Is it Thursday already? It has been a very busy last couple months
here at Tiburon; all of us on the NCAA Football 10 team have been
working extremely hard put the finishing touches on this year’s game.
Every day brings us closer to putting NCAA Football 10 into everyone’s
hands and we couldn’t be more excited.
Last week we released two
game play improvements for NCAA Football 10. The first one showed off
the Pass Blocking Pocket; and the second was about the new Player
Pursuit Angles. Today we are going to reveal another two features
brand new to the game: Player Lock and Defensive Assist.
While
playing defense in Dynasty or Play Now are you the type of person who
likes to just take the DE and try and make a play? What about only
choosing the FS? Or have you wanted to be the WR on a big third down
because you think you can run his route better?
How would you like to be able to do this?
With
Player Lock you can select a player on the field and choose to stay him
the entire play, this gives you a new perspective depending on the
position you choose. In the above example you can see the transition
from going from our normal game-play camera to a view behind the middle
line backer we locked on too.
You can take any player on
defense and any skill position on offense (sorry offensive linemen) to
Player Lock onto. I’ve found it the most fun to use on defense, it
brings a new way to look at the field and play the game. It is really
fun and rewarding to know you were locked on to one player for the
whole play and got the pick or the sack.
Here is a random screen shot we got last night of an attempt to block a field goal:

Makes for a nice break for our next feature…
In
an effort to help players on defense we’d also like to introduce
Defensive Assist. By pressing the A button on Xbox 360 (or the X button
on PlayStation 3) your player will move to his correct position at any
given time. For example say you are not exactly sure where the corner
you are controlling should be playing his zone; all you have to do is
press the A button and the player under you control will move to his
assignment on the field.

Not
only does this apply to zone coverage it applies to all movement on the
defensive side of the ball; pursuit angles, man coverage, and ball
landing spots. It can also help you swat down a pass, but it will not
try and go for an interception or attempt a hit stick tackle (it is an
assist after all).
Personally I’ve used the Defensive Assist
to be able to focus on reading what play the offense is doing and not
have to worry about if I moved that linebacker I was controlling too
far out of his zone. It’s also nice to get a player moving in the right
direction as soon as the ball is thrown, then I like to take over and
go for the tackle or pick myself.
And there we have it, another
week done in the countdown to July14th and the release of NCAA Football
10. It’s going to be a fun time as we get to release more and more
information about the game between now and when you have it in your
hands.
One last cool looking screen shot for the road.

-Russell Kiniry
Designer NCAA Football 10