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YouTube TV will let you check fantasy football scores in its mobile apps
Fantasy View only works with NFL.com fantasy leagues, however.
Former pro League of Legends team opens wallets to fantasy eSports
Former League of Legends team Vulcun started a new fantasy eSports website, offering a $250,000 prize pool for League of Legends spectators. Much like other fantasy sports such as baseball and football, players participate in daily challenges by selecting a team of competitors during the upcoming 2015 League of Legends Championship Series. Also like other daily fantasy sports challenges, both of Vulcun's free and paid leagues work on a salary cap basis; the best League of Legends players in the LCS will be more expensive to roster, so fantasy players will need to be discerning about the athletes they add to their teams. Founded by Ali Moiz and Murtaza Hussain, Vulcun earned $1.3 million in funding from investors such as eVentures, Battery Ventures and 500Startups, and the team plans to "re-invest every single dollar we make at increasing the prize pool for League fans." While this season's fantasy League of Legends prize pool is $250,000, Vulcun's next goal is to reach $1 million. The next LCS season begins on January 22, so those interested in Vulcun's fantasy challenges will need to request an invite to its closed beta. As League of Legends continues to grow in popularity as a competitive sport, universities are awarding scholarships to student eSports athletes. [Image: Riot Games]
Corner the fantasy football market with Stadium Stock Exchange
At this time of year it appears just about everyone is involved in fantasy football in one way or another. You can enter a league and draft or buy your individual players who score points for you. In an app I reviewed earlier, Big Play Scoring, users select offensive, defensive, and special teams units for each day an NFL game is played and receive points for the big plays those units make. Now you can do a fantasy investment in time and college football teams with Stadium Stock Exchange, a universal app that requires iOS 7.1 Stadium Stock Exchange treats each major college football team as if it was a stock available on the stock market. Users are provided with a $100,000 portfolio that they invest through buying shares in different college teams. The value of each team is determined by how many victories the team is expected to achieve during this season. Each win is worth $10 towards the stock price. For example Clemson's value at the time I did this review was $97.91 per share or a projection that the Tigers will win nine to ten games this year. If you think Clemson will win ten, you can buy shares and if they do the stock price will rise. However if they only win nine or fewer, the stock price will fall. Each team works the same way. So if a team goes through the season unbeaten and wins the National Championship its stock will be worth $150 and if that team instead ends up 10-3 the stock will only be worth $100. Just like the real stock market Stadium Stock Exchange allows you to buy and sell teams at any point during the season. As other users make decisions on buying and selling shares of the teams, those decisions will impact the price of your investments. If a lot of people decide to buy the price will move up and likewise drop if users dump that team. The goal is to find teams that are under valued: projected to win fewer games than you think they will. Buy that team and watch the share price zoom upwards as the wins keep coming. If you find a team you think is valued too highly you can short the stock just like on the real stock market so you are betting on the price being lower at the end of the season than at the time you put in the short order. The goal is simple. He who has the most money at the end wins. Carefully build your portfolio through wise investment and receive a big payoff at the end. If you are a big college football fan, I think Stadium Stock Exchange clearly offers a different and interesting approach to fantasy football.
Now you can score big with Big Play Scoring
The NFL season started Thursday night in Seattle and if you missed out on a chance to play fantasy football, Big Play Scoring offers a second chance. The free universal app requires iOS 7.0 and provides a different type of fantasy game using NFL teams rather than individual players. You will be selecting separate offensive, defensive, and special team units for each game day. So with games on Thursday, you will select units from the two teams playing that night and then different units for the Sunday games and additional units from the Monday night teams. Once you register using your email and a password, or your Facebook login, you will be asked to choose your favorite team and then a default set of units. Your favorite team earns you bonus point with every win while the three you choose will be used if for some reason you cannot or fail to make picks each week. One of the features of this fantasy game is that you can play all season or just one week at a time. Big Play Scoring provides users with the chance to join a Global league or set one up with friends, families and co-workers. After you select your units each week, the app rewards you with points based on the play of each unit. This is where the app gets its name. Unlike most fantasy games that have scoring for yards gained, passes completed, etc. Big Play Scoring rewards big plays. For your offensive unit, you only get points for touchdowns, 2-point conversions, gains of 40 yards or more, touchdown of 50+ yards, and 4th down conversions. You lose points for negative plays such as sacks, interceptions, and fumbles lost. Defensively similar point values are awarded. Your unit gains points for sacks, intentional grounding, safeties, 3 and outs, fumble recovery returned to the Red Zone or for a touchdown, interceptions, and defensive stops in the Red Zone and lose points for touchdowns and long running or passing plays. A good showing by your special teams selections will net points with long kick returns, blocked kicks, field goals, and successful onside kicks. All the plays by the three units receive 1-3 points and likewise negative plays result in the loss of 1-3 points. According to the developer, total points will be reflective of actual game outcomes more than 99% of the time. I am not a big fantasy player. I believe it takes too much time to really do it correctly with lots of studying of game match ups, checking on injuries and tracking other players who might be available. However Big Play Scoring provides a chance for those of us not inclined to play normal fantasy football to get involved and have something at play as we watch all the NFL games each weekend.
Manning or Brady? Peterson or McCoy? You decide with the new NFL app
Millions of Americans anxiously await September 4th. That's when the National Football League kicks off its 2014 schedule and begins a four-month journey of joy and anguish for Fantasy Football players. So now is the time to prepare and get ready for the months ahead. The NFL has launched the latest version of its NFL Fantasy Football-Official NFL.com Fantasy Football App which is a free download for both the iPhone and iPad. It requires iOS version 7. This latest version offers lots of player information, statistics, injury reports, trends, and analysis. In addition, new features include Game Center where you can view in-season matchups, and a quick place to find NFL scores and information on any additional leagues where you are participating. Two other new features show up in this version, a 24/7 Draft Lobby that allows you to join and draft whenever you want and 24/7 Mock Drafts to provide you with the chance to practice your draft strategy. I found that setting up a new league and entering my team were easily accomplished using the app on my iPhone, however you are not allowed to edit the league settings from the app. For that you have to go to the NFL fantasy web page, find your team, and then make changes in the league settings such as rosters, scoring, trades, waivers, etc. According to the site's support staff, more management tools will be added to the app in the coming months. Once you sign up and register your team, NFL.com sends you an email with a link to your league's web page where the settings are easily changed. Once you have set up the league, it's time to get others to join you and hold your player draft. The app supports live standard draft and auction drafts. In the auction drafts team managers have a set amount of money and bid on specific players in each round. Additionally, the app allows for Autopick drafts. Each team manager can preset his or her rankings of players and the website will pick players for that team based on those rankings. The app allows you to use a variety of social media sites to send out invitations and updates including Yahoo!, Facebook, Google, Twitter, and others. So there should not be any problem keeping team managers informed and up to date. The NFL app is just one of many similar fantasy football management apps. Others include Yahoo, ESPN, Rotowire, Footballguys, and CBS. The Rotowire and Footballguys apps cost US$4.99 while the others are free. All offer similar information and features including drafting choices, player stats and projections, injury updates, and the opportunity to set up your own league or join others. So if you already are part of a fantasy league you can check out the NFL.com Fantasy Football app to see if it's better than what your league currently uses or if new to the fantasy football world download the app and get started. Remember just two weeks to go before the season begins.
ESPN coming to Xbox One, NFL.com fantasy football on Xbox 360 now
ESPN on Xbox Live was Microsoft's first network partner on the Xbox 360 back in 2010 and the network has signed a new deal to stream content on the Xbox One. ESPN.com clips, ESPN 3 live content and everything streamed through WatchESPN, which requires a cable-authenticated package, are all presented in the app. "Sports fans know what they like. We're just trying to give them better ways to access that content in a more quickly and more user-friendly format," David Jurenka, Director of Sports at Xbox Entertainment Studios, says. Within the app, users can create a specific channel for their favorite team, and the app will even pull in their personalized data from ESPN's ScoreCenter app. In addition to ESPN, Microsoft's new partnership with the NFL has spurned development of an NFL app for Xbox One – with NFL Network content, including Thursday Night Football and NFL Red Zone – and a fantasy football app for Xbox 360. The latter app, which allows players to log into their NFL.com fantasy teams and do just about everything they could on a computer or smartphone, should be available today. Users can adjust their lineups and watch NFL.com highlights through their Xbox 360 console. The NFL app is also coming to Xbox One in November.
NFL adds Google+ Hangouts to fantasy football leagues for extra-personal trash talking
So your fantasy football team just clinched its spot in the virtual Super Bowl. There's now a better way to rub it in everyone's noses than snarky message board posts: Google has just teamed with the NFL to integrate Google+ Hangouts across the league's fantasy football pages. The multi-person video chat is now just a step away, whether you're trading players or checking the latest results. Google is even bending the rules slightly to allow for a full league's dozen players in one session, instead of the usual 10, and will help host talks between commentators and league participants. Hangouts at the NFL pages are already up and running -- that gives us just enough weeks to hem and haw over linebacker choices before the real NFL's schedule gets going.
Trickster Online and Pangya United want to send you to Las Vegas
SG Interactive wants to send you to Las Vegas, and all you have to do to qualify is play one of the company's MMORPGs. A new press release spills the beans, and entering the contest is as easy as completing a couple of in-game events. Said events are happening in Trickster Online and Pangya United, and one winner from each title will take home a prize pack that includes airfare, hotel accommodations, and tickets to attend the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show. What's the skinny on the events themselves? First up is The Pirates of Pangya Island contest. The pirate queen Kooh is challenging players to collect gold coins hidden at the 18th hole of each Pangya Island course. All you have to do is collect one coin and you'll automatically be entered into the Las Vegas trip contest. The Pangya event ends on September 21st, and the winner will be announced on the 22nd. Entering the Trickster Online contest is even easier. Rack up 100 hours of game time by September 28th and you'll be eligible to win. The victor will be announced on October 5th. [Source: SG Interactive press release]
Bill Roper reflects on Hellgate
How exactly does a well-funded studio composed of Blizzard veterans end up creating one of the more spectacular failures in recent gaming history? That's a question that Gamasutra attempts to answer in a new interview with former Flagship (and Cryptic) CEO Bill Roper. The debacle that was Hellgate: London stemmed mainly from over-ambition, Roper says, coupled with the lack of capital necessary to support the don't-release-til-it's-ready mentality that much of the staff experienced at Blizzard. "There was always the support there [at Blizzard] to say, 'You know what? If that's what you need to make this game great, then that's what we'll get for you. We'll figure it out.' It's obviously very different when you are an independent company, right, and not owned by somebody." The interview also touches on Flagship's involvement with Mythos as well as Roper's experiences dealing with the Hellgate fallout and extensive (and often personal) fan backlash. "It went from 'I didn't like your game' or 'I don't think your company makes good games' to the personal assault level," he says.
Rallycast promises "the equivalent to tabbed browsing" on HDTVs, hopefully doesn't mean memory leaks and crashes
After hitting CES with a bang, it's been a quiet year for the TV widgets movement, but Rallycast isn't giving up, going from app developer to announcing its own TV App Store for 2010. The company's CEO Jeff Allen calls its plans to allows multiple programs running at once similar to tabbed browsing on the PC. Not having to pick and choose what's running is great, but while we love our Firefox, its never ending performance issues and the already poor reputation of speed on widget televisions could be a slow, scary mix. Hopefully a year of development (and maybe some newer HDTVs at CES?) can improve performance, because the last thing we want is lag when it comes to updating fantasy football rosters, deleting that note Mom left on our Facebook page, or both. Samsung's LED TVs will support the new store, as well as "several other models" check the full PR after the break.
Sportacular updated for (fantasy) football
I only follow a few sports teams, but for the teams I do follow, Sportacular (that's the iTunes link for the free version, and here's the paid version, sans ads) is definitely my app of choice. For nearly every professional sport you can think of, the app will track scores, plays, schedules, standings, and anything else you need to know about everything from NFL to college football to the English Premier League and the PGA. Right after iPhone OS 3.0 came out, the developer added in push notifications, and now I've got push updates coming whenever the Cubs have a game starting and ending (or at least, when they did -- there's always next year) and whenever a Bears quarter ends. Sportacular even has a few social features happening -- you can make picks and discuss each game with other fans using your Facebook login, as well as read news and updates about each team in the games you check out.The app was updated to version 1.6 last night, and the new features include better game pages for NFL and NCAA football, and option to manage and track your fantasy football team in conjunction with their fantasy football app on Facebook. The one bummer I have is that they don't have actual media of the games -- for that, you'll probably have to go for an official app. But especially as a free download (the ads are definitely non-intrusive), Sportacular is really impressive with everything it does to help you track your favorite sports and teams.
Blood Bowl trailer everything but a blood bath
We haven't seen any gameplay of Blood Bowl yet, and, sadly, this trailer is no different. It does provide us with a taste of the color commentary that will frame the many conflicts taking place in the soon-to-be-bloody bowls, though. There's even a brief look at the many different races and squads that will take to the field in this most literal fantasy football title. In terms of quantity, it looks like the amount of teams will be somewhere between a lot and a whole freakin' lot.
XBLA: Double D Dodgeball, Coffeetime Crosswords & Live Draft Tracker
It looks like we were in for a surprise on the Xbox Live Arcade after all. Available now for download are three new Arcade titles -- well, two and a half.First up is Coffeetime Crosswords, a crossword puzzle game with over 150 puzzles. Coffeetime Crosswords features a co-op mode for up to 2 players (local only) to work together to solve difficult puzzles. Coffeetime Crosswords is another stellar Konami release, weighs in at 42MB and is priced at 800MS points.Double D Dodgeball from Yukes is a dodgeball game (Sup, powers of deduction?). Featuring up to 4 players locally or 8 players online, D-triple is described as a retro-style dodgeball game. The tiny 17MB download is also priced at 800MS points. Originally D-triple was scheduled to hit the XBLA on July 30, so either it was pushed forward, released by accident or something secret was supposed to release but was postponed.Lastly is the EA Fantasy Football Live Draft Tracker, which isn't exactly an Arcade game, per se. The Tracker acts as the middle man between EA's online fantasy leagues. Using the tracker commissioners who host league drafts offline and in-person can import your fantasy league settings. Once settings are established, players can select their picks with the tool and then upload completed drafts to their online accounts on EA's Fantasy Sports website. The tracker is priced at 400MS points.
Blood Bowl trailer channels Madden + Warcraft
Tabletop gamers are no strangers to the game Blood Bowl, which we mentioned back in November. The game has spanned 22 years, multiple editions and several expansion sets. The basic concept is "fantasy" football, literally. As in orcs, trolls, elves and the like playing an organized team sport where they try to tear their opponents' heads off. Check out the newly released, Warcraft-tastic trailer after the break.
EA Sports wants to make your fantasy (football) come true
Electronic Arts is dogpiling new features onto their Fantasy Football service in an effort to get people to migrate from the siren-like call of other fantasy football sites, including the ever-popular (and free) one at Yahoo. EA has created both a free fantasy football website as well as downloadable applications for both Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network that will be available for an as yet-unannounced fee. Both services will give you the ability to manage your fantasy teams and track stats through the extremely long-named EA SPORTS Fantasy Football Live Score Tracker application.However, what really caught our eye in the press release was this: "The fantasy scores can be viewed in two ways: full screen mode with complete rosters and details or picture-in-picture mode which allows gamers to keep an eye on scoring updates while watching live football action." Is EA magically adding live television to our consoles? If so, thank you, wonderful elves! We've contacted EA about this and will pass (get it?) an update once we have it. Oh, you'll also be able to import your fantasy team into Madden NFL 09 and pit them against other players. Finally, we'll have fantasy fantasy football.%Gallery-25266%
Fantasy soap opera league launched
SoapNet has launched Fantasy Soap League, an online game modeled on fantasy football. Instead of charting a QB's passing yards or a kicker's field goals, the Soap League tracks soap characters' "soap moments." If characters on your team of six get slapped, take off clothing, wake up from a coma, or participate in other soap staples, you score points. For $10, the site tracks progress over ten weeks.The game seems like a cool idea for soap opera fans; we hope that it gets applied to other TV shows. For example, instead of critical game bombs like Survivor, which failed to simulate island life, designers (and marketers) could have built a game rewarding viewers' predictions. Sure, this type of game would have a narrow audience, but the style could be popular with fans.
