Electronic Arts chief competition officer Peter Moore discussed the current status of the publisher’s dormant NCAA Football series in an interview with IGN this week (via Gamespot), revealing that the college sports sim franchise could make a triumphant return “one day.”
Moore also discussed the legal issues that doomed the series in 2013, noting that settlements for affected players are still being worked out by EA’s legal team.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association dropped its decade-spanning licensing agreement with Electronic Arts in 2013 following a series of player lawsuits over their featured likenesses. NCAA Football 14 marked the final release for the long-running series, which saw its genesis in 1993’s Bill Walsh College Football for 16-bit consoles.
“We are confident in our legal position regarding the use of our trademarks in video games,” the NCAA stated afterward. “But given the current business climate and costs of litigation, we determined participating in this game is not in the best interests of the NCAA.”
During this week’s interview with IGN, Moore revealed that NCAA Football’s ongoing legal fees vastly outweigh the potential for revenue, turning the series from a popular favorite to a losing venture over the course of just a few weeks in 2013.
“Settlements are still going out so it’s tough to get into a lot of detail,” Moore said. “But what happened was NCAA Football became the lightning rod for bigger issues regarding college athletes getting paid for their performance in not only football but all college sports.”
Moore continued: “It was a sad day when we realized, ‘We are in the sights of a number of lawsuits.’ It was a sad day. When your lawyers fees are more than the revenue that you can expect to get in…”
Despite the series’ legal setbacks, Moore expressed confidence in the series returning in the future, though he did not identify a specific time frame.
“One day I know we’ll be back,” Moore said.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.