year-to-year introduction of features with easy-to-market themes. But in 2012 the plan delivered real-time physics, something desperately missing from this full-contact sport, plus a unified career suite that has no imitator coming into its second year. "We are going to hit this transition with all of the game modes and all of the depth you have in generation 3 [the 360 and PS3]. You will absolutely have all of the depth of those games, and much more." "All our teams—Madden, FIFA, UFC and the NBA team, because we're all working off the same code base today, the advances Madden make benefit the FIFA team, which benefit the other teams," Bilbey said. "We're working closer together than we have in our history." In the last console transition, EA Sports had half a dozen titles going it alone into the new era, and nearly every one of them stumbled. In this transition, EA Sports has decided it will win or lose as a team. STICK JOCKEY Stick Jockey is Kotaku's column on sports video games. It appears Sundays.

Once upon a time there wasn't much of a dispute over the word "football." Over here, it meant cheerleaders, instant replay, and concussions. Over there, it meant relegation, riots, and flopping. Then came the Internet, and commenters stomping around in one another's mud puddles. Football. Soccer. Handegg. Communist Kickball. Whatever you call your version or the other guy's, EA Sports makes the top video game for it: FIFA and Madden NFL. Madden is the older title, one that not only gave rise to the EA Sports label but also the company's console publishing dominance. Today, FIFA sells more, to more countries, and the bosses of EA Sports during its ascent and primacy have been a Liverpudlian and an Australian supporter of Chelsea F.C. So, inside EA, which game gets called football? "My title is general manager of football," says Cam Weber, the man in charge of Madden and NCAA Football for EA Sports. "It's on the business card I give out." "To me, there's not really any rivalry," sniffed Matt Bilbey, an Englishman and Tottenham supporter. "My official title is just general manager of football for EA Sports." In consideration of our U.K. readers' feelings, since late 2011 I've tried to refer to American football as just that on first reference, unless the sport in question was already established by a reference to NCAA Football or Madden or some other title. In stories where both FIFA and Madden or NCAA are discussed, I've deferred to calling FIFA football, because God knows, if you don't, you'll hear about it. But I can make such decisions unilaterally. After coming aboard as the chief of Madden and NCAA in 2011, Weber had to sort out such matters with Bilbey. It's especially humorous that Weber himself is Canadian, whose version of football, like its versions of bacon and whiskey, must always be qualified by its country of origin. So Weber proposed a round of golf, at Northlands Golf Course outside Bilbey's home turf of Vancouver, to resolve ownership. "He lives on a golf course and plays a lot of golf," said Bilbey. "So Cam gave me a 10-stroke lead." "I beat him by eight," Weber said. "Either way, I won," Bilbey said. "Yes, my business unit, internally, is called American football," Weber said, sounding none too pleased. Was his staff informed of the showdown or its stakes? "No, they don't know anything about it," he said. What about Bilbey's gang? "I wouldn't say I was bragging about it," Bilbey smirked, "but they were informed. There may have been a few updates from the course. A simulcast back in the office." Will there be a rematch? "I fully expect Matt to appear on stage as the general manager of European football next year," Weber laughed. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

The boss of Electronic Arts' games labels admits the company has sent vague, if not conflicting messages about its intentions on the Wii U, but with the BBC he wasn't going to be more specific about what games, if any, they'd be making for the console in the future. "We didn't make it easy for the market to figure out our stance on the Wii U, that's for sure," Frank Gibeau told the BBC in this interview. That's putting it mildly. Two years ago, then-CEO John Riccitiello took the stage to declare an "unprecedented partnership" with Nintendo at E3 2011. That statement has been mocked and made into a meme since, as Electronic Arts has apparently ceased all development for the Wii U. A statement from the company's top spokesman in mid-May said as much, though later EA's chief operating officer moved the company's posture away from that claim, saying there were titles in development. Meantime, Tweets from an EA Sports software engineer that the console was "crap" and Nintendo is "walking dead" proved unhelpful. To this ferment, Gibeau now adds that "Do we have developers inside Electronic Arts that are watching the Wii U and understanding how it's developing? Yes, we're absolutely doing that. Do we have active development of Wii U titles that we're ready to publicly announce right now? No we do not." What's been most curious to me about this posture is not so much the conflicting statements, nor the fact EA Sports—joined by NBA 2K14 and Pro Evolution Soccer 14—will have no offerings for the console. It's that EA Sports, in this statement on Monday, said it is making a version of FIFA 14 for everything but the Wii U—the Wii included. And that's after last year's Wii version, which was just about the worst thing a sports video game could be—a reconditioned roster update. At any rate, action—or in this case, inaction—speaks louder than words. Electronic Arts: Video games firm wants to stop being 'hated' [BBC]

These screens and trailer for FIFA 14 showcase some of the game's features. The game is coming to PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 on September 24.

This is the first gameplay trailer for FIFA 14. Not the fancy new FIFA for next-gen systems. The now tired-looking FIFA for 360, PS3 and PC.

Monday, Jason Kidd gave the NBA his retirement notice. He and Grant Hill were the only active players this year that appeared in NBA Jam: Tournament Edition from 1994. Like veterans of a long-ago war, day by day we are losing the athletes of video gaming's cartridge era. These are the last of them. In 1994, Kidd, out of California, and Hill, from Duke, graced a loaded all-rookie team in NBA Jam: TE, fondly remembered in arcades as well as basements and rec rooms on the Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, and a slew of other platforms synonymous with video gaming of that decade. There are three NHL warhorses still playing whose video game appearances go back to the 16-bit era. They are joined by two other baseball players who may retire at the end of this year, and a handful of NBA veterans whose futures are likewise in the air. These are the longest-tenured video game performers in North America's four principal team sports leagues, plus the last active players from three classic video games. Longest Video Game Tenure, Active Player, NHL Jaromir Jagr As I've written before, NHL '94, a cartridge venerated like no other sports title of its time (with great thanks to an iconic cameo in Swingers) is down to just three active players who appeared on its roster: Teemu Selanne, Roman Hamrlik, and Jaromir Jagr. (New Jersey's Martin Brodeur, a vacuum cleaner in NHL '95, did not appear in NHL '94, though his career began the year before. Ray Whitney of the San Jose Sharks likewise made his video game debut in NHL '95.) Jagr shows no signs of quitting any time soon. And he is also the last active player to appear in NHLPA Hockey '93, a relic of the age when sports video games would release with the licensing of a players' association but not its league (such as Tecmo Bowl and R.B.I. Baseball.) Longest Video Game Tenure, Active Player, NFL Adam Vinatieri Until it arrives Aug. 25, there is one man and one man only who can say he appeared in every version of Madden NFL that has included real-world players. And that is Jason Hanson (above left), the Detroit Lions kicker who retired in April. Hanson was on the roster for Madden NFL '95, the first game in the series to be licensed by the NFL Players Association. That is a remarkable distinction. If I was Hanson, I'd have a belt buckle made for that. But with Hanson out of the league, the next longest-tenured NFL performer in video games is Adam Vinatieri (above right), who is the league's oldest player and shows no sign of retiring. He appeared in Madden NFL 97, and the Sega Saturn-exclusive NFL '97. He's also a kicker. After Vinatieri is Tony Gonzalez, the Atlanta tight end who just signed a two-year deal. Gonzalez made his console video game debut in Madden Football 64, the last sports video game to be licensed by a league's players' association and not the league itself. Longest Video Game Tenure, Active Player, Major League Baseball LaTroy Hawkins In what will be his final season, much is being made of Mariano Rivera's longevity. But he is not the major leaguer with the longest string of appearances in video games. That goes to another New York reliever with 19 years of service—LaTroy Hawkins, currently of the Mets. Baseball video games in 1995 did not release before Opening Day, as they do now. Thus their rosters—which could not be updated online as they are today—depended not only on who was part of the team, but who was a member of MLB Players' Association, as its group license only allows the use of likeness for union members. Neither Rivera nor Jason Giambi, the only other active players with service in the 1995 season, saw much time that year. But Hawkins, in his rookie season, was in Minnesota's starting rotation on opening day even though he would be sent back to Triple-A Salt Lake to pitch 22 games in midseason. Hawkins made his debut in the Twins' fourth game of the season, and that got him onto the roster for Frank Thomas' Big Hurt Baseball, which released in September 1995 for the Genesis and then in November for the Super Nintendo. All other games released that year drew on the majors' 1994 rosters. Longest Video Game Tenure, Active Player, NBA Juwan Howard With Kidd and Hill now out of the picture, Juwan Howard—who is only nominally active for the Miami Heat as they go to the NBA Finals—holds this distinction, going back to Konami's Super Nintendo-exclusive NBA Give 'n Go of 1994. Howard and Kidd both appear on their correct teams in this game, unlike NBA Live '95. Had the duo made that roster, they would be the only ones to appear in every version of EA Sports' basketball franchise. NBA Live '96, for some peculiar reason, included several rookies only as Easter eggs—Jerry Stackhouse, Kurt Thomas, Rasheed Wallace and Kevin Garnett among them. You had to enter their names in the player creation menu to unlock them. Who knows why NBA Live '96 resorted to that; it may have to do with the NBA Players Association group license. But if that counts as a video game appearance, then they will be the incumbents once Howard retires. If not, then the longest video game tenure is somewhere in a pool of players including them and Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Ray Allen, Derek Fisher, Marcus Camby and Jermaine O'Neal, assuming any remain active next season. For now, it's undisputably Juwan Howard. For the nostalgia minded, here's a look back at the last veterans of the 8-bit era, all of whom have since retired. Last Active Player from the Original Tecmo Bowl Roster Sean Landeta Landeta, whose last game was in 2005, is the last man on the Tecmo Bowl roster to appear in an NFL game, beating out the Raiders' Tim Brown, the 49ers' Jerry Rice and Minnesota's Rich Gannon, all of whom retired in 2004. Tecmo Bowl's roster was based on the 1988 NFL season, but remember that it did not feature every team in the league (and, with only the NFL Players Association's license, did not even feature the team names or logos of those who did appear.) Vinny Testaverde, Morten Andersen, Jeff Feagles and John Carney all were in the league in 1988 and played longer, but they were not on the Tecmo Bowl roster. Last Active Player from Tecmo Super Bowl John Carney Carney's consolation prize is being the last active NFLer on a game even more loved—Tecmo Super Bowl, which did feature all of the teams, all of their names, and practically every player from the 1990 NFL season. Reports at the time said that Feagles, another Giants punter, was the last active Tecmo Super Bowler when he retired in May 2010. But Carney came back for two games with New Orleans the following season (making five of six field goals) before retiring. Feagles and the late Junior Seau were Tecmo Super Bowlers who made their final appearances the year before. Last Active Player from R.B.I. Baseball Roger Clemens/Julio Franco I love R.B.I. Baseball because, being the first console game to feature real baseball players, it churns up some fantastic trivia answers and anomalies. Two guys who made their major league debuts in 1966—Don Sutton and Nolan Ryan—both appear in R.B.I. Baseball. That's one degree of separation from names like Sandy Koufax and Gil Hodges. Here's my biggest forehead smacker—how the *crag* did John Kruk get into this game? R.B.I.'s main roster featured 10 teams—the four playoff squads from 1986 and 1987, plus all-star teams for the National and American Leagues (even though R.B.I., like Tecmo Bowl, had licensing only from the players' association, not the leagues themselves.) John Kruk was on the San Diego Padres in 1986 and 1987, and did not make an All-Star team until 1991. Yet there he is. And 27 years later, Kruk still is appearing in video games, as an analyst for MLB 2K13. The question of last active major leaguer to appear in R.B.I. Baseball, though, depends a little on what standard you use. Roger Clemens, on Boston's roster in this game, pitched his final regular season game on Sept. 16, 2007. Julio Franco, on the game's American League all-star roster, played his final major league game the very next day. But Clemens did appear in the 2007 postseason. Franco is popularly assumed to be the last man standing from this roster. I think it's at least a tie, if not Clemens' title outright. Finally, I offer: My Prediction for Last Surviving Athlete of the 16-Bit Era Phil Dawson, Kicker, University of Texas The forerunner to today's NCAA Football series by EA Sports, College Football USA '96 was renamed from Bill Walsh College Football and was the first in the series to feature every Division I-A team, plus real bowl games. While players on this roster did not appear under their own names, as I and many others have said, this is a fig leaf to get around the NCAA's amateurism requirements. There are about 20 players whose NFL careers began between 1996 and 1999 (thus would have been playing when this game released) who are still active. I found two playing under their college numbers at their positions in College Football USA '96: Tennessee's Peyton Manning and Texas' Phil Dawson, Though Manning came back from a neck injury to lead Denver to a 13-3 record with the NFL's best completion percentage, I'll put my money on a kicker. They're the true survivors of the NFL. Last year, Dawson was perfect on all 13 attempts from 40 yards or more, and he just signed with the San Francisco 49ers, too. But it wouldn't surprise me to see him end his career kicking for the Eagles. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

Those who lock in their Madden NFL 25 purchase through GameStop will be guaranteed a trio of greats from the San Francisco 49ers of yesteryear: former owner Eddie DeBartolo Jr., former coach Bill Walsh and Joe Cool himself, four-time Super Bowl champion quarterback Joe Montana. All three will be available in Connected Franchise and Madden Ultimate Team modes.

Madden NFL 25 is EA Sports' annual football release, this year boasting improved ball handling and a tweaked engine, plus team relocation. Fan voting appointed cover duties to Hall of Fame running back Barry Sanders.

Hyping the cover vote for NHL 14, the league reached back to that old 16-bit crowd-pleaser, NHL '94, to make this adorable video. It's appropriate because one of the finalists is the New Jersey Devils' Martin Brodeur, the only active goalie whose NHL career is older than the video game. So, once again, it's time to check on who is left in the league who appeared in one of console sports gaming's greatest titles. Interestingly, Brodeur, is not one of them. NHL '94 released in March 1993 and would have used the league's 1992-1993 rosters. Brodeur had been called up for four games in the 1991-1992 season for four games when the New Jersey Devils' two starting goalies were hurt. The next year, he was back in the AHL before returning for the 1993-1994 season. So he even though he's 41 and played in 20 seasons, he still doesn't belong to that exclusive fraternity of the Active Players in the League Who Appeared in NHL '94. Its membership is Teemu Selanne, Roman Hamrlik and Jaromir Jagr, all of whom logged time in the playoffs. Alexei Kovalev also appeared in the game and in this past NHL season but officially announced his retirement in March. Selanne and Hamrlik are considering retirement. Jagr, who is three weeks older than coal, will skate until he falls apart. Brodeur faces another goalie, Sergei Bobrovsky, in the final round fan vote for the NHL 14 cover. Watch the NHL 14 Cover Vote Finalists in NHL '94 Style Video [Operation Sports]

Last week, Madden NFL 25 announced an "Anniversary Edition" that at first didn't seem like it had much to offer. Then word started to circulate in an officially unofficial way that a promo code could be used to watch DirecTV's Sunday Ticket NFL broadcast on a PC, with or without signing up with the satellite provider. Well, this being Madden, this being big bad Electronic Arts and, more relevantly, this being the NFL and its less-than-consumer-friendly TV policies, few believed it. After all, the official news release doesn't straight up say this is how you can use the offer, which seems to be more about giving a discount toward a DirecTV subscription. The code, which gives Sunday Ticket access on PC, tablet or mobile phone, is referred to more or less as an alternative for those who are not cannot receive DirecTV service. Considering DirecTV has 35 million subscribers, there would seem to be few in America who can't get it, but it's true in the case of dorm rooms and some apartment buildings where you can't mount a dish. So, through the past week word spread that this was going to be a screwjob. You'd buy a hundred-dollar Madden and be unable to use the thing you really wanted because DirecTV would know, by zipcode or IP address or whatever, that its service was available to you. I'm not ordinarily in the business of policing special edition offers but this one, being enticing to me on a personal level (I have no cable or satellite TV but watch a ton of sports over the Internet), was interesting enough I went to the man putting his name on this unofficially official offer: Anthony Stevenson, Madden's top marketer. I asked Stevenson if I could use this code to watch Sunday Ticket on my iPad even if I had no intention of signing up with DirecTV. "There is a unique code in every single anniversary edition, and that code will entitle you to the 17-week full-season trial on PC, tablets and mobile devices," Stevenson said, and I started grinding my teeth. Why can't we get a simple yes or no? "We absolutely understand there is some confusion with the language, and how it is written," he said. "To bring this great deal to life—it's very complex and complicated, involving the NFL and its television partners, and DirecTV. The reason is because everyone's interests have to be protected and this has to be written in a certain way." There's a lot of reading between the lines here. So I'll say what Stevenson could not above: Sunday Ticket is not a thing greatly loved by networks that have paid billions-with-a-b to broadcast Sunday afternoon games. To straight-up invite people to ditch a television set altogether and watch this stuff online, while it may be within the terms of DirecTV's deal with the NFL, is a provocation to its biggest licensing partners. Hence the unofficially-official offer, and the heavily lawyered wording of the news release and the line Stevenson must toe. The "unable to get DirecTV service" thing is just a fig leaf that allows DirecTV to put out this service, and then let you figure out how to exploit it. You self-select whether or not you have DirecTV access. Protip: Say you do not. Really, how is it going to know? It doesn't matter if there's a contractor in the area to connect you. Maybe you have a landlord that won't allow you to mount a dish to the house you rent. This is how it works when you use the Sunday Ticket app on the PlayStation Network (note: This offer does not give you access to the PS3's app.) Sunday Ticket on a mobile device is otherwise only possible if you sign up for the deluxe "Sunday Ticket Max" package, which requires a DirecTV subscription. This is a code that essentially breaks off that feature and gives it to you for $40 above Madden's cost. Madden special editions have been, candidly, kind of a snooze up to now. They get a different, sometimes prettier cover and some exclusive in-game content, usually for the Ultimate Team mode (and there's a bunch of that in the Anniversary Edition, too.) This, though, has legitimate value. I almost pulled the trigger on getting Sunday Ticket on the PS3 last year, but didn't, because I work weekends and my lone TV is in a room well away from my office. That changes if it's on my iPad here at my desk. No extra TV, no cable or satellite subscription. So, I'm going in on this, even if I get a copy of Madden free in advance to review. And if I get screwed, well, I know where Anthony works and what he looks like. I'll say hello for you. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

FIFA 14 will line up for the North American continental anthem on September 24 for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC. The European launch is September 27.

Pre-orders of FIFA 14 through GameStop, Best Buy, Walmart, Target, Amazon or Origin get Ultimate Team gold packs. Each pack contains 12 items - players, contracts, stadiums, managers - to support players as they create fantasy teams of real-world athletes.

FIFA 14 is one of four EA Sports games confirmed for Xbox One, Microsoft's next-gen console revealed this week. FIFA 14 will use EA's new Ignite engine on Xbox One and PS4, but not PC or current-gen consoles.

A federal appeals court has revived a lawsuit brought by a college quarterback against EA Sports, on grounds the video game publisher used his likeness without permission in their popular NCAA Football series. Ryan Hart (pictured), who played for Rutgers University from 2002 to 2005, sued years ago on grounds that the Rutgers quarterback in NCAA Football, while he played for the school, exhibited all of his traits except for his name, and therefore constituted his actual likeness. In 2011, Hart's case was dismissed at the federal district court level, in a ruling that said his depiction in NCAA Football fell under EA Sports' normal First Amendment rights of artistic expression. Hart appealed, and a decision Tuesday by a three-judge panel of the federal 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals agrees with him. "The digital Ryan Hart does what the actual Ryan Hart did while at Rutgers," wrote Judge Joseph Greenaway, for the 2-1 majority. "He plays college football, in digital recreations of college football stadiums, filled with all the trappings of a college football game ... [t]he various digitized sights and sounds in the video game do not alter or transform the appelant's identity in a significant way." The reversal of the dismissal of Hart's complaint means it goes back to district court. A similar complaint, filed by former Nebraska and Arizona State quarterback Samuel Keller, also is on appeal at the the federal level in another district. While this ruling is not binding to Keller's case, his complaint and appeal are basically the same as Hart's. Keller's lawsuit was combined with that of Ed O'Bannon's, the former UCLA standout who sued EA Sports over his appearance—after his college days—in a video game under all but his own name. O'Bannon's suit seeks to become a class action and a ruling on that will take place in June. If it does become a class action—involving thousands of past and present college players—the potential damages could force the NCAA to severely alter its rules for eligibility, and even compensate athletes, as well as threaten the viability of licensed college sports video games. Former Rutgers QB Ryan Hart gets favorable call on lawsuit against EA Sports [NJ.com] To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood. Image by Getty.

Sorry, Master Race. That superduper Ignite Engine that EA Sports is bringing to its next-generation games? Yeah, it's not going to power any upcoming PC version of FIFA. That's per FIFA community manager Rob Hodson, who had this to say on Twitter. Clarification for the PC related questions earlier - EA SPORTS IGNITE will power FIFA 14 on Xbox One and PS4, not PC bit.ly/192nrNz — Rob Hodson (@RobHodson_) May 21, 2013 Naturally, PC gamers did not react well. @denis_fdrv there's no trick. Ignite isn't powering it, plain and simple. (even if it's disappointing for you) — Rob Hodson (@RobHodson_) May 22, 2013 The truth is that PC has been a dying, if not irrelevant, sports constituency for years, primarily in North America. Granted, that's in large part because EA Sports just does not support it. Of licensed sports simulation titles, the ones folks commonly associate with the genre, F1 2012, Pro Evolution Soccer 2013, FIFA 13, NBA 2K13 and MLB 2K12 published for PC last year. (MLB 2K13 did not have a PC version this year.) Madden NFL elected to stop publishing on PC back in 2008, a choice that's marked the platform's declining relevance in sports. Since then what strength it does have in the genre lies largely in management simulations like Football Manager, Out of the Park Baseball or Sega's MLB Manager Online. FIFA 14 on PS4 and Xbox One uses the fancy new Ignite Engine - but the PC version doesn't [Eurogamer] To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.

EA Sports had an outsize presence at the Xbox One's debut today in Washington, peeling the tape off something called the Ignite Engine and teasing a "very special relationship," with the console, while offering few specifics of that beyond some exclusive DLC for the FIFA franchise. All four sports titles discussed today—FIFA, Madden, the newly acquired UFC license and a rehabilitated NBA Live—will also release for PlayStation 4. Still, it's meaningful that EA Sports chose the Xbox One's event to showcase its next-generation promises. It was silent for the PS4's debut. That means this series of four videos are sports gamers' first understanding of what the extra processing power of the next console generation will mean to their experience. Andrew Wilson, the executive vice president in charge of EA Sports, said the Ignite Engine will offer "ten times more animation detail" and processing power that translates to better, faster decisionmaking for both player and AI alike. While yes, the visual fidelity in these clips is tons better than anything you're playing now, it'll be some time before that claim can be fairly judged. The pre-rendered scenes, particularly those of Lionel Messi and Robert Griffin III, are blood-pumping and dynamic. But some of the animations in the wireframes and technical demonstrations—particularly RG3 getting rid of the ball to his halfback as the blitz bears down on him—look very familiar to longtime players of each series. NBA Live's showpiece scenes make that work look more sophisticated than you'd expect for a title that abruptly canceled its past two editions. That said, EA Sports' failure to execute with current-generation hardware for that franchise makes it a legitimate question what they're able to do with next-generation technology, even if they put all of their effort into that platform. Realize that while NBA Live 14 is a definite for PS4 and Xbox One, no announcement has been made about a PS3 or Xbox 360 version. There also needs to be some reading between the lines. EA Sports has never done console-exclusive downloadable content. The publisher's willingness to scrap Online Passes is assuredly because the Xbox One will feature across-the-board used-game restrictions. We can assume some form of this will be present on the PlayStation 4, whose used-games support still has not been fully addressed. Sports video games have long been among the games you'd take over to a friend's home to play on his machine there. If you want to do that on the Xbox One, you'll have to install the title to that machine and pay a fee to do so. Now he gets to keep it. We're unclear on what the fee is, or what that means for the original owner, but offhand the viral-sales nature of such a system certainly plays to EA Sports' favor. I still think we are due for major announcements regarding EA Sports' next-generation offerings as numberless subscriptions rather than annual releases. (All four games appeared on stage under their upcoming numbered titles.) For now, this is the clearest vision available of what the future of video gaming will mean for sports, one of its oldest and largest-selling genres, worldwide. To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.