Recently, the developer and creator of Axis Football, Danny Jugan sat down to talk with SGO’s very own The Natural. Jugan is the game’s lead developer, so he was able to go in depth with SGO to answer some of the community’s questions. Jugan and The Natural’s conversation covered nearly every aspect of the new Axis Football ’18, which is set to release its first console versions of the title this summer.
Every year, Axis Football has developed into a better and deeper football simulation game. Even though the title has always been exclusive to the PC, the game has cultivated quite a following. With the first console version of the popular simulation title set to release this summer, Jugan had a lot to cover and discuss in his interview with SGO. The first topic of discussion, of course, covers some of the additions and overall improvements fans can expect to see from Axis Football ’18.
Improving Gameplay and New Features
The biggest areas of focus for this year’s edition of Axis Football are Franchise mode and overall Gameplay. Much of the community is wondering, however, exactly how the game will translate over to the consoles.
Given that Axis Football is widely known for its customization features, developers have had much more file space to utilize when creating previous editions of the game. The game is perhaps best known in the football simulation community for its incredibly detailed customization options. Users can customize uniforms, stadiums, teams, and the players themselves. The console version of this season’s Axis Football should allow fans the same ability to customize all these same aspects of their team, just like with the PC version available on Steam.
The look and feel of the game will still feel like an “older generation” Madden title, like one from the days of PlayStation 2 or PlayStation 3. For anyone looking to replace their edition of Madden with Axis Football, you might want to reconsider.
“I think it’s important for fans to realize what they’re getting with this game. It is not Madden,” Jugan explained, and later went on to explain just how much time and effort goes into making a game that’s as smooth as Madden in terms of gameplay and player interaction.
Although Axis Football ’18 will feature new and enhanced player interactions, the game won’t match that of Madden’s AI.
When asked about his biggest challenge when developing a football game, Jugan answered, “You can’t take shortcuts when it comes to producing quality football.” Jugan later added, “There’s an expectation everybody has that this is how actual people play football.”
Player interaction isn’t the only area of the gameplay that’s being improved upon with this year’s edition of Axis Football. The developers expanded the game’s commentary as well. Commentary has been improved to more accurately depict what exactly is happening in the game. One particular area Axis Football ’18’s commentary improvements focused on had to do with the way penalties are called. As small as it may seem, the best sports titles cover the little details. For Axis Football ’18, improving those small areas such as commentary and penalties goes a long way.
Expanding Playbooks
Until now, the number of plays and playbooks offered by previous Axis Football titles has been extremely limited. Not anymore, though. Axis Football ’18 will give users many more options when it comes to plays. While last year’s Axis title only offered a low 100 plays across 7 different formations, Axis Football 18 will give users over 1,000 plays across 60 formations.
“One of the consistent points of feedback that we [Axis Developers] got was that wasn’t enough depth for an offense,” Jugan commented.
The community clearly wanted the ability to call a variety of plays, but the Axis team also gave teams an identity with their playbooks. It’s something new that previous titles didn’t offer. There are now different playbooks for different types of teams.
Online Play
Clearly, one of the most popular aspects to pretty all sports games is the ability to play online, Head-to-Head with other users. Unfortunately, Axis Football ’18 isn’t quite at that level just yet.
When asked about the ability to play online, Jugan was upfront about the development team’s thought process. “At the end of the day we came down to the decision that online play is really important to users, but its not as important as Franchise mode,” Jugan explained.
“We made the choice to hold off on online play until the game was better,” Jugan remarked. The desire to improve the gameplay before offering users an online game mode option shows that the development team over at Axis Football is committed to giving fans a quality football experience.
Axis Football and Franchise Mode
As Jugan stated, the team at Axis Football wanted to really improve the Franchise game mode in this year’s game. That’s why they added a plethora of new features to the popular game mode including the ability to sign Free Agents and Trades. They also threw in a new feature that even Madden doesn’t offer. Users can now manage coaching staffs in Axis Football ’18.
“We wanted you [users] to be able to hire coaching staffs, and have the coaching staffs really effect what’s going on, not only with the playbook but your coaching strategies during the game,” Jugan revealed.
This feature is something that Madden doesn’t offer. That’s a major improvement in the game’s Franchise mode. It’s also incredibly to think that there only about a half dozen developers working on this game, and that’s only part-time.
Jugan knows that his team can’t compete with the Madden titles. From the look and feel of Madden to the gameplay itself, the team at Axis Football understands they won’t be able to duplicate that. However, Jugan is confident in his team’s ability to compete with the major title in one particular area.
“We can compete in Franchise mode and that where were going to hang our hat, and give users what they want,” Jugan confidently expressed.
The new Axis Football is set to release this summer. This year’s edition of Axis Football is, again, being released for the traditional consoles as well as the PC version. We’ll see how fans react when the title’s released.
Sports Gamers Online would like to thank Danny Jugan for taking the time to sit down and talk about the upcoming Axis Football ’18.
Remember, Sports Gamers Online is your source for the sports gamer. Be sure to check back regularly with SGO for all the latest on Axis Football ’18 plus breaking news and notes from around the world of sports gaming.
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