Hi, and a question or two

andyp99x · 05-12-2014, 06:54 AM

Bonjour.

Been playing Football Manager (in its various guises) and Madden NFL since about 1998 so naturally I'm pretty excited to see a managerial American football game. I think a lot of people have been waiting for one for ages (NFL Head Coach was okay, but not great) - it's not exactly a niche market, really is it? Really looking forward to seeing how your project develops here. I'll try and throw in some decent suggestions where possible as 15+ years of playing experience might mean something.

Anyway. Out of curiosity, how did you procure the rights to use the NFL players and teams? I was under the impression that one of the reasons for the lack of NFL coach/manager games was due to the fact that EA Sports held exclusive rights over this sort of thing. Kudos to you.

Also, will it be a one-off game with continual (perhaps purchasable) roster updates or will it be an annual release like the other games I mentioned?

Cheers

BradC · 05-12-2014, 06:33 PM

RE rights issues: Our other games, Out of the Park Baseball and Franchise Hockey Manager, are able to avoid licensing because we don't ship them with official logos and player images (but they can be added after purchase). A court decision several years ago involving fantasy baseball ruled that player names and stats are public domain information, so we can freely use that info.

Basically, Madden locked up arcade-style football games because obviously you need player images and logos for a game like that, but games like ours can still exist because we don't have to worry about those things.

Also, like OOTP and FHM, BTS Football will be an annual release, with a lot of new features added on top of the usual roster updates and such. We'll have plenty of things we can add from one year to the next, so it won't be hard to come up with a nice list of new features each year.

Thanks for stopping by.

andyp99x · 05-12-2014, 06:44 PM

Cool, cheers for the response.

05-12-2014, 06:54 AM	#1
andyp99x Bat Boy Join Date: May 2014 Location: UK Posts: 3	Hi, and a question or two Bonjour. Been playing Football Manager (in its various guises) and Madden NFL since about 1998 so naturally I'm pretty excited to see a managerial American football game. I think a lot of people have been waiting for one for ages (NFL Head Coach was okay, but not great) - it's not exactly a niche market, really is it? Really looking forward to seeing how your project develops here. I'll try and throw in some decent suggestions where possible as 15+ years of playing experience might mean something. Anyway. Out of curiosity, how did you procure the rights to use the NFL players and teams? I was under the impression that one of the reasons for the lack of NFL coach/manager games was due to the fact that EA Sports held exclusive rights over this sort of thing. Kudos to you. Also, will it be a one-off game with continual (perhaps purchasable) roster updates or will it be an annual release like the other games I mentioned? Cheers

05-12-2014, 06:33 PM	#2
BradC All Star Starter Join Date: Jan 2011 Location: northern CA Posts: 1,872 Blog Entries: 1	RE rights issues: Our other games, Out of the Park Baseball and Franchise Hockey Manager, are able to avoid licensing because we don't ship them with official logos and player images (but they can be added after purchase). A court decision several years ago involving fantasy baseball ruled that player names and stats are public domain information, so we can freely use that info. Basically, Madden locked up arcade-style football games because obviously you need player images and logos for a game like that, but games like ours can still exist because we don't have to worry about those things. Also, like OOTP and FHM, BTS Football will be an annual release, with a lot of new features added on top of the usual roster updates and such. We'll have plenty of things we can add from one year to the next, so it won't be hard to come up with a nice list of new features each year. Thanks for stopping by.

05-12-2014, 06:44 PM	#3
andyp99x Bat Boy Join Date: May 2014 Location: UK Posts: 3	Cool, cheers for the response.