So you've finished first in your Yahoo! Fantasy Football league 5 years in a row now, none of your friends want to play against you anymore and you feel like with your managerial gifts from God you were meant for something more, something special. Well, the folks at Quick Hit intend on giving you that opportunity – for free.
A free-to-play browser-based game, Quick Hit Football likens itself to EA Sports' NFL Head Coach and bills itself as a “freemium” game – meaning premium quality but free-to-play. It may not be licensed by the NFL (EA Sports still owns that) but it does offer a creative alternative to the Madden series. Did I mention it's free?
If you had to describe a genre that fits Quick Hit Football it would be something along the lines of “casual strategic MMORPG,” said the game's Director of Design Brandon Justice. While that can certainly be a mouthful, I'd describe QHF as fantasy football juiced up on roids. It's intended to reach out to football fans who may not own a console or who may be intimidated by the Madden series but love and know the sport well.
“We want to reinvent the way flash games are played,” said Justice, who acknowledges that most people don't equate “premium quality” with flash games. Sure they can be entertaining for an hour or two, some can be addicting for a day or a week at most, but than you forget about them. QHF intends on bucking that trend – and with a development team that includes talent that has worked on multiple Madden games, the NFL 2K football series, All Pro Football and NHL 2K9, I'd say the chances of them succeeding is good.
Hot route, red 7, red 7!
There is no elaborate controls in QHF because you never get to control your players on the field. Instead you call the plays, designate which players should be getting the ball and watch how it plays out in a top-down Tecmo Bowl-like view. The graphics however, are much better than Tecmo Bowl. You can play against the CPU if you'd like, but Justice admits the real fun is in going head-to-head with your friends online, whether they're real or virtual. Quick Hit incorporates a social networking feature that allows you to make “friends” and chat with them via a chat client or forums so you can talk smack and challenge them to a game.
Once off the field, gamers will experience the other half of QHF. The front office transactions are just like you'd expect, you can sign free agents and trade with other gamers as well as develop your current roster of 53 players. It's the developmental aspect that is the most interesting and where the RPG elements come into play. Each position will have different categories that help define that player's on-field style. For example, quarterbacks can be pocket passers, scramblers, or a mix of both. Linemen can specialize in run blocking, pass blocking, or be balanced.
In addition to the positional categories, gamers will have to decide how to spend their fantasy points, effectively called “coaching points.” Coaching points are earned during games and are used to rank up players just as you would in an RPG. While there is a set of in-depth attributes running behind the scenes, gamers will only be asked to rank up a broader set of skills like “running,” or “passing” and the game will modify the attribute sliders accordingly; Gamers will not have to deal with dozens of sliders for attributes like jumping or pancaking.
Flex your financial muscles
QHF is, like I said, free-to-play. However, if you want to get ahead a little quicker than your competition you can buy card packs that will have new plays, better players and extra coaching points in them. Right now Justice and the development team is thinking the packs will cost 25 cents for a bronze pack, 50 cents for a silver and 1 dollar for gold. Obviously the better the pack, the better chance you have of getting more points and players.
Packs won't just be for those with a little expendable income though, free-to-play points can also be used to purchase card packs and are earned at the same time as coaching points, said Justice. In addition to the card packs, Justice said Quick Hit plans to sell banner ads and show commercials between quarters and during halftime to help them see some return on their investment.
Perhaps the most important part of QHF will be the community involvement. This game has massive potential and Justice said Quick Hit has plans in place to allow the community to steer the direction of the game.
“We want the community to feel like this is their product,” said Justice. Quick Hit will use the forums as a way to bounce ideas off their fans and decide on what new features they should roll out after the game launches in September.
Stand tuned for more on Quick Hit Football as I head to Quick Hit's studio in Foxboro, Mass. to get some hands-on time with the game next week. Also, check out their Web site at www.quickhit.com.
