Season 1: Week 4 Open

This week's video is a song featured in Madden NFL 12, the last year of EA Trax.

Ani is dropping from the league right around the same time he does every year to focus on school (and Destiny it appears).

Regular member Ockerman aka THE_GHOST_1NSIDE is back. This time with the Iggles. As soon as he reads/signs the rules, he'll get an invite. He's scheduled to face the temporarily absent Squirrel_Hunter who I assume is still moving across the country.

Sixth time's the charm as Week 3 GotW lived up to it's billing with an OT thriller between the Jags and Colts with the kitties pulling out a 3 point victory. You have to wonder if Demon's R1 button wasn't working as only the Colts forced a fumble. The footage went MIA as to get the game to complete they dropped the twitch stream.

**Reminder: (This applies to BigSteve, Capeman, Squirrel_Hunter, Illmatic, Posky, and GHOST)
I pm'ed a number of you to properly set twitch to temporarily save your videos and directed you to a [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]. These temporary auto-archives are the bare minimum you have to do. But ti's so easy, and I would greatly appreciate it if you would take the extra minute to just create a highlight and save the entire game indefinitely. I believe I can export them to YouTube, or if you have a Google/YouTube account, I can make you a "manager" of the account to give you rights to upload straight to the channel.





So Coca-Cola has brought back SURGE, available exclusively from Amazon.com in 16 oz cans.  Is that just awesome? Or is it super awesome?

im back. sorry guys

Nothing to apologize for.

I should be set correctly now!

Hey, I am heading to Vegas tomorrow.  Will be returning  Monday morning.

I am in no way a tech expert. I rely heavily on the web and forums to see people discuss the same issues we're having. So if we have an expert here, speak up and correct me.

EXCESSIVE GRIEVING | What it means
We've had multiple games experience this already this year.

Because it's the internet and idiots will stop at nothing to cheat someone out of a win because it results matter and must mean their penis (or ovaries) is really big, EA servers monitor the connections of the players playing. When a connection is spiking, or lagging and failing to provide a smooth enough experience, they get kicked for grieving as EA things they're doing it on purpose to gain a competitive advantage or kick you from the game. It's not always connection though, as constantly jumping offsides (3 times in a row I believe) to harass your opponent can trigger the kick as well.

The downside is if a network is under heavy traffic, or just plain slow, good natured folks like the members of our league can get kicked for "griefing" even though it's not actually happening.

A better internet connection is the best option. A DSL connection can work fine, but if anything is interfering with or sharing the bandwidth, there may not be enough to go around.

Versus Plusch, I audibled, but the lag was so bad my player dived trying to tackle to Center before the snap because the game couldn't interpret the button process correctly. And when trying to hot route/audible a play, the game is shut down for grieving on Plusch's end. I'm guessing Plusch saw a message say "connect lost." Some players can't pick plays Causing Delay of Games and weird offsides. Maybe think twice before accepting those random penalties.

DE-SYNC Errors | This is just shoddy EA programming
A patch is required by EA to fix this.  Until then, make sure you have a realistic depth chart (helped past games) with no holes or players out of position (OLine doesn't count) and no injured players playing. Secondly, you need to have your individual settings match those of the franchise. So go to the Settings menu and make sure what you use matches what I have set.  No word if Custom Playbooks cause any issues.


Tips to help internet games:
Ethernet! Wi-fi is very convenient. But there are too many variables that can destroy the connection. A long ethernet cable is usually not recommend, but it's still better than wi-fi. Especially if you're in an apartment complex with everyone crowding frequencies with their own routers.

Latency: Run a speed test at [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] You want your latency under 33 ms. Under 16 is ideal.  I'm pushing it at 25-27 ms myself tonight for example. I think the recommended minimum upload is 500 kbps? I could be wrong there. This is likely an issue with your ISP. I don't think you can do anything other than make sure your're not using any other devices on the network.

Pony up? If you play online enough, might have to see if there are better options for high speed internet going with cable over DSL, or Fiber over everything. I've had Cox, Qwest (CenturyLink now), Mediacom, and Time Warner over the years, and Cox has been the least evil, and most consistent of the three. CenturyLink Customer Service was phenomenal though. Don't be afraid to try someone new, it may only cost you a week or two of gaming if you have issues.


Also take the chance to get political and see how much of a shame US internet is compared to other countries. Poor Eastern European internet infrastructure crushes what's available in the US.  For a country that prides itself on consumerism and competition, the bigger companies have too much power on regulation.  Granted, we're a huge country, but the greedy ass telecoms that hide behind government laws protecting them from competition and the ridiculously deep pocketed lobbyists are ruining the development of higher speed internet options. If your community is thinking of building its own fiber infrastructure, for dear god vote yes.  Any news coming from the Comcasts and other big companies are lies hoping to sway the vote and prevent competition that can dent their profit margins. Seriously, Comcast has flat out lied in writing to sway votes.  And those incremental speed upgrades that your ISP offers each year are a sham. They likely require no effort on their part to boost the speed. It's basically a flip of a switch. But they do it to squeeze more money out of your pockets making you think you're getting a better deal. Watch every community Google Fiber enters, and see the companies miraculously boost their speeds and offer better pricing. In Kansas City, Time Warner almost doubled customer speeds at little to no cost for many customers, just to prevent them switching, and they could've offered more. This is becoming gibberish, I'm stopping here. I think I made a point?

Surge being back is amazing. I remember drinking it as a child and it being one of the best drinks ever. Can't wait to get my hands on a can of it again

SIXTH times the charm as the Bears/Packers game sustains a long enough connection to finish a game. And the Madden Gods reared their benevolent faces to assist the Bears towards a 36-14 drubbing of the Cheeseheads thanks to timely turnovers and big play passes down the field.

OPotY: B Marshall: 3 Rec; 41 Yds
DPotY: J Allen: ZERO Stats
RotY: K Fuller: 2 Tackles; 2 Pass Def