John Madden Rips Into Developers Early in Development, Didn't Like 7 on 7 (NSFW)

[Steve_OS]

I'm not sure how big of an impact John Madden has on the Madden series nowadays, but he sure did have an impact early in the development process when Trip Hawkins was still there.

Check out what he said to the developers when he was shown an early version of the game. Quotes were found in the book http://www.amazon.com/All-Your-Base-...=operasport-20 by Harold Goldberg.

Quote:

"In a chapter detailing how Trip Hawkins started Electronic Arts, it mentions that Trip dreamed of making high art that would have players crying. At some point that took a back seat to EA’s true calling: being the biggest sports game maker in the world. Early on the company paid big money to sports legends to give authenticity to their games, and when Trip decided to make the definitive football game, he enlisted legendary Oakland Raiders coach and commercial pitchman John Madden to be the (giant) face of the game. When the developers showed Madden an early version of the game that could only display seven players per team, John wasn’t shy about sharing what he thought. “**** that and **** you people. Either we do it ****in’ right or we don’t ****in’ do it at all.” The team was pretty shocked to hear him saying things he’d normally keep confined to the locker room, but it ultimately pushed the team to get their football game as close to perfect as possible. They toiled for years, even as some in the company wanted to cancel the seemingly unending project, and when it finally did launch it created a dynasty that will probably exist as long as people throw footballs and the NFL gives exclusive contracts."

Source - Harold Goldberg's book is filled with game development anecdotes worth sharing (Gamesradar)

[PantherBeast_OS]

Man you got to love John Madden and the way he got things done back then. I don't blame Madden one bit for using that kind of language back then to get the Madden crew to make his game close to been real as possible. John said if his name was going to be on the cover of a game like this. Then the game should feel and play close to real football as it can. Good for John for he said back then. Maybe John needs to do it again for todays crew to get them really moving like they did back then.

[rspencer86]

That is an interesting story... might have to pick up that book.

[videlsports]

I'm glad he did that.. Just like the other posters says it's time for him todoit again.

[Philliezfinest]

He need to give dat speech again lol

[wildinkc]

This is a great book to read. I just finished it a couple of week ago. Very informative of the gaming industry. It was pretty cool reading about how the game developing company's were in the 80's like how I think it was Atari who worked out of an old skating rink. It was really cool. I could not put this book down.

[wildinkc]

oops I mean I could not put my kindle down.

[CKA15]

Quote: Originally Posted by Philliezfinest

He need to give dat speech again lol

He really does