Madden NFL 10 Impressions (Pasta Padre)

[GTheorenHobbes]

Quote: Originally Posted by adembroski

Actually, Pasta was quite hard on M09, especially for robo-QB.

That's just not true, Adem. Pasta is basically an EA/Tiburon employee at this point, and will almost NEVER say anything negative about a major EA game, especially Madden. Let's look back at some of what he had to say about Madden 09 during his early Hands-On, shall we:

http://www.pastapadre.com/2644/madde...ands-on-report

"As I mentioned as the blog began I have a completely different feeling about the game this year compared to how I felt last year. That is accented even more by how it is still a few months to go until release. Outside of a few bugs, which were reported to the producers and some already having been fixed by the time we left the studio, it felt like a game that was prepared for release.

Originally I didn’t want to be too enthusiastic considering how my thoughts could’ve changed as the day progressed. However I left with the same general feeling as I began with. Last year, playing the actual release copies, I quickly identified the fumbles, poor o-line blocking, and overpowered kicking as issues that would be relatively serious. However with 09 I didn’t come across any of those type of things. Instead I passed along some feedback on minor areas along the lines of reducing the camera flashes and adding return plays with a single returner deep."

Now, we all know that Madden 09 ended up having more than just a few "minor" issues. Notice, nowhere in his 09 or 10 previews does Pasta mention anything about the lack of camera angles (especially compared to other next gen sports games), the lack of in-game saves (just a terrible, terrible omission), or last year, Robo QB.

Some more from his preview last year:

"The presentation really enhances the experience and isn’t just thrown on the top. The replays are well integrated, things are easy to access on the play call screen, and the commentary is quite good (especially Chris Collinsworth)."

"Online leagues were talked about quite a bit, much of which was already known, but if you have questions I can probably answer most of them. They really wanted to focus and get the base right so they could expand on it over the coming years. Some other things they are working towards are spectator mode and possibly saving/reconnecting into online games that were interrupted (which would eventually grown out of the in-game saves feature they will have next year). Those might not be next year but they are things that they would like to add in down the line."

If Online Leagues were talked about quite a bit, then why wasn't anything said about the bogus (i.e., non-real) schedules that were being used? And spectator mode? Where's that??

I appreciate Pasta's website, because he does come through with a lot of pre-release videos. But I take anything he says about EA's games with a HUGE grain of salt.

[countryboy]

Quote: Originally Posted by ChaseB

True story: I saw Pasta accept money directly from several EA developers during E3....This story and more coming up on the 11 o'clock OS Report.

LMFAO!!!

[Moegames]

Quote: Originally Posted by adembroski

Nice thing is, it's something they built in a way to tune it very easily, so I expect we'll see improvements. It was happening WAY too much at CD, so it's sort of a matter of finding the happy medium between then and now.

Remember the vast improvement the guy from IGN saw from two builds that were two weeks apart...thats a good sign that things can quickly be tweaked. Im referring to the IGN E3 madden preview article at ign

[edaddy]

Quote: Originally Posted by GTheorenHobbes

That's just not true, Adem. Pasta is basically an EA/Tiburon employee at this point, and will almost NEVER say anything negative about a major EA game, especially Madden. Let's look back at some of what he had to say about Madden 09 during his early Hands-On, shall we: http://www.pastapadre.com/2644/madde...ands-on-report "As I mentioned as the blog began I have a completely different feeling about the game this year compared to how I felt last year. That is accented even more by how it is still a few months to go until release. Outside of a few bugs, which were reported to the producers and some already having been fixed by the time we left the studio, it felt like a game that was prepared for release. Originally I didn’t want to be too enthusiastic considering how my thoughts could’ve changed as the day progressed. However I left with the same general feeling as I began with. Last year, playing the actual release copies, I quickly identified the fumbles, poor o-line blocking, and overpowered kicking as issues that would be relatively serious. However with 09 I didn’t come across any of those type of things. Instead I passed along some feedback on minor areas along the lines of reducing the camera flashes and adding return plays with a single returner deep." Now, we all know that Madden 09 ended up having more than just a few "minor" issues. Notice, nowhere in his 09 or 10 previews does Pasta mention anything about the lack of camera angles (especially compared to other next gen sports games), the lack of in-game saves (just a terrible, terrible omission), or last year, Robo QB. Some more from his preview last year: "The presentation really enhances the experience and isn’t just thrown on the top. The replays are well integrated, things are easy to access on the play call screen, and the commentary is quite good (especially Chris Collinsworth)." "Online leagues were talked about quite a bit, much of which was already known, but if you have questions I can probably answer most of them. They really wanted to focus and get the base right so they could expand on it over the coming years. Some other things they are working towards are spectator mode and possibly saving/reconnecting into online games that were interrupted (which would eventually grown out of the in-game saves feature they will have next year). Those might not be next year but they are things that they would like to add in down the line." If Online Leagues were talked about quite a bit, then why wasn't anything said about the bogus (i.e., non-real) schedules that were being used? And spectator mode? Where's that?? I appreciate Pasta's website, because he does come through with a lot of pre-release videos. But I take anything he says about EA's games with a HUGE grain of salt.

Excellent post and I agree with you Pasta has been called out about this very thing on several occassions..at least on this site..I think it goes without saying that alot of people take Pasta's reviews about EA's game with a grain of salt..I do think to some extent that in order to be invited to some of these events you have to be pro-EA to some extent...

[Brandwin]

Thanks for the impressions, Pasta.

[FOREST007]

Quote: Originally Posted by edaddy

Excellent post and I agree with you Pasta has been called out about this very thing on several occassions..at least on this site..I think it goes without saying that alot of people take Pasta's reviews about EA's game with a grain of salt..I do think to some extent that in order to be invited to some of these events you have to be pro-EA to some extent...

im pro-ea, by choice and by force. i love football, and only ea makes licensed pro nfl football games...end of story, end of discussion

[Exonerated]

What was wrong with Pasta's comment about Madden 09?

He didn't seem overly excited about it. But you don't expect him to completely slander and destroy Madden, like faceless anonymous members (who have no accountability) do.

He said it like it was.

In my PERSONAL OPINION, in-game saves, multiple camera angles, spectator mode are absolutely useless. And I think Pasta didn't give much thought to these things.

And he said ONline league was just a base. He didn't hype it up.

[JMD]

Quote: Originally Posted by splff3000

Wow! So anyone can just come along and randomly join a franchise. This is getting worse by the minute I can't wait until Ian opens up for discussion. I'd be interested in knowing what some of there thought processes were for doing some of the things they did.

Yeah this bothered me as well:

"Unlike Online Dynasty in NCAA Football which requires an invite there will be the ability to join random Online Franchises in Madden. Given this news I’m not sure it wouldn’t be better to have them be solely invite based like NCAA."

I don't want any glitching cheeseballs joining my OLF.