Madden Innovational Implimentations - mirrored32's Blog

mirrored32's Blog

Madden Innovational Implimentations

Posted on August 28, 2011 at 02:19 PM.

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If you have read my other blogs, you will note a understanding of how awesome the Madden Franchise is. There is so much to the game and does a pretty amazing job of capturing a lot of the game of the NFL. One can hardly deny how drool worthy each year is of Madden. Yes, there are the extremists as always whom want it they way they want it, though in general I would say Madden is pretty awesome. Why then the frustration of the fans? the harshness? This has always intrigued me as a fan of Madden, because I myself have gotten very frustrated with the game just as much of Love the game.

I have stepped back in recent years to look at what Madden makes me feel. Every year it is released I can't help but really like the features they advertise. I remember when they released the 'playmaker' move. Awesome. loved it. Though now it is no longer in the game. You can no longer direct your wide receivers like Tony Romo did with Witten in this year's preseason game with a flick of the stick or thumb. So what happened to that feature? Perhaps it really wasn't as cool as I thought. So it was removed. Maybe there was a discussion on it in the public and I didn't see it. I enjoyed it while it lasted. So in short, Tiburon knows how to bring innovations to the game EVERY YEAR and that is a feat I heavily applaud them for!

So what is this blog post about? implementation. Feature execution. Didn't I just say they do an awesome job innovating? why yes! Yes I did. So what am I getting at? This is the point I wanted to make. it truly is in execution. There are elements of how the features are implemented that frustrates me and other fans of the franchise to the point of great annoyance. I suspect it is why we as fans have such passion for the franchise.

This year in Madden 12 the Madden team has sent a letter to the fans and one of the features they have implemented with great advertisement is preseason substations that are like the real NFL. That is simply awesome! I love this idea! The issue isn't that they have made this feature, it is in its execution of concept that is an issue. In a NFL Preseason game it is pretty much a given that the coaching staff will play the starters early and get them off and on the bench to safety. What is one of the main goals of preseason for coaches? to get players through the pre season healthy. This is where Madden kind of misses the goal. Though they have done an awesome job of listening to the fans in wanting to implement the features of the NFL into this awesome simulation, the execution of the feature has caused more problems then if it were left alone.

The words of a couple of blog posts are worthy to quote here:

"The AI does some pretty wonky things over the course of a few years in Franchise. The first thing you will notice (mainly because it's the first thing you do) is that the substitution system in Pre-Season games is pretty broken. Since the AI puts guys in down the depth chart that don't actually play the correct position, you can have Safeties playing WR and QB's playing kicker at the end of pre-season games. It's not a big deal until Calvin Johnson gets hurt playing Safety in the fourth quarter of a pre-season game." - Chris Sanner (http://www.operationsports.com/featu...ranchise-mode/)

"The pre-season games allow for a chance to get acclimated with the players but beyond that there doesn�t seem to be much value to them. How the games are handled isn�t great. First string plays the first quarter, second string the second quarter, ect. It is jarring to switch the whole lineup at the change of quarter � in the middle of a drive � instead of at the start of a new drive. It also ended up putting players in odd positions.
A game against the Vikings saw Adrian Peterson who had been removed as a running back out at wide receiver since he is down the depth chart for that position and in doing so risking injury. Backup kickers and punters (usually position players or kicker doing the punting and vice versa) also made for some awkward moments. There is no unique pre-season commentary and ratings for rookies aren�t completely displayed until after the pre-season." - Pastapadre (http://www.pastapadre.com/2011/08/26...ons#more-46425)

Remember the goal of the NFL head coaches is "to get through the preseason healthy" and as you can read, this is not how the feature of the new preseason works.

Every year the Madden creation team works diligently to give us an amazing game. Being as one of the Madden community members, being on the outside of the Madden creation processes, we don't have have an idea of the goals, time constraints, budgets the team has to adhere to. But I do have to ask, with the preplanning of the 'features' why is it that these features are not completely implemented correctly?

The issues of Madden have never been "that feature sucks" it has been "it doesn't work as intended". (or it is buggy or broken, see my other blog on the use of these words). This years implementation of the preseason auto roster substations is a good example.

Follow this to see how this annoys the fans unfortunately and for good reason:

Since the game 'auto subs' your players, you can't choose whom will play series one and then sit and NEVER GO BACK INTO THE GAME for series two or three. So what ends up happening is instead of the old system of just after start of third quarter kick off the user manually changes the roster to fit whom the user coach would like to see on the field and mainly prevent the injuries of starters, you now have to do this 3 times and probably with some major confusion as the computer keeps trying to think for you.

See how this frustrates? so how is it fixed? This is the second part of frustration Madden fans deal with. Now that we have this new feature that doesn't work right (doesn't work as what the goal of this feature should achieve) is how will it be patched? will it be patched? (see the blog on bugs and broken to see the worries of fans whom pay the money and wonder if it will be fixed)

So in wrapping this up, Madden's team has every year put out incredible features to the franchise and this year really topping the cake with franchise mode, though as a fan, i would hope that inner workings of feature creation, implementation and patching is understood from soup to nuts as to provide a quality feature that will break 'fun' in using it.

Hope this blog posts is helpful.