Where Football Games Should be in 2011

[dcal]

Physics - canned animations for player interaction just has to go. The technology is there. I dont think we will see it until the new round of consoles though.

[misterkrabz]

Quote: Originally Posted by tazdevil20

The list of things that are missing from Madden is far too large to list here. However, I see the biggest problem being the development team who works on the game. They don't acknowledge the problems and lack the ability to fix them or improve on them. There is very little vision from them, and they also have an arrogance about them that will prevent them from achieving true success. Even with an exclusive license, a better, more talented development team would be able to reach new heights. Sorry, but it's the truth. 7 years is plenty long enough to have nailed this game beyond recognition. Instead it's gone backwards in those 7 years. It's downright embarrassing in my opinion. It's not really worth discussing though, because EA will never relinquish that license nor will the NFL. Each year we will be left with another lackluster effort missing the boat on the key elements of football and will have zero innovation. 2k and Sony will continue to embarrass the developers at Tiburon and they developers at Tiburon will continue to make excuses as to why something CAN'T be done as opposed to believing that things CAN be done.

The people behind madden suck...that includes management and the people who actually do the work. They have destroyed video game football. I miss the good old days of knowing there were 4 or 5 different football games coming out. Now there's only one and it sucks every year. Such a shame.

[RogueHominid]

Never thought I'd be saying this, but this year's game is almost exactly where I want my football game to be.

Once you figure out what can be done with sliders, coaching schemes, run/pass ratios, and positional priorities within franchise mode, you will see:
-incredibly realistic OL/DL animations (including the elusive edge rush without the patty-cake animations)
-a wide variety of positional player types (corners who hit, corners who don't)
-adaptive AI (the CPU will adjust to the gameplan that you set prior to the game)
-you can even fix WR/DB interaction and get WR to position for the ball better

There's more too, but that's just off the top of my head.

There's already a great pre-season UFDA system and a really dynamic offline mode thanks to DPP and player roles.

I for one don't want to press three buttons and wag a stick to throw the ball. I'm fine with button-based passing that's truly pressure sensitive and that combines well with directional passing.

I would like for QB awareness to be better reflected, but not by a vision cone. I'd rather see a play develop where only the first two reads are visible as icons, and the rest of the route runners are blank, for example, if a guy has poor awareness. He could also perhaps misread routes and sail an out route when the WR was running an in. Stuff like that.

I'd also like to see less freaks of nature in the generated draft classes.

And perhaps lastly, full customization options. I hate that you can't edit body types this year.

All in all, I think this is a helluva game and I really don't get why people bag on it so hard.

[Obnoxious]

Franchise Mode has been pretty much the same since 07-08 other than minor additions. We need something new and creative.


Physics is a MUST for Madden 13.



That's all I really ask for.

[RogueHominid]

Quote: Originally Posted by Obnoxious

Franchise Mode has been pretty much the same since 07-08 other than minor additions. We need something new and creative. Physics is a MUST for Madden 13. That's all I really ask for.

IDK man. I mean, DPP and player roles are huge this year. Players on hot and cold streaks are really obvious, and I've seen the roles come into effect myself and it's been awesome. Santonio Holmes turned into Super Bowl MVP man vs. the Jets in my Raiders franchise, nabbing two spectacular scoring catches in the 4th to bring the game within reach.

The coaching schemes and positional priorities are also huge.

Were these things all in '07 and '08?

As for physics, everyone wants it but there are too many ideas about how it should work. Weight and momentum matter, but some folks say that if a 250 LB player hits a 190 LB player X outcome should always happen, or should happen at a highly favorable rate for the heavier player.

I don't disagree about height, weight, and speed as relevant factors, but I think it's easy to be too reductive about the possibilities and outcomes of physics based stuff.

I'm happy with appropriate animations. The way I have it set up now, Hillis WILL truck you if you're a DB. He WILL make your life hard if you're a smallish LB. McCoy WILL juke you out of your socks in the open field, and he will make you miss in the hole.

I'm good with all that stuff because it's believable from an animation standpoint.

I'd just like to see them continue to tune what they have. I'd like coaching strategies to work for each team rather than feeding off the user team's; I'd like a fix to the weird UFDA stuff, and perhaps enhance the defensive AI, which can still over blitz on late downs.

[LambertandHam]

I'll leave the nuts and bolts to other posters as they have a better handle on the game, but presentation, especially audio wise, needs to be looked at. Dynamic audio, a halftime or weekly highlight show(2K games on the PS2 had this), making the draft something other than text, and other improvements.

My dream would be to get the ball back on a punt, see my offense running on the field, and then hear Gus go "while the offense takes the field, let's go to the studio and see what's happening with Eli Manning".

EA has made steps forward with Madden '12's presentation, but things still feel "flat" at times.

[Cardot]

My biggest issue with the current crop of games is that not all plays have an accurate success/fail rate. As I scroll through the playbook, there are just too many plays (or pass routes) that are "money".....or at least too successful for me to feel good about. And ofcourse there are plays that are just doomed to fail. I try to run them every now and them to be realistic and add some variety, but never in crunch time.

With practice, I suppose you can get some success from the crappy plays, but that doesn't help the CPU. In NCAA, playing a team like Oregon should be tough. But since they run a spread/option style offense which is ineffective in EA's game, they are fairly inept.

[Big FN Deal]

Quote: Originally Posted by Cardot

My biggest issue with the current crop of games is that not all plays have an accurate success/fail rate. As I scroll through the playbook, there are just too many plays (or pass routes) that are "money".....or at least too successful for me to feel good about. And ofcourse there are plays that are just doomed to fail. I try to run them every now and them to be realistic and add some variety, but never in crunch time. With practice, I suppose you can get some success from the crappy plays, but that doesn't help the CPU. In NCAA, playing a team like Oregon should be tough. But since they run a spread/option style offense which is ineffective in EA's game, they are fairly inept.

This is a great point, imo and shows the missing strategy in Madden. Even Tecmo Bowl represented the move/counter move aspect of football, better, imo. If the defense guessed the offensive play, it was a "jailbreak" and the chances for success on that play were greatly reduced.

In Madden, the offense and defense playcalling seem to have very little to do with each other. HB screens shouldn't be effective against everything except the DE "reading" the play. How about, screens getting "blown up" the majority of the time unless it's against a blitz, the seam being open against Cover 2, counter runs/cutbacks mostly effective against an over pursuing defense, playaction effective after gashing runs, double moves effective after repeated corresponding single moves, etc.

It's crazy as much of a football laymen as I am, that this stuff sounds advanced in relation to next-gen Madden.