Dissecting the Madden NFL 18 Features Reveal

[DeuceDouglas]

Quote: Originally Posted by roadman

I feel it's important to note that if people want to make an analysis one way or the other on only the information that is available at the time, the poster should be aware there will be a lot more information released at EA Play and blogs down the road.

Just to add to this, even after we get information it's important to just take it for what it is and not get too high or too low on anything because it's usually never as good or as bad as it initially seems. Sometimes it can be but the feature deep dives and preview articles still will never tell the whole story. Last year, just off the top of my head we got the first screenshot of 17 and people immediately thought there was no new equipment and we ended up with a lot of new equipment. A GC said that the new kick meter would have no latency online which ended up not being true. There was an article where EA stated that all 300 rookies at the combine were scanned and ready to go in 17 and that wasn't true either. Nothing is really ever final until the game drops in August.

[Greenblood60]

Quote: Originally Posted by CM Hooe

It made the game immediately and obviously less visually appealing and damaged authenticity of presentation by projecting a giant flashlight cone onto the field.

I don't see why people freaked out about the "giant flashlight cone" visual cue, as if there aren't other visual cues. EA could have made the cone dimmer, or found some way to lessen the effect if it was that bothersome to people

Quote:

It made the game's controls unnecessarily complicated for new players (even moreso than they already are). It artificially increased the difficulty of the game for all players without dramatically increasing authenticity of gameplay or skill ceiling.

I don't what's so complicated about holding the R2 button and tapping the corresponding button twice to throw the ball. To be honest, it nullified the the difference between higher vs. lower awareness ratings because ( for me at least, and the people I played against ) it eliminated the intended handicap smaller coned qbs were supposed to have. What it forced me to do is look off defenders when I was playing head to head, which is realistic.

[OhMrHanky]

Quote: Originally Posted by Greenblood60

I don't see why people freaked out about the "giant flashlight cone" visual cue, as if there aren't other visual cues. EA could have made the cone dimmer, or found some way to lessen the effect if it was that bothersome to people I don't what's so complicated about holding the R2 button and tapping the corresponding button twice to throw the ball. To be honest, it nullified the the difference between higher vs. lower awareness ratings because ( for me at least, and the people I played against ) it eliminated the intended handicap smaller coned qbs were supposed to have. What it forced me to do is look off defenders when I was playing head to head, which is realistic.

Forget that R2+double tap, I LOVED using the right stick for that. I think back at that time, the right stick wasn't being used for the QB at all, so it made sense to map it there, and it allowed for the flexibility of scanning the field. It was 1 extra thing to do, but in real life, as a QB, u have to have your head on a swivel. U have to feel the pass rush, and move slightly in the pocket while keeping your eyes downfield. The cone did that!! And, I loved looking safeties off and KNOWING I was looking safeties off by looking left, and timing my look back to the right on a fly pattern and BOOM! TD!!! Yeah, it took a few games to get used to, but as a football game, I felt this actually did replicate some intricate things that a QB does. If u have a 4th and 3, and have to go for a quick slant, hey, u might want to focus on the primary the whole way to get a good pass off, but it also allows the defender to maybe see where you're throwing. I mean, I could go on and on with specific examples of how the cone actually fleshed out different situations. And, the simple fact that Peyton's cone was YUGE!!! And, my Falcons Mike Vick (back in his early days, he wasn't the most accurate QB) had a sliver of a cone. Lol. I took pride in skillfully whipping that cone around to the correct WR and hitting him. The more I think of this, the more I want that damn cone back!!!! Lol. BRING BACK THE CONE!! BRING BACK THE CONE!!!!


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[Ueauvan]

i play coach mode offline cfm, setting up sliders and team schemes as per Josh's thread.

having set out how i play for context:

authentic - if a play is started before 2 min drill, inbounds or outbounds on catch i believe the coach has to challenge if they want to reverse even if the clock stops say @ 1 min 58 secs. so im playing last night and this happens, i can't challenge and then the booth reviews and overturns in my favour. i think i should have to challenge?

holy roller rule ie fumbling in last xx of half cant be recovered by someone other than the fumbler. is that in?

i cant catch a kickoff that is just landing in bounds by stepping out and catching creating a penalty ala Packers

big decisions, never used it ... ever. i think i know i have to make decsions most arent big and if i have a player who im paying large money could injure worse by playing early i wont play them. as an aside (havent seen it) concussion injuries do they happen and i hope you are never prompted for early return

i loved madden 08 on pc but havent played with mods as im dense with my newer pc and how to install the modes etc.

[OhMrHanky]

Quote: Originally Posted by Ueauvan

i play coach mode offline cfm, setting up sliders and team schemes as per Josh's thread. having set out how i play for context: authentic - if a play is started before 2 min drill, inbounds or outbounds on catch i believe the coach has to challenge if they want to reverse even if the clock stops say @ 1 min 58 secs. so im playing last night and this happens, i can't challenge and then the booth reviews and overturns in my favour. i think i should have to challenge? holy roller rule ie fumbling in last xx of half cant be recovered by someone other than the fumbler. is that in? i cant catch a kickoff that is just landing in bounds by stepping out and catching creating a penalty ala Packers big decisions, never used it ... ever. i think i know i have to make decsions most arent big and if i have a player who im paying large money could injure worse by playing early i wont play them. as an aside (havent seen it) concussion injuries do they happen and i hope you are never prompted for early return i loved madden 08 on pc but havent played with mods as im dense with my newer pc and how to install the modes etc.

Concussions? No, they're not in the game. That would be too realistic. . But, seriously, the NFL won't let concussions be in the game. Tarnishes the brand.


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[Hooe]

Quote: Originally Posted by Greenblood60

I don't see why people freaked out about the "giant flashlight cone" visual cue, as if there aren't other visual cues. EA could have made the cone dimmer, or found some way to lessen the effect if it was that bothersome to people

No one "freaked out". Rather it was immediately ugly and obviously made the game look silly. There is no argument at all for the visual appearance of the cone being authentic to an on-air NFL broadcast. That observed valid criticism is not "freaking out".

Second, it is not comparable to other UI helper prompts and visual cues which have no affect on gameplay if disabled; to use the cone, you must know where the cone is, you must be able to see it, you must look at the ugly thing.

Specifically, it is very different from Tackle Cone in that respect. Tackle Cone is a visual aid to help new players learn the distances for attempting conservative and aggressive tackles. An advanced user may disable Tackle Cone once he learns when and how to tackle and still succeed at tackling; the Tackle Cone is never necessary to succeed at tackling. There was no analogous usability with the Vision Cone; if you take the flashlight away, you can't see where the QB is "looking" to determine if you will throw an accurate pass, and thus you can't use it.

Quote:

I don't what's so complicated about holding the R2 button and tapping the corresponding button twice to throw the ball.

The mechanic literally got in the way of success in the passing game without offering any immediate gameplay benefit.

That second button tap is the difference between getting the pass off in a tight window and an interception. That second tap is the difference between getting the pass out before protection breaks down and a sack.

If you were using the R-stick instead, that delay is instead mechanically enforced by the significant fractions of a second it takes for you to move your right stick from the face buttons to the R-Stick (because you must press A / X to snap the ball and start the play) then back to the face buttons to throw the pass (because you must use the R-Stick to manipulate the cone first to ensure you throw an accurate pass).

All of this was necessary to achieve the same function a user could accomplish with a single button press the previous year - press one button, the pass is thrown. The Vision Cone added unnecessary steps to achieve the same result as the previous year while adding more failure states (throwing to a receiver not in the cone resulted in a wildly inaccurate pass). The mechanic dramatically raised the skill floor of the game (making the game harder to learn for new players as more steps were required to succeed at performing basic actions) without increasing the skill ceiling (the end result of successfully using the Vision Cone was the exact same as not using it at all the year before; an accurate pass in the direction of a receiver).

Quote:

What it forced me to do is look off defenders when I was playing head to head, which is realistic.

For many people that one benefit does not outweigh the many drawbacks I've laid out above.

Compare the vision cone and its drawbacks to every Madden game before or since where all I have to do to throw a pass is tap or hold a face button and it instantly happens. No, my QB doesn't have to "see" the open receiver as with the vision cone, but this control scheme is immediately more responsive (I press one button and the ball is thrown) and immediately more mechanically intuitive (no bouncing back and forth between the right stick and face buttons). In addition, I'm already reading the coverage with my own two eyes anyway, so requiring my in-game QB avatar to also do so was redundant.

To circle this back to the topic at hand - Madden NFL 18 - I speculate that the new Target Passing mechanic will be built in such a way where the game is still playable at a basic level without touching it at all (i.e. it may not be as dramatic departure from face button passing as the name implies), but the best players will leverage the new mechanics to throw their receivers open, throw back shoulder fades, etc. etc. in ways which were not possible in previous Madden games. Something which pushes the game more towards the easy-to-learn hard-to-master direction the game has been trending the past couple years.

[adembroski]

Quote: Originally Posted by CM Hooe

No one "freaked out"..

I did. I was committed and needed a decade of therapy. I'm better now though.

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[Greenblood60]

Quote: Originally Posted by CM Hooe

To circle this back to the topic at hand - Madden NFL 18 - I speculate that the new Target Passing mechanic will be built in such a way where the game is still playable at a basic level without touching it at all (i.e. it may not be as dramatic departure from face button passing as the name implies), but the best players will leverage the new mechanics to throw their receivers open, throw back shoulder fades, etc. etc. in ways which were not possible in previous Madden games. Something which pushes the game more towards the easy-to-learn hard-to-master direction the game has been trending the past couple years.

I'm 100% certain that we'll be able to pass the ball the way we can in M17. There's no way EA is going to impose this new passing system onto users ( and risk alienating them ). What I hope is that the target passing gives the user who uses it a significant advantage over the person who doesn't ( like we'll be able to carve people up in ways that just isn't possible with traditional passing ).