Is Madden's Gameflow a Revolution or a Gimmick?

[BezO]

My vote: Neither

It's just half baked at this point. And it's based on playbooks that need lots of work, especially on defense.

It doesn't seem to account for end of the game situations too well. I was beating the CPU by 20 and they were still running on every 1st down, but then they would no-huddle on 2nd. My team was still passing. I heard it starts to consider the score at 2:00 in the 4th, but that's too late a lot of times.

It also doesn't seem to account for personnel/formation. Base defense vs 3/4/5 WRs is too common.

No formation subs is also a problem.

But the playbooks are the main problem. Many teams run only a few running plays. Indy is a good example. I'd be surprised if they use more than 4 running plays. They just run them from different formations. Madden needs to duplicate plays in different formations. For example, almost every 2-back running play should be in every 2-back formation. I shouldn't have to search through different I-formations for an off-tackle.

And defense... unless they can increase the number of "plays" 10 fold, which they can't, they have to consider tiering the play calling. The pre-packaged "plays" are not cutting it. There are just not enough stunt/blitz/coverage combinations to account for the most basic of defenses let alone teams like the Ravens & Eagles.

[TarHeelPhenom]

IMO Gameplanning and Gameflow go hand in hand. Without Gameplanning then to me Gameflow is of no use to me. I'm loving both features TOGETHER. I love the fact that I can go in and gameplan down and distance and then leave it up to the "OC" to call the plays. Like someone else said, you can easily go in and get rid of those horrible plays that the "OC" may call during certain points and down and distances during the game. I'm still tweaking my gameplan after each game. Playing my best friend with the Redskins against his Cowboys, I was eating him up with the run. I loved how my "OC" stuck to the plan and kept calling the run while sprinkling in some play-action. Ultimately, if you don't like a certain call, you can audible out or you can even stop gameflow and call your own plays. I love it!

[maddenps2]

Nope, not revolutionary at all, Nfl2k5 had the VIP system, 5 years ago, on inferior hardware.

[kennyacid]

gimmick..the time could have went else where.

[DirtyJerz32]

Could be rev or a gimmick. I think it's to early to tell.

I for one like it. I think if you set up the game plan correctly it could be very helpful. I know people like picking there own plays but, what I think people are forgetting is that those are the plays you picked.

I'm using it on offense only and I love it. I haven't set up a plan for my D yet so I still pick the plays but, I think once I do I'll never go back to picking plays again.

[sportsgeist]

Gameflow is nice but it doesn't always call the right play in some situations. I wouldn't call it a revolution or gimmick.

The only revolution play calling had in years was when you could call your plays on the VMUs playing 2K on the Dreamcast. You could call your plays w/o your opponent seeing them on-screen.

[FedExPope]

Its nothing more than an even more automatic Ask Madden. And when I used it in the demo, it stunk, giving me All Streaks way too often. The IGN review mentions it will call this stupid play inside the redzone at times as well, and too often in general. Even when setting up the gameplan the way they wanted.

[Spongedaddy]

Quote: Originally Posted by BezO

My vote: Neither It's just half baked at this point. And it's based on playbooks that need lots of work, especially on defense. It doesn't seem to account for end of the game situations too well. I was beating the CPU by 20 and they were still running on every 1st down, but then they would no-huddle on 2nd. My team was still passing. I heard it starts to consider the score at 2:00 in the 4th, but that's too late a lot of times. It also doesn't seem to account for personnel/formation. Base defense vs 3/4/5 WRs is too common. No formation subs is also a problem. But the playbooks are the main problem. Many teams run only a few running plays. Indy is a good example. I'd be surprised if they use more than 4 running plays. They just run them from different formations. Madden needs to duplicate plays in different formations. For example, almost every 2-back running play should be in every 2-back formation. I shouldn't have to search through different I-formations for an off-tackle. And defense... unless they can increase the number of "plays" 10 fold, which they can't, they have to consider tiering the play calling. The pre-packaged "plays" are not cutting it. There are just not enough stunt/blitz/coverage combinations to account for the most basic of defenses let alone teams like the Ravens & Eagles.

I agree with one caveat. When the casual player runs into a serious cheeser/jerk online..someone who fakes every field goal, etc. they will get frustrated with the experience and Gameflow wont help them much since it doesn't seem to adopt so well. I think they need to do an overhaul to the matchmaking system and online play to help steer the more casual sports gamer into situations where they can have fun online.