JULY 2005 PAGE 1 EA SPORTS™ and NASCAR® Creating a Winning Team Year After Year By Gabe Leon Forty-one laps into the 2005 Welcome to NASCAR 06: MBNA RacePoints 400 at Dover Total Team Control International Speedway, Tony For the fi rst time in a racing video Stewart found himself trailing game, players have the opportunity rival Jeff Gordon by the slimmest to command and manage multiple of margins. After failing to pass teams and personalities—on the Gordon on previous laps, Stewart track and in the garage. In quest made his move. of individual glory and team Coming out of turn No. 2, the championships, you are not alone. Home Depot No. 20 car found an With the ability to switch between opening and began to slide down cars in the middle of the race low. Unwilling to give up ground, or instruct teammates’ actions Gordon did his best to hold his with real-time voice recognition, position. With two of the biggest NASCAR 06: Total Team Control stars in NASCAR® reluctant to raises the bar and sets a new give in, it was only a matter of time standard in video game racing before these two fi erce competitors history. It’s the latest breakthrough would swap some paint. from the NASCAR franchise developed by EA SPORTS™. As Stewart accelerated to the inside, his front bumper tapped “One of the things we have to Gordon’s car—just enough to send deal with every year is to try to get the No. 24 car into a race-ending away from the polarizing effect that spinout into the wall. a product like this can bring—‘the good ol’ boys driving around in Though Gordon’s day was over, Jimmy Johnson (left) and Jeff Gordon team together in NASCAR 06: Total Team Control circles,’ ” said NASCAR Game the story had just begun. Producer Scott Stutsman. “To With Gordon sidelined, it was up to his Hendrick Motorsports overcome that, it’s important for us to innovate in the functionality of teammate Jimmy Johnson to battle it out with Stewart. Racing for the product—create different possibilities you can do with this particular himself and for his team, Johnson eventually found himself in a similar title that make people want to go out and say, ‘I need to experience this.’ situation—racing side-by-side with Stewart. I feel we have delivered again with NASCAR 06: Total Team Control.” Jockeying for position, Johnson slid in tight during his pass, giving With true-to-life gameplay colliding head-on with NASCAR Stewart a little nudge along the way. The move left a dark donut tire authenticity in NASCAR’s newest video game, the Total Team Control mark on Stewart’s door and sent a message that was loud and clear. concept is just one of the latest innovations from a franchise that has led After the race Gordon and Stewart exchanged heated words. Both the video gaming industry since its inception. pointed fi ngers. Both made threats of retaliation. Stewart claimed However, the road to team racing didn’t begin over night. Gordon had the slower car and should have moved aside to let him pass; Gordon accused Stewart of being impatient. It was a typical day at the The Green Flag Is Out track for two NASCAR champions. By 1996, EA SPORTS had become one of the most popular brands in So what would you have done in Johnson’s situation? You just the gaming industry. With the Madden NFL Football, NBA LIVE, and witnessed your teammate being knocked out of the race and you had the NHL franchises near or at the top of the sales charts annually in their opportunity to do something about it. Would you leave more than a tire respective categories, Electronic Arts was looking to expand its lineup. mark or would you gun for the checkered fl ag and win the race in honor After having already produced racing games like Andretti Racing and of your fallen teammate? with the booming popularity of stock car racing, a NASCAR branded Now you’ll know. game was an obvious choice for EA. JULY 2005 A LEGACY OF INNOVATION PAGE 2 “By the mid-90s, we were looking for new opportunities in under- exploited sports, and the racing category was one that was growing at the time,” said David DeMartini, former Executive Producer of the NASCAR franchise. “Since the company already had experience making racing games we began to have discussions with NASCAR about the possibility of creating a new stock car racing title. With NASCAR’s expansion into new regions such as Texas and California, the sport’s demographic and fan base were growing faster than any other major sport at the time. We felt we had a chance to become a part of something special—something that was about ready to really take off.” In 1997, EA SPORTS began working with NASCAR on the fi rst stock car racing game in the company’s history. Featuring 24 drivers on 11 tracks, NASCAR 98 made its debut. The game received rave reviews from critics, fans, and most importantly, NASCAR. It was a sign of good things to come as the company continued to fi ne-tune the game each year. 43 Drivers on a Single Track One of the franchise’s biggest innovations came in 2001. Although it seemed like a no-brainer to include 43 drivers in a NASCAR video game, no title had been able to accomplish this task until NASCAR 2002 was released on the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and Nintendo GameCube. It Cover athlete Tony Stewart demos NASCAR 2001 during race weekend at Phoenix International Raceway. was a major accomplishment in the franchise—one that triggered a series of breakthrough enhancements in the following years. NASCAR with Personality “Having a full fi eld of 43 cars in a single game separated us from Up to this point, racing games had focused solely on the cars. Players any other racing game,” Stutsman said. “It made the game completely were able to select cars based on a favorite driver or car scheme, authentic while providing a great competitive experience. In addition, but their driving experience on the track was disconnected from the individual drivers who are such a large part of the sport’s popularity. In after the commitment was made to include all 43 drivers, we were then addition to an enhanced Career mode, NASCAR 2003 integrated driver able to move forward with a set blueprint which enabled us to focus on awareness into the gameplay. It was a groundbreaking moment for the other aspects of the game.” NASCAR franchise. Running full-throttle, the franchise began to add a deeper gameplay “In other games you were in a situation where the other computer- element with the introduction of Career mode the same year. It was the controlled cars were just following certain paths,” Stutsman said. “They fi rst time the game moved away from the race-to-race model, as players had no player awareness whatsoever. You would get rear-ended only were now able to experience the pressure of winning season after season. because the AI cars were following a racing line at a certain speed. With NASCAR 2003, the team took Career mode to a whole new level. Contact was pure coincidence; you just happed to be in the way. We took the game two steps beyond that. Our drivers actual knew where you were As a full-fl edged manager of a racing career, players now had the on the track at all times.” opportunity to choose a manufacturer, paint their cars, and entertain NASCAR 2003 also introduced Lightning Challenge, a game mode in new sponsorship offers based on their overall performance. Racing which players were given the opportunity to relive the greatest moments on authentic tracks against a full fi eld of drivers for multiple seasons, in recent NASCAR history. Put in real-life scenarios, players were players got a sense for the fi rst time of what it’s like to be a part of a real challenged to change history, or try to overcome the same scenarios real NASCAR team. drivers faced during the prior year. 1998 1999 2000 2001 • Featuring 24 drivers and 11 • Backed by an all-new Season mode, • Long or short? With the ability to race • The Daytona 500 is introduced as tracks, NASCAR 98, the fi rst NASCAR 99 is fi ne-tuned with the against 40 drivers, players have the NASCAR 2001 runs full-throttle offi cially licensed NASCAR addition of more tracks and drivers ability to modify their championship on the next generation platforms game in EA history, debuts on including six racing legends. season schedule. including PlayStation 2, Xbox, and the PlayStation and Sega Saturn. Nintendo GameCube. JULY 2005 A LEGACY OF INNOVATION PAGE 3 “Because people were only used to relating to the cars, it was neat Series. Rookie drivers started out at the bottom, without sponsorships to fi nally give the users a driver’s perspective of what they go through and without a team. Working with an agent, players began their career on during heated racing situations,” Stutsman said. “We gave them a feeling the Modifi ed Circuit with the goal of working through each racing series of what it’s like being out at the tracks with the situations we created.” in order to earn victories and a reputation. With each win came more Grudges and Alliances recognition. With more recognition came more opportunities. Soon, players were racing with major sponsorships in major races.