• ESPN Integration in NCAA Football 11

    After the success of television broadcast integration in NCAA Basketball 10, all sports games were put on notice. Not to be outdone, NCAA Football 11 will utilize ESPN Integration. "One of our first goals for this year’s title was to give our in-game presentation an upgrade with the audio and visuals of ESPN College Football," said designer Greg Heddlesten.

    Check out the full blog from Greg at the NCAA Football 11 website.

    Hey everyone, this is Greg Heddlesten and I’m a Designer for the NCAA® Football 11 team here at Tiburon. My main area of ownership is presentation and, as Roy mentioned in his previous blog, when we began work on NCAA 11 it was very important for us bring even more authenticity to the product and continue to blur the line between real life and the game. One of our first goals for this year’s title was to give our in-game presentation an upgrade with the audio and visuals of ESPN College Football.

    Previously, we had only gotten our feet wet with ESPN integration by implementing the ESPN SportsCenter updates and the news ticker. But everyone here, as well as everyone on the forums, felt that the ESPN experience just wasn’t complete without the ESPN College Football theme music and the in-game visuals and presentation. We all got our first taste of what an ESPN style broadcast could bring to our college sports products in NCAA® Basketball 10. The excitement, imagery, and sounds they were able to implement gave their game an entirely new vibe. With that in mind, it was time for us to dive in and really give our in-game presentation a new coat of paint with the help of ESPN.

    One of the cool things about working with ESPN on the visual side was we were able to see the new graphics package they were going to roll out in 2010 before everyone else. The general public got one of their first glances of this new visual style during the Bowl Season this past winter. It was really important for us to have the graphics in the game match what you would be seeing during the College Football season this year. The reference provided by ESPN really helped our artists replicate the look and UI animations you’ll see on television and help us continue to blur the line between NCAA Football 11 and watching a broadcast of ESPN College Football. So, without further delay, let’s take a closer look at what’s to come!

    The sights and sounds of ESPN you can expect in NCAA® Football 11:

    Updated In-Game UI:

    Game Clock: As some of you recently speculated in the Tim Tebow interview article, the game clock has been updated to reflect the new visual style that ESPN revealed during bowl season. We’ve recreated nearly every animation in the game clock from the Touchdown animation to how the clock opens out from the single ESPN cell.



    Banners: Banners received a face lift to match the ESPN style with new data like home town info for Impact and Injured player banners. In addition, we’ve also created a “Dual Threat” banner to support our mobile quarterbacks now that everyone will be taking advantage of our locomotion update mentioned in our previous blog.





    Replay Wipes: ESPN logo intro wipe plays as you start the replay and outro wipe plays as you exit back to the field. These aren’t just videos played back over the screen, the wipe is actually a fully animated 3D animation rendered in real time. It’s pretty slick.



    The Monolith! It’s our take on the broadcast bumper you see before every game with the College Football shield logo. This thing is completely rendered real time in the stadium you are about to play in and helps us kick off the broadcast. Coupled with the ESPN College Football Theme…awesome.





    Updated UI in the Main Menu and Screens:

    The new ESPN look wasn’t only integrated into the in-game broadcast. The entire game has been accentuated by the ESPN style to really give the entire game a new television broadcast theme.

    Other ESPN additions: On Demand Improvements You can now filter ESPN news articles by you favorite Sports, Conferences and Teams ESPNU Top 150 Recruits ESPNU lists their top 150 recruits that are available in your dynasty

    From the new look of ESPN’s game clock and stat banners to the ESPN College Football theme; we’ve infused our game with the iconic sights and sounds of College Football on ESPN. I hope that you’ve enjoyed this sneak peak of what’s to come for our presentation updates in NCAA® Football 11. Stay tuned for more presentation announcements as we get closer to launch. I can’t wait to show you guys our next major presentation update!

    *all images are work in progress