Madden NFL 11 News Post

Madden NFL 11: Madden is Watching (ESPN)

05:29 PM - March 10, 2010 by Steve_OS

You wouldn't believe how many interceptions Brett Favre threw online last season, and EA is counting every single one as they track online user data to help shape the direction of Madden NFL 11.

Quote:


	"The average length of a "Madden NFL 10" game is 63 minutes, but only 17 minutes of this time is spent actually playing the game. The other 46 minutes are spent on things like calling plays, setting up audibles, making substitutions, and watching replays. Another crazy stat thrown out at the event is the fact that while most team playbooks offer an average of 330 plays, the average gamer only uses 13 plays per game. That is why the tag line for this year's game is "'Madden NFL 11': Simpler. Quicker. Deeper," as EA Sports is looking to not only speed up the time it takes to complete a game, but make the experience geared more toward how people are actually playing "Madden" online according to this user data they've compiled. "Our online base, our online connected rate continues to rise dramatically," explains "Madden" executive producer Jeremy Strauser. "We're able to now bring a tremendous amount of data in on real-time usage, real-time gameplay, in terms of reports from our connected user base. "We're bringing in over 173 million data reports ever single day with 'Madden,'" adds Strauser. "We're able to take this real-time data, confirm what's working, what's not working, and make changes to the game real-time while it's consumed." One example of how this quick-fix ability is a gameplay tweak from last year. When "Madden NFL 10" first shipped, EA started tracking Hit Stick tackles. While 1,135,443,163 were attempted, an astounding 518,959,818 were actually completed, for a success rate of 46-percent. Hit Stick tackles were meant to be a high risk/high reward type feature where gamers whiff and pay the price, but by making 46-percent of these tackles, the high risk part of the equation was almost nullified. So EA Sports went in and made a gameplay change through an online update about a month into the season, and the Hit Stick success rate plummeted down to the levels the game designers originally intended."

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Member Comments

# 41 CreatineKasey @ 03/11/10 05:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ODogg


	Sorry, I disagree that improving online won't help offline users. Improving a game based on human intelligence tendency vs. trying to adapt the obviously dumbed down AI is always going to benefit the game tremendously when one goes back to playing offline. Instead of trying to make the AI more smart, they should be making it more human like. That's the essence of what offline users want (IMO) - a game that plays more human-like.

Aren't the gameplay complaints the same for offline and online users?

- Flats defense
- Blocking schemes- OL/DL interactions - pocket forming issues.
- Pass ball trajectory - deep ball ineffectiveness - WR's not elevating for the football - can't throw a deep ball and have your player "run under" it.
- Locomotion - unrealistic transitions and movements (especially on defense) - backpedaling without a loss in speed.
- Hitstick risk/reward issues
- Pro-tak multiple broken tackle smoothness.

Now, let's say they go in and work on these things. Who wins? online or offline?

BOTH!

Offline guys are missing the point here gameplay-wise. I understand their anger about offline franchise, but gameplay complaints insinuating that it's catering to casual online players is BS.

# 42 sb24 @ 03/11/10 06:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	Too funny. See why this place drives me crazy?!?!?!

We understand completely. Thats why many guys wont step foot into these Madden forums at all. Game is far from perfect of course but you did a great job. This coming from a 2k fan.

# 43 CreatineKasey @ 03/11/10 06:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flamehead


	And online statistics are needed to identify these?

Nope.

# 44 roadman @ 03/11/10 06:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Valdarez


	That's because the publisher/customer trust has been destroyed this generation by the publisher. Trust is earned and lost through actions, hence the responsiveness to perceived actions.

Wasn't part of that trust restored with 10 taking away the suits? I'm not saying there isn't more work to complete, either.

# 45 PantherBeast_OS @ 03/11/10 06:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Valdarez


	Somehow your posts consistently instill a yearning for a warm glass of milk and a nice soft blanky. Sticking with something through thick in thin definitely makes you a fan, and there's nothing wrong with that IMHO. Especially when you grew up with it as a kid. EA Sports lost this fan with the NFL Exclusivity deal, and won't get me back until we have competition once again. I grew up with so many games, it's hard to list them all. I'm fan of games like Zelda, Mario (though didn't like Galaxy game), SoulReaver series, in the late 90's Diablo (DII and soon D3!), TopSpin, APF2K8, God of War (Ultimate Edition arrives in t-minus 6 days!), Assassin's Creed, BioShock, and too many other games for me to list.

Well I understand some fans rights to be mad about EA hogging the NFL rights and all. But thats the way the world works now a days.Yes I admit for the first 4 years of madden new life on the next Gen. Consoles haven't been all that. But Madden 10 is a step in the right direction. I am sorry that EA and the Madden crew can't make everyone happy in the world. I would agree it is time that Madden crew step it up on the realism part of the game engine that is in MLB the show right now. But that is all up to EA and the Madden crew. For all we know behind closed doors right now they might be doing alot work on the game engine and so on. But I feel that EA deserves alot of support from it's fans for all the good years they have given us. Just because they are in a slump right now doesn't mean they deserve to blasted on by their fans. They are trying their best while trying to give their fans everything they ask for. Are would fans wheather Madden crew not listen to us and do what they did year before they started listening to us. All I am saying is alot of people are bailing out on Madden because they are taking to long to get settled into the next Gen consoles. I believe in EA and the madden crew they will soon bring back madden to the top of the gaming sports world. Call me a fanboy are not. It does not bother me. Plus I support the new BB football game coming out in may so you know that. But I still 100% support madden aswell.

# 46 PantherBeast_OS @ 03/11/10 06:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wEEman33


	Honestly, he shouldn't have to clean up anything here. People on this forum just seem to overreact and manipulate every little detail that is released about Madden so it fits into their opinion of the series (usually, a negative opinion). Only on this forum can we have basically no real news about Madden 11, yet people are already on here telling us that the sky is falling before it's even been put in place by the creator.

True I agree Ian should not have to clean up at all. But I guess it makes people feel better if explains what all this means and all. But I guess Ian still wanted to make everyone happy to know that they was not doing anything to take away from the fun of the game.

# 47 PantherBeast_OS @ 03/11/10 07:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CreatineKasey


	Aren't the gameplay complaints the same for offline and online users? - Flats defense - Blocking schemes- OL/DL interactions - pocket forming issues. - Pass ball trajectory - deep ball ineffectiveness - WR's not elevating for the football - can't throw a deep ball and have your player "run under" it. - Locomotion - unrealistic transitions and movements (especially on defense) - backpedaling without a loss in speed. - Hitstick risk/reward issues - Pro-tak multiple broken tackle smoothness. Now, let's say they go in and work on these things. Who wins? online or offline? BOTH! Offline guys are missing the point here gameplay-wise. I understand their anger about offline franchise, but gameplay complaints insinuating that it's catering to casual online players is BS.

Yes alot of these problems are the main problems most people are complaining about right now. But I mean what do you expect out Ian and crew within a 10 month deadline to finish the game up. When millions of fans across the web asking for every little thing in the game and they are trying to give it to them. To be honest to make the fans once again happy. Ian and crew need to stop listening to fans for one year and just get his crew to focus mainly on gameplay and offline franchise instead of focusing on millions of other projects in the game. People just don't understand how hard it is for a small little group of guys to go through tens of millions lines of coding just to find the problems in the game and fix them. It takes time. Ian and his crew is trying their all to give us the best game possible.

# 48 ZoneKIller @ 03/11/10 07:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pantherbeast


	Yes alot of these problems are the main problems most people are complaining about right now. But I mean what do you expect out Ian and crew within a 10 month deadline to finish the game up. When millions of fans across the web asking for every little thing in the game and they are trying to give it to them. To be honest to make the fans once again happy. Ian and crew need to stop listening to fans for one year and just get his crew to focus mainly on gameplay and offline franchise instead of focusing on millions of other projects in the game. People just don't understand how hard it is for a small little group of guys to go through tens of millions lines of coding just to find the problems in the game and fix them. It takes time. Ian and his crew is trying their all to give us the best game possible.

I've said that for the longest time.

# 49 Valdarez @ 03/11/10 09:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pantherbeast


	Well I understand some fans rights to be mad about EA hogging the NFL rights and all. But thats the way the world works now a days.Yes I admit for the first 4 years of madden new life on the next Gen. Consoles haven't been all that. But Madden 10 is a step in the right direction. I am sorry that EA and the Madden crew can't make everyone happy in the world. I would agree it is time that Madden crew step it up on the realism part of the game engine that is in MLB the show right now. But that is all up to EA and the Madden crew. For all we know behind closed doors right now they might be doing alot work on the game engine and so on. But I feel that EA deserves alot of support from it's fans for all the good years they have given us. Just because they are in a slump right now doesn't mean they deserve to blasted on by their fans. They are trying their best while trying to give their fans everything they ask for. Are would fans wheather Madden crew not listen to us and do what they did year before they started listening to us. All I am saying is alot of people are bailing out on Madden because they are taking to long to get settled into the next Gen consoles. I believe in EA and the madden crew they will soon bring back madden to the top of the gaming sports world. Call me a fanboy are not. It does not bother me. Plus I support the new BB football game coming out in may so you know that. But I still 100% support madden aswell.

I didn't call you a fanboy. I abhor that label. It's typically used by the real fanboys when they either don't know the facts about the subject/game. I just called you a fan, and labeled myself one as well. Big difference between fan & fanboy. One is a positive, and the other is a big negative.

2K gamers have bailed on Madden due to EA the predatory management style that pushed for a NFL Exclusivity deal via backroom deals and the overall poor quality of the product. EA gamers have bailed on Madden due to poor quality this generation. If Peter Moore keeps at it employing even more predatory practices but this time aimed at the consumer instead of the competition, then even EA gamers will bail on the company.

Madden 10 was basically a bug fix release with ProTak tacked on to help counter the publicity of BackBreaker. Was it a step in the right direction? Absolutely. Did they earn our trust back? Not yet, the game still has too many gameplay problems not to mention the poor business practices meant to bleed the consumer (overlay Ads, charging for QA codes that used to be given away for free, attempting to charge secondary consumers for used sales through online franchise charge) and with Peter Moore out there broadcasting his ill minded digital consumer plans, pretty much all of the trust that Ian earned last year was lost.

It's amazing the business decisions, and more importantly, the design decisions that have been made for Madden, especially if they have had the data mining abilities that we're seeing they claim to have for so many years back. It boggles the mind how a company with so much information and every competitive advantage can so utterly massacre the game of football and only when a game like BackBreaker hits the market do they truly start putting $$$ and resources into improving their game.

# 50 Valdarez @ 03/11/10 09:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pantherbeast


	Yes alot of these problems are the main problems most people are complaining about right now. But I mean what do you expect out Ian and crew within a 10 month deadline to finish the game up.

A 10 month deadline sounds good... but the game's effectively been in development 20+ years. It should consistently be the pinnacle of sports game if only for the fact that it's been around the longest.

# 51 Jukeman @ 03/12/10 06:40 PM

The "Troof Chasers" were right.....

Damn...

# 52 ODogg @ 03/12/10 08:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pantherbeast


	Well I understand some fans rights to be mad about EA hogging the NFL rights and all.

I don't. The NFL sold EA the rights. If fans should be mad at anyone it should be the NFL not EA.

# 53 kjcheezhead @ 03/12/10 09:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roadman


	Wasn't part of that trust restored with 10 taking away the suits? I'm not saying there isn't more work to complete, either.

Nope. When things that are promised in the game actually make the game the way they were advertised and Peter Moore isn't talking about taking further advantage of me, then maybe trust will be restored. As someone else has said in this thread, seeing the EA logo back on the PS2 days used to be great advertisement. Since I bought my PS3, seeing that logo makes me check a few extra sources of info or else I just put the game back on the shelf.

# 54 Valdarez @ 03/13/10 09:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ODogg


	I don't. The NFL sold EA the rights. If fans should be mad at anyone it should be the NFL not EA.

True, but you know there had to be some backroom deals for it to occur at the time it happened. The license sale occurred the year after ESPN NFL 2K5 outsold them on the XBox (though the numbers have been updated to show Madden sold more now). Couple that with the the revelations on the EA / NFLPA conspiracy to screw old players out of their revenue share from sales of Madden games and you have a company that will sink to any level to defend their cash cow. Unfortunately, since there's been no investigation, it all comes down to what you believe. I honestly long for the 2000 through 2005 days if only because then the quality of the both games didn't mean as much as I always had a choice between games (not to mention NFL Fever!).

# 55 ceroik @ 03/13/10 10:12 PM

First off, I'm new on this forum and I found it because I was looking for a place where all info on new Madden games is gathered in one place. Also, I like to read feedback from fans and new ideas for upcoming games. Not a big poster, I just skim through the information and try to filter the good info out of it. Just like in this post.

The news here is that EA uses online data to make the stats of the game more realistic. The example used is the hit-stick. They introduced hit-stick in 2005 to provide a feature which makes it possible to make big hits. Real simple.

The problem is, there aren't that many big hits in any given NFL game. They (EA) realized that the balance was off. Let's say in a game of Madden somebody is able to produce 20 big hits in a match, because they are skilled users of the stick. In an NFL game that just doesn't happen 20 times a game. So they use online data to determine the average amount of big hits produced in a game of Madden, so they can tweak the stick in a way that hits are less often succesful and a player going for a big hit misses more often. This asjustment goes for the entire overall game of Madden, both online and offline.

So, the point here in this article, or press release or whatever, is that they gather loads of information (from hardcore AND casual online gamers) to determine an average. With this average in mind EA can make changes to the gameplay, which affects the ENTIRE game of Madden.

Now how did this topic get to EA focussing their attention exclusively to online gamplay?! This article concerns only little tweaks in gameplay that affect both online and offline. They only gather their information online, because that way they can get the most information about every kind of Madden player (hardcore and casual). How else would they get this information? They can't play millions of games themselves to determine the statistical flaws. Certainly not when everybody in the world expects them to be working on a better game for next year at the same time as playing those millions of games. Much less can they gather information from games played offline. You can't expect the great guys from EA to join you in your living roon when you are playing a pick-up game of Madden.

Now please get your heads on straight, read your info correctly and instead of complaining about every single aspect of the game, show that you care and MAKE SUGGESTIONS on how to IMPROVE the game. I'm sure they know what's wrong with it, help them with IDEAS to make these flaws right.

That being said, I'll return to just reading. Just had to get that off my chest.

PS: I'm sorry if my post is unreadable, I'm dutch, not a native English speaker. And didn't mean to offend anybody, just think people should post constructive thoughts. That's what this message board is for, am I right?

# 56 CreatineKasey @ 03/13/10 10:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ceroik


	First off, I'm new on this forum and I found it because I was looking for a place where all info on new Madden games is gathered in one place. Also, I like to read feedback from fans and new ideas for upcoming games. Not a big poster, I just skim through the information and try to filter the good info out of it. Just like in this post. The news here is that EA uses online data to make the stats of the game more realistic. The example used is the hit-stick. They introduced hit-stick in 2005 to provide a feature which makes it possible to make big hits. Real simple. The problem is, there aren't that many big hits in any given NFL game. They (EA) realized that the balance was off. Let's say in a game of Madden somebody is able to produce 20 big hits in a match, because they are skilled users of the stick. In an NFL game that just doesn't happen 20 times a game. So they use online data to determine the average amount of big hits produced in a game of Madden, so they can tweak the stick in a way that hits are less often succesful and a player going for a big hit misses more often. This asjustment goes for the entire overall game of Madden, both online and offline. So, the point here in this article, or press release or whatever, is that they gather loads of information (from hardcore AND casual online gamers) to determine an average. With this average in mind EA can make changes to the gameplay, which affects the ENTIRE game of Madden. Now how did this topic get to EA focussing their attention exclusively to online gamplay?! This article concerns only little tweaks in gameplay that affect both online and offline. They only gather their information online, because that way they can get the most information about every kind of Madden player (hardcore and casual). How else would they get this information? They can't play millions of games themselves to determine the statistical flaws. Certainly not when everybody in the world expects them to be working on a better game for next year at the same time as playing those millions of games. Much less can they gather information from games played offline. You can't expect the great guys from EA to join you in your living roon when you are playing a pick-up game of Madden. Now please get your heads on straight, read your info correctly and instead of complaining about every single aspect of the game, show that you care and MAKE SUGGESTIONS on how to IMPROVE the game. I'm sure they know what's wrong with it, help them with IDEAS to make these flaws right. That being said, I'll return to just reading. Just had to get that off my chest. PS: I'm sorry if my post is unreadable, I'm dutch, not a native English speaker. And didn't mean to offend anybody, just think people should post constructive thoughts. That's what this message board is for, am I right?

Your post looks good. I like your attitude.

Yeah, that's what this message board is for.

# 57 43Chargers4Now @ 04/17/10 04:18 AM

I sincerely hope that the hit stick doesnt become totally obsolete after its success rate is tweaked. I hate trying to hit stick a quarterback that isnt very mobile (Peyton Manning) to try to cause a fumble and have them bounce right off of my hit and keep going. That's extremely fake looking and would less than likely actually occur in a real football game.

# 58 cowboy_kmoney @ 04/17/10 04:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 43Chargers4Now


	I sincerely hope that the hit stick doesnt become totally obsolete after its success rate is tweaked. I hate trying to hit stick a quarterback that isnt very mobile (Peyton Manning) to try to cause a fumble and have them bounce right off of my hit and keep going. That's extremely fake looking and would less than likely actually occur in a real football game.

Man this used to make me break my controler when I was winning and Drew Brees runs a to the end zone to be met by my linebacker and I got good hit on him just see him run over my player still standing going in for the score

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