Electronic Arts Inc. and The Weather Channel Interactive today announced that the recently released NCAA Football 08 features the ability to experience real-time weather conditions and updates through a service provided by The Weather Channel. The latest version of the top selling college football video game will use up-to-date information from The Weather Channel Interactive (TWCI) to reflect accurate, real-time weather conditions at NCAA stadiums.
If a winter storm threatens the Northeast, the Eagles of Boston College will play through the snow. Hurricane threatens Florida? See how the Gators field goal kicker deals with 50 mph winds. Through a deal with EA SPORTS, the sporting division of Electronic Arts, The Weather Channel will provide real-time weather to the game via the Internet.
“This is a long-awaited feature for gamers – it is the first sports game we know of where actual current weather conditions will affect weather conditions in the game,” said Derek Van Nostran, director of marketing for The Weather Channel Interactive. “The Weather Channel Interactive welcomes this opportunity to work with EA Sports to bring an extra dose of realism to the game.”
TWCI provides a custom weather data feed to EA SPORTS for each stadium location. Every time a player with a live Internet connection loads a new game, they have the option to choose real-time weather from TWCI. The video game will then use the current conditions at the selected location to create the weather experience for that game.
“We are always looking to add more realism to the game experience,” said Jeffrey Luhr, producer for NCAA Football 08. “Adding real-time weather conditions from The Weather Channel interactive truly helps gamers feel ‘in the game.’”
Developed by EA Tiburon, NCAA Football 08 is now available in retail stores on the PlayStation 2 and PLAYSTATION 3 computer entertainment systems, and Xbox and Xbox 360 video game systems from Microsoft.
