My Thoughts on Madden and how to fix it : Part 1 - 24's Blog

24's Blog

My Thoughts on Madden and how to fix it : Part 1

Posted on September 3, 2010 at 03:35 AM.

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Madden. You don't even have to be a gamer or a Football fan to know what this stands for. As it is possibly one of the most successful Video Game franchises ever. Successful does not mean consumers are happy with the game it means that due to the sheer presence people buy it expecting more year after year. I fall into the Category of not being happy with Madden. I am not saying EA is not producing a good product I am stating though that i am not happy with said product. Truthfully the last madden product i was satisfied with was Madden 2005. 2005 I consider to be the Golden year of sports video games due to the fact that many games (especially football) were amazing. So good that many still play that certain title made by 2k sports (i will not mention its name for legal purposes

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But anyhow even though i doubt anyone from the Madden Team is reading this i would like to present my suggestions on making Madden a better game.

1. Break it down to the core and build it up again.

You heard me. Gameplay rebuilt from the ground up. It is better starting all over again with a clean slate than to try and repair the unrepairable. If it takes more than a year i am fine with that personally but start fresh and anew by taking bit's and pieces from other games and blending it with your own creativity. I mean this for virtually everything.

Starting with game play the first thing i would do is scrap the entire running system. When i am playing and i break off a run with Chris Johnson or AP it literally feels like i am gliding on skates. Madden 2004 had one of the best running engines i have ever seen in a football video game in terms of feeling realistic to me. It was Simple yet gave you the feel of a real NFL running back breaking off tackles, hurdling over defenders and getting into the open field. to me it truly felt that i was in control of the runner.

Continuing with the running mechanics i would scrap the highlight stick and revert back to the truck stick. I thought it was the greatest creation in 06 just a simple flick of the stick upwards for a shoulder charge and a push of the stick back to stop running and make the defender fall flat on his face. I don't find it enjoyable having jukes on the analog stick because to me it makes it to easy. When juking used to be assigned to the L1 and RI triggers (for the ps2 anyway) i felt that it was more realistic because it made you have to make more of a split second decision. I am pretty sure that in the NFL sometimes Backs don't have the chance to make that juke and that's exactly what the old running system presented to me, a feel of realism towards the game.

Next to the passing game. While many hated the QB vision cone i believe that if done correctly it could have been a giant success. In real life there is always that one receiver that is usually planned to be the beneficiary of the passing play. The QB essentially locks on to that receiver from the get-go and if that receiver is covered moves on to the next most viable option. With proper tweaking it could develop into something special.

In terms of defense get rid of Pro-tak and just convert back to the old hit stick. Pro-tak I find a bit gimmicky. I find many times that these "Pro-tak" plays are useless as the running back amazingly breaks through about 10 defenders. I understand you want the realism of Chain tackles but i really don't find it acceptable when you see something like that happening i take a semi-realistic hit stick over Tim Tebow plowing through defenders like he is some mutant gazelle like creature. Keep it simple because in the end it will feel more realistic.

As I end part one of this blog. I would like to leave all readers with this quote. "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" : Leonardo DaVinci. To me that means that keeping things simple makes them the most worthwhile. thanks for reading and I bid you farewell until part 2
-James

Comments

# 1 jugganott @ Sep 3

Interesting read....but I doubt seriously EA is even in that area of thinking.

# 2 Beastly Wayz @ Sep 3

Thank you, now I hope EA may read your BLOG,

- Yeah right, that would be to hard for them. Madden neads work, every year the product gets ****tier and ****tier

# 3 eyeknowzz @ Sep 3

Nice blog. I agree with you although EA is likely to keep Madden as is. This is my third year in a row without purchasing Madden. I'll continue to boycott until I see some REAL improvements in the game.