Madden NFL 15 Gameplay Video - Seahawks vs. 49ers (SimFBallCritic)

[carnalnirvana]

at this point the fact the 49ers had a 3rd and 18 and didnt call a 4verts or screen is enough for me to rent this game....

thats my biggest problem with madden now, the cpu needs to call a better game to beat me, they can hold me to 17 but i can hold then to 10... and its not my stick skillz, its the cpu cant convert anything over 9yds on 3r down... thay call that stupid 4verts or screens that i know is coming and can stop EVERYTIME...

THE CPU literally goes 2 for 15 on 3rd down against me most games...

at this point the animations and movement/ presentation is what it is but playcalling for the love of god just let the cpu mix it up on 3rd down....

only in the madden universe is 4verts or a screen a high% play...

[Cowboy008]

Were the Seahawks and 49ers the only teams they had available in the alpha? The video looks decent I like the things that they are trying to do.

[SA1NT401]

Meh... Still more missing than included. On next gen, madden still looks so far behind.

Hype Meter 3/10. We will see come August. But I firmly expect all of the same issues we have had.


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[BlackBetty15]

Well...unless he stinks at playing football I believe we got our first glimpse of all pro difficulty! LOL

[SageInfinite]

Quote: Originally Posted by Cowboy008

Were the Seahawks and 49ers the only teams they had available in the alpha? The video looks decent I like the things that they are trying to do.

On some of the off camera footage I saw some other teams(definitely saw the chiefs), but the direct feed footage it's only been Hawks 49ers. Which is why my conspiracy theory is this footage isn't from E3, lol.

[Mr.Smif]

When you have to preface it with saying you have to play the game to experience the difference I cracked up laughing. The canned animations is killing the game, when a tackle animation starts surrounding defenders just stop playing when they should attempt to help out on the tackle, the user controlling the game can just stop playing too once a tackle animation starts they play is over. The on field presentation is nice though.

[GiantBlue76]

The very first thing that comes to mind for me is the player movement. It's so fast! Everything happens way to fast and twitchy. It's absolutely KILLING this game. The other issue I see that pops out is the lack of gang tackling. You will never see more than one defender "wrap up". Also, why are the players always hunched over? You see Zach Miller in the flat, the ball is thrown and when he catches it, he's hunched over and standing still like a zombie. Another problem I see is that I still don't see the pocket being pushed. None of the cpu players on the 49ers moved the pocket. This is why pocket passing in Madden still feels like a crap shoot. There is no sense of the pocket collapsing. It's still binary. Either you will have all day, or your lineman will get instantly beat and you get clobbered. This is a legacy issue for 10 years and despite the line play being rewritten with all of their fancy buzzwords, it's still a problem.

Some of the solo tackles look a lot better, but I've seen every animation 100 times already. Some even repeat in the small amount of footage shown. It's still scripted, as you hit a guy and magically he spins and falls forwards for 4 yards even though it doesn't fit the context of the hit.

Not having interaction between defenders and receivers is a killer. Everyone talks about WR/DB interaction, but it's more than that. Anyone in coverage should be interacting with anyone out on a route. When receivers run through zones, I want to see them being passed off or carried. Give a guy a shove, hand check, something. Make it look like they are alive. Penalties may end up resulting from these types of things.

Positives:

I liked the double team block on the Seahawks DT where he went down to one knee and got back up.

Most of the time, the line play looks pretty good.

Wrap up tackle was nice.

Graphics are incredible.

This game is a MASSIVE improvement over what we had on the 360. What we are seeing right now, sans graphics, is what we should have gotten in 2006. (Arguing that it should have been even earlier is a fair case as well). Basically, this all depends on how you are willing to look at things. From a gameplay only standpoint. If you are someone who is willing to basically say that the last 10 years were a complete waste and should be thrown in the trash, then the game will look better to you because you are viewing this as version 2 of Madden instead of version 26. If you are someone who is not willing to give them a mulligan for 10 years of disastrous football, then you probably think this is all very average. The issue I have is that if you take away the great graphics, nothing here works better, and in many cases, even as well as 10 year old games on far lesser hardware. There is more to a sports game than graphics. AI, interaction and movement and of course off the field all are big pieces.

Overall, the potential for an excellent playing football game does exist here. There is still a large list of things to go before that happens, and it is not going to be done by the time 16 or even 17 comes out. Adding a small number of fundamentals to the game each year takes too long. We will be mid way through this gen before we have a game that at least contains the basic elements of gameplay that we once had. That being said, if they follow through on their word and fix their difficulties with implementation and programming, they could really have something to finally be proud of.

[jpdavis82]

Quote: Originally Posted by Mr.Smif

When you have to preface it with saying you have to play the game to experience the difference I cracked up laughing. The canned animations is killing the game, when a tackle animation starts surrounding defenders just stop playing when they should attempt to help out on the tackle, the user controlling the game can just stop playing too once a tackle animation starts they play is over. The on field presentation is nice though.

I'm really not sure why people are surprised that he's saying you have to play the game to notice the difference. It was just last year where people were saying Madden 25 next gen looked exactly like current gen and then after the game came out people were like oh ok I see the difference now, it's an improvement, a step in the right direction. 15 is another jump in that same way, 16 will probably be a bigger jump(more dev cycle time) and IMO the game where things will come together for most people to truly understand the shift that's happening. Rex said last year that he compares it to turning around an aircraft carrier, it was also said that 25 was the first year of the "3 year plan". 15 is the second, if 16 isn't that game we've been wanting all along, then we should probably write this team off. Until then, people are just jumping to conclusions based on the past.

As far as why we are only seeing Seattle and SF, it's because those were the only two teams that EA was finished working on with player models, faces, equipment, etc...as of E3.

I do believe the Seahawks have the "new" Nike shoes that we saw a pic of back in Madden 13 blog.