While I was in Los Angeles, I received an email from Brittany Sauser, a reporter from Technology Review magazine. She was working on an article that focused on NCAA Football’s new Weather Channel feature. I answered a few questions and today, the article was published online. Her article is below and it continues after the jump. Thanks Brittany, we appreciate it!

It’s a typical day in L.A.–75 degrees, clear sky, calm winds, no precipitation in sight–as the University of Southern California Trojans football team takes the field. It’s a great day to play football, in real life or with Electronic Arts’s (EA) newest online sports game, NCAA Football 2008. Scheduled to be released on July 17, the game has an entirely new feature: live weather data, played out on the field. Now when you sit down to play, you will get up-to-the-minute weather conditions for the location where you choose to play.

“If you are playing in a cold-weather stadium, you are going to realize it, whether it’s through the snow on the field or seeing the breath of players,” says Ryan Balke, the editor of Sportable.com, a sports news site. Balke previewed the title at EA Sports Tiburon Studios in Orlando, FL, last month. He says it was an incredible experience. “Football is a game that’s played in some brutal elements, and this new feature is a nice way to bring that realism into the game and take online gaming to a more realistic level.”

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