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NFL Head Coach 09 Hands-On

We get our hands on EA Sports' football management sim for the first time.

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With the 2008 NFL Draft almost upon us, football fans are thinking about the future of their teams, and what they might do to turn things around if they were given the power to run their favorite team. The upcoming NFL Head Coach 09--which was recently announced as a pack-in with the 20th anniversary edition of Madden NFL 09--will give fans the chance to live that fantasy. We saw the game earlier in the year at the 2008 NFL Scouting Combine and got a feel for the extensive changes to scouting and player signing as compared to the original NFL Head Coach. Yesterday, we got an updated look at the game, including a look at the actual in-game play calling for the first time.

Think you've got more what it takes to out-coach Herm Edwards? Find out in NFL Head Coach 09.
Think you've got more what it takes to out-coach Herm Edwards? Find out in NFL Head Coach 09.

As the demo began, the producer guiding us through the game jumped directly into the Coach Now mode, which will give you instant action on the field. As with the day-to-day coaching duties that surround the off-season activities, everything you do in an actual game is centered around the clipboard interface. This feature will give you a moment-by-moment recap of your next big decision as coach--be it making a substitution, make adjustments on the field and, of course, calling plays.

Madden veterans will feel right at home when calling plays, but there are some important and compelling changes on hand. The interface of available plays organizes your playbook in the standard ways--formation, play type, and so on. The crucial difference is that once you've made your call and send your players out on the field, you'll be able to pause the game and adjust any player in formation on the fly. With its grid effect superimposed over the field, it looks like a more sophisticated version of the player creator in the original game. In addition to adjusting player positions on the field, you can reassign individual players to new assignments, for example new routes for receivers, or new blocking assignments for your linemen.

Creating plays up on the fly is good for making adjustments; where NFL Head Coach 09 shines is in the ability to save any created play you've just run, rename it, and add it to your profile's playbook. You'll be able to save up to 200 offensive and 200 defensive created plays to your playbook, export them to your Madden NFL 09 profile for use in that game (though you won't be able to use created plays online in Madden).

You'll also be able to upload created plays to your EA Locker for sharing with other Head Coach players. Here you can download the plays of other fans in the game and vote on your favorites. Interestingly, EA Sports producers told us that the AI-controlled coaches in the game will also be importing some of those user-created plays into their playbooks. In addition, as you continue your career as a coach, you'll occasionally see college coaches enter the ranks of the NFL--you'll be able to hire them and import their playbooks (which might include college-specific plays and formations such as the Maryland I or the Wishbone) into your own list of plays.

In the original NFL Head Coach, you could only play five-minute quarters; that's been rectified for Head Coach 09, and you'll be able to play full quarters as you go. Of course, if you're looking for things to move quicker, you can always check out the supersim options, which will let you skip ahead one play at a time, or further ahead in the game. Unfortunately, though you can use your teams and original playbooks online against other opponents in Head Coach, you'll only be able to play the games out using the supersim style of play, which is a bummer in terms of realism but, at the very least, will probably keep games quick.

Roster updates will be available in NFL Head Coach but will only be available to you if you start your season in the preseason (not in the off-season, which is the other option available to you). These will be the same roster updates that Madden NFL 09 users will get, but with updated ratings, player information, and--possibly--player portraits to boot.

Tom Coughlin thinks you stink as a coach.
Tom Coughlin thinks you stink as a coach.

While we would have love to have spent more time examining the in-game gameplay, we had to move on to other aspects of the game which we still hadn't seen--namely the NFL Draft. As with practically every other aspect of your job as head coach, you'll have goals when it comes to drafting talent that you will be expected to attain; indeed, your overall performance rating will hinge on how you perform in the draft. An example of a goal might be to draft a quarterback with an overall rating of 85 (and remember, ratings in NFL Head Coach aren't an absolute value, but rather a measure of a player's ability set against your philosophy as a coach. If you're looking for a mobile guy in the pocket, even a great quarterback like Peyton Manning wouldn't fit in your program.)

As you're searching for that great quarterback, you'll have multiple options for reaching that goal--you can grab him in the NFL Draft (better have a high pick!), trade for him with another team (better have some talent on your team to trade away!) or sign a free agent (better have some cap room!). How you go about meeting that goal doesn't matter to the fans (or in some cases, the front office), as long as you get the player on your roster.

Practice will let you focus and develop specific areas of your game plan.
Practice will let you focus and develop specific areas of your game plan.

When it comes to your roster, you'll have plenty of options to help you ensure that your draft is as successful as possible, including in-depth scouting tools an a mock draft that will show you where your team will fall in the order on draft day and what likely players will be available at that spot on the big day. In addition, you'll always have access to your team needs list so you'll know what your priorities are and, once you start making picks on draft day, you'll get real-time feedback on your picks in the form of your performance rating increasing or decreasing.

As with everything else in Head Coach, the draft will use the clipboard interface to help you navigate you through the process of taking a player, negotiating trades of picks with other teams, and so on. You'll also have a premade draft board you can refer to, as well as suggestions from your assistant coaches during the draft, just in case you're looking for an extra opinion or two.

Once the two-day draft event is over, you'll still be able to invite undrafted players into training camp (and like the free agent eBay-style bidding process) you'll be able to bid on these players to entice them to come to camp. Remember, though, these guys weren't good enough to get drafted so, despite finding the occasional diamond in the rough, you won't want to blow the payroll on getting these scrubs into camp. You'll be able to select a maximum of five nondrafted players for training camp and scout them as you. Head Coach will allow expanded rosters in the preseason (up to 75 players) but you'll have to cut down to the standard 45 players once the season begins.

One other intriguing aspect of the game was the practice mode, which you'll be able to run during the season and in training camp. Here you can focus on specific aspects of your game plan, or on specific members of your team, giving players an ability boost at their position. As producers explained it, this isn't merely an attribute boost, but rather an improvement that will affect the actual player animations in a game--so if you were to focus on the play of a defensive lineman, he would be winning his battle against the tackle assigned to him more often than not. In addition to boosting players, you'll also be able to give boosts to certain plays, such as quarterback blitzes, or zone coverage.

How often you'll be able to use that "boosted" ability or play will depend on the quality of your assistant coaches; the better coaches will give you more opportunities to use a boosted player or boost a player performance. During the regular season, you'll typically get three of these practice sessions per week, which will let you focus your game plan on very specific aspects of your team's strengths and weaknesses when compared to your opponent.

On the field and off: Every choice counts.
On the field and off: Every choice counts.

While visuals aren't the most important aspect of a management sim's appeal, it's worth noting that Head Coach 09 isn't looking too bad. The coach models that are currently in the game look spot on (love the suit, Mike Nolan), and the changing lighting and weather effects in the game are turning out well, too. The game is using the Madden engine for the on-field gameplay and you'll probably recognize faces on the sidelines, as many players will be walking around without their helmets. In addition, the commentary team has been replaced with the sounds of your assistant coaches offering advice as you go.

Currently, all the features are in NFL Head Coach 09; all that remains for the team at EA Tiburon to do is fix bugs and polish the game from here until its release with Madden. While it could be argued that NFL Head Coach 09 would have been great as a big-time feature in the next Madden game, what we've seen so far makes us think it will be a great complement for EA Sports' juggernaut. We'll be following this game's progress all through the summer, so stay tuned for much more in the future.

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