Madden NFL 15 News Post

Madden NFL 15 Developer Livestream - Presentation and Graphics

01:54 PM - July 30, 2014 by Steve_OS

Watch live video from EASPORTS on Twitch

EA Sports is currently livestreaming Madden NFL 15, detailing the presentation and graphics. (Note: As of 3:30 PM EST, the stream has now ended. We'll effort an archived version soon!)

UPDATE: Click here to watch the archived stream. (It takes some time to load...)

Here are some thoughts on the stream today:

The halftime show is definitely improved and of good quality. The problem will be most will find it perfectly skippable, but there aren't any real cases where a halftime show is must-see TV, even in real-life. It's sponsored by Verizon, so there's that.
Commentary was ok, you didn't hear much of it due to the dev commentary over the gameplay, but it seemed to flow a bit better. We won't know anything about that until a later date.
Coaches have unique body types and head models, so they do look better. Coaches we saw today (Reid, Tomlin mainly) were definitely a step up.
Celebrations and such definitely are smoother/more aware of the context they're happening in since they happen within the gameplay itself and not a loaded cut-scene. Still some wonky instances but overall better.
The developers talked about equipment a bit. The new uniforms for each team are going to be in, and uniform/helmet degradation are in as well.
Switching of cameras was very smooth, definitely a huge improvement there.
Sidelines are much busier now, more people on them, etc. They still don't look perfect, but from where we were to where we are now, huge improvement.
Overall the presentation is quite good in-game this year, it definitely has a new layer of polish on it that wasn't there last year. It's not perfect, but clearly its taken yet another leap ahead this season.

What did you think of the stream?

Game: Madden NFL 15Reader Score: 6.5/10 - Vote Now
Platform: PS3 / PS4 / Xbox 360 / Xbox OneVotes for game: 42 - View All

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Member Comments

# 361 Quint75 @ 08/01/14 04:52 PM

I am surprised no one from the Madden team has tried to put out the fire that this stream created. I know they are super busy right now, but you think someone would have been monitoring the reactions.

And for those that hope, year after year, that "this must have been an early build", we have been down that road way too many times before. If you really think that the inaccurate passes, bad coverage, numerous drops and myriad problems with the presentation will be fixed before the game goes gold and ships, you have not been paying attention to Tiburon's history.

# 362 The JareBear @ 08/01/14 04:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quint75


	I am surprised no one from the Madden team has tried to put out the fire that this stream created. I know they are super busy right now, but you think someone would have been monitoring the reactions. And for those that hope, year after year, that "this must have been an early build", we have been down that road way too many times before. If you really think that the inaccurate passes, bad coverage, numerous drops and myriad problems with the presentation will be fixed before the game goes gold and ships, you have not been paying attention to Tiburon's history.

I'm trying to take the ignorance is bliss approach and lie to myself. You're right, though, the track record is less than stellar.

It's easier for me to pretend then it is to accept that in two years I will be hearing about why I need to wait two more years all over again.

# 363 iLLWiLL @ 08/01/14 05:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jpdavis82


	I said they would be tapping him on the helmet, I was just showing he is reserved too.

I am just saying that it -- Gerhart & Matthews' post-TD (non)reactions...and their teammates' -- is a poor excuse to not have emotions in those situations. Again, you're giving EA a 'pass' here with these excuses. In no way do those situations portray the NFL ...

# 364 Gronk4M13 @ 08/01/14 05:22 PM

Liked what I saw. Game looks great.

# 365 OhMrHanky @ 08/01/14 06:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The JareBear


	I'm trying to take the ignorance is bliss approach and lie to myself. You're right, though, the track record is less than stellar. It's easier for me to pretend then it is to accept that in two years I will be hearing about why I need to wait two more years all over again.

U know, I actually watched this stream again on my tv instead of PC, and actually appreciated it much more. 'Most' of the gameplay was fine and did appear to be similar to previous gameplay footage we've seen. I still saw more things in this feed that I did NOT like that I didn't see in previous vids. The most notable of which was Smith throwing a perfect strike on the run across his body. That just kills the whole, 'we've got QB inaccuracy in the game now,' for me. That play needs to be a 10/10 times throw the ball in the dirt play for me. That being said, for whatever reason, the 1st time I watched this on PC, it just did not look good. But, on big screen tv, it shaped up better, so I don't know. I will be purchasing, regardless. Just hope there aren't a lot of throws across the body for completions. Lol.

# 366 OhMrHanky @ 08/01/14 06:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iLLWiLL


	I am just saying that it -- Gerhart & Matthews' post-TD (non)reactions...and their teammates' -- is a poor excuse to not have emotions in those situations. Again, you're giving EA a 'pass' here with these excuses. In no way do those situations portray the NFL ...

I'll actually back jp on this a little. While there could have been some more emotion, I do believe it is actually in the game that gerhardt is more reserved, and thus triggered less of a response (or NO response in this case). But, the McCoy TD was a perfect celebration, so I can imagine we'll all disagree on when and how much any particular player should celebrate in madden 15. And, I'm sure I'll have a similar moment in a big game and madden won't celebrate the way I think it should, but I think the McCoy TD celebration alone shows improvement over 25, anyways.

# 367 jaynral @ 08/01/14 07:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quint75


	I am surprised no one from the Madden team has tried to put out the fire that this stream created. I know they are super busy right now, but you think someone would have been monitoring the reactions. And for those that hope, year after year, that "this must have been an early build", we have been down that road way too many times before. If you really think that the inaccurate passes, bad coverage, numerous drops and myriad problems with the presentation will be fixed before the game goes gold and ships, you have not been paying attention to Tiburon's history.

I feel the same way...This scares me alot...To have such a great first stream and then have a stream like this with the total opposite negative response, you would think that damage control would be out quick as hell....its just confusing

# 368 Darth Aegis @ 08/01/14 07:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jaynral


	I feel the same way...This scares me alot...To have such a great first stream and then have a stream like this with the total opposite negative response, you would think that damage control would be out quick as hell....its just confusing

Yeah I don't get it either, just bad. They should probably never do a stream without Rex EVER!
After seeing this stream my fear is that the AI wont really use the new defensive features. And it only will be useful for the tourney guys and human vs human. For guys like me who don't play online could be a bad deal. When that dude was the jags and he ran it to the outside for 10 yards without no one even close scares me. I know it was right before half and normally you would be calling a pass, but it looked way to easy. The de was not protecting the edge like they showed in the 1st stream

# 369 SmashMan @ 08/01/14 08:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jpdavis82


	Gerhart is reserved for sure. Yeah teammates would tap him on the helmet, but they do that at other points in the stream, it's not like they didn't do the things you're mentioning at all.

What a weird attempt to reframe the discussion point. The issue isn't that they don't do it "at all", it's that they didn't do it specifically in the context of their team scoring a touchdown.

# 370 jaynral @ 08/01/14 08:39 PM

So I just watched both streams back to back.....man, They were 2 totally different games...Im no damn fool...In the video with rex, the tackling was great, so-so gang tackles with a guy(s) flying in after. The reach out tackle on the screen play, and the DEs were aggressive as hell and this stream, nothing...also, I thought on all pro, the tackling cone was up, I didnt see that in this stream...the DE's were weak, no really aggressive tackling...This had(need) to have been a earlier build.......No sign of Rex confirming or saying anything about this stream.. whatz going on?....also, the highlights were short and didnt show the whole and thats the one thing I HATED in the previous madden....It just shows a lack/laziness of detail...Damn

# 371 ThisIsReality @ 08/01/14 08:41 PM

How late can one cancel a pre-order on Amazon, lol. I bit the bullet before the second stream and y'all are making me paranoid.

# 372 The JareBear @ 08/01/14 08:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThisIsReality


	How late can one cancel a pre-order on Amazon, lol. I bit the bullet before the second stream and y'all are making me paranoid.

I don't think it is that drastic man. It was just one stream with some stale gameplay shown/lack of any real improvements shown. The first stream had some really nice moments and I don't think this stream is really a full representation of the final product.

Don't get me wrong, the stream was really bad from a gameplay perspective (in the second game, first game was fine, second game was really bad). I have no issue saying that, but that is just one game played by a dev who really seemed bored and uninterested in what he was doing. I would wait a little bit, at least until the demo.

# 373 jaynral @ 08/01/14 09:14 PM

here is my theory.....This stream is a older build because they only wanted to show off the graphics and presentation and the newer build is still being worked on. It has to and better be the right theory!!!

# 374 The_Balm @ 08/01/14 09:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jaynral


	here is my theory.....This stream is a older build because they only wanted to show off the graphics and presentation and the newer build is still being worked on. It has to and better be the right theory!!!

I don't want to be too easy on EA, but that does seem very plausible.

# 375 Darth Aegis @ 08/01/14 09:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jaynral


	So I just watched both streams back to back.....man, They were 2 totally different games...Im no damn fool...In the video with rex, the tackling was great, so-so gang tackles with a guy(s) flying in after. The reach out tackle on the screen play, and the DEs were aggressive as hell and this stream, nothing...also, I thought on all pro, the tackling cone was up, I didnt see that in this stream...the DE's were weak, no really aggressive tackling...This had(need) to have been a earlier build.......No sign of Rex confirming or saying anything about this stream.. whatz going on?....also, the highlights were short and didnt show the whole and thats the one thing I HATED in the previous madden....It just shows a lack/laziness of detail...Damn

I'm starting to think the same thing, this has to be a earlier build of the game than the one we saw two weeks ago. All it looked like too me was Madden 25 with better body builds and graphics, game play seemed exactly the same as last years. If this is the case at least have a disclaimer saying that's the case. Like maybe the presentation and graphics were done already and the game play was still being worked on or tweaked. Just makes no sense still to me to showcase a old build. But I did remember them saying in the first stream that they couldn't show halftime, so it seemed to be in that build they were playing the first time.

# 376 statum71 @ 08/01/14 10:16 PM

Stat banners disappear entirely too fast!!

# 377 The_Balm @ 08/01/14 10:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cutler23


	I'm starting to think the same thing, this has to be a earlier build of the game than the one we saw two weeks ago. All it looked like too me was Madden 25 with better body builds and graphics, game play seemed exactly the same as last years. If this is the case at least have a disclaimer saying that's the case. Like maybe the presentation and graphics were done already and the game play was still being worked on or tweaked. Just makes no sense still to me to showcase a old build. But I did remember them saying in the first stream that they couldn't show halftime, so it seemed to be in that build they were playing the first time.

It doesn't have to be a overall old build, it could just have older gameplay. The teams can work in parallel.

I won't go too in-depth on version control systems (like Git), but there can be many branches of Madden being worked on in parallel, this is to keep the teams from getting in each others way. The gameplay team can have their own branch that only they change and the same for the presentation team, the MUT team etc.

They are then worked on in parallel and the teams changes are occasionally merged together so they get the updates from the other teams, but then they all continue working on their own branches.

For the last stream the gameplay team showed their latest fairly stable build. Then for this stream the presentation team showed their latest fairly stable build. Now in between the two streams the two teams may not have merged their changes (Or not all of the changes. The teams could have many, many branches just for themselves and not merge them all at once.) and the last time the presentation team was working with the newest gameplay changes could have been months ago.

Of course this is all speculative, but EA has to be using a version control system of some sort and they all generally let you do things like this.

# 378 jaynral @ 08/01/14 10:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Balm


	It doesn't have to be a overall old build, it could just have older gameplay. The teams can work in parallel. I won't go too in-depth on version control systems (like Git), but there can be many branches of Madden being worked on in parallel, this is to keep the teams from getting in each others way. The gameplay team can have their own branch that only they change and the same for the presentation team, the MUT team etc. They are then worked on in parallel and the teams changes are occasionally merged together so they get the updates from the other teams, but then they all continue working on their own branches. For the last stream the gameplay team showed their latest fairly stable build. Then for this stream the presentation team showed their latest fairly stable build. Now in between the two streams the two teams may not have merged their changes (Or not all of the changes. The teams could have many, many branches just for themselves and not merge them all at once.) and the last time the presentation team was working with the newest gameplay changes could have been months ago. Of course this is all speculative, but EA has to be using a version control system of some sort and they all generally let you do things like this.

This makes alot of sense and can be very true

# 379 Darth Aegis @ 08/01/14 10:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Balm


	It doesn't have to be a overall old build, it could just have older gameplay. The teams can work in parallel. I won't go too in-depth on version control systems (like Git), but there can be many branches of Madden being worked on in parallel, this is to keep the teams from getting in each others way. The gameplay team can have their own branch that only they change and the same for the presentation team, the MUT team etc. They are then worked on in parallel and the teams changes are occasionally merged together so they get the updates from the other teams, but then they all continue working on their own branches. For the last stream the gameplay team showed their latest fairly stable build. Then for this stream the presentation team showed their latest fairly stable build. Now in between the two streams the two teams may not have merged their changes (Or not all of the changes. The teams could have many, many branches just for themselves and not merge them all at once.) and the last time the presentation team was working with the newest gameplay changes could have been months ago. Of course this is all speculative, but EA has to be using a version control system of some sort and they all generally let you do things like this.

This has to be the case, otherwise I don't know what to think.

# 380 jpdavis82 @ 08/01/14 10:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gronk4M13


	Liked what I saw. Game looks great.

Glad I'm not the only one to think so.

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