Madden NFL 12 Gameplay Q&A (ESPN The Gamer)

[gbombbay]

Im not ready to have a parade yet...but this Madden "sounds" like its moving in the right direction as far as stepping up the game play is concerned. Been a long time "ian... not coming." Nothing to do now but wait and see.

[bxgoods]

Ok it sounds all good, I like that hits are more violent. But I need too see videos of it.

I didn't the feeling of violent tackles watching the NCAA videos, in the Madden Video I need to see a WR getting popped coming over the middle.

[BlueNGold]

Quote:

Another thing we added this year is the ability to adjust the shading of your defensive backs on receivers. Now you can play press on an individual receiver on a play as opposed to playing press on everybody. You can also have a defender shade inside or outside of the receiver depending on whether you press shade left or shade right. Or you can just back one guy off and give him extra space. We give you a lot of options, and while some of these might sound like small features, with our goal to be true to the game and true to the NFL, we want to make sure we're giving our "Madden" fans ultra-fine control over our defense this year. It has been a while since some of these features have been in our game and we're glad to finally have them back.

Hell yes. It's about time.

Every thing I've heard up to this point sounds great. We're not seeing useless features or gimmicks, but actually seeing things a lot of us have been asking for for years. It's also looking like this is going to be as good of a jump Madden 10 was from past NG Madden's. EA seems to have really put in work this year.

Can't wait for gameplay videos to roll around. That should just about make my decision on whether or not I'm buying this year. At this point it's "definite rent".

[BezO]

Quote:

The biggest difference gamers will notice right away, however, is the increased violence of every hit. With the old Pro-Tak tackling system, the game turned into gang tackles where groups of players ended up huddled together pushing a pile one way or another. But now that the new tackling system has more to do with momentum and point of impact, instead of watching a pile moving in boring fashion, now one defender might grab the ball carrier while the second defender charges in and cleans the pile out.

I noticed more violence & effort in the tackles, but I hope they didn't get rid of those 3+ defender tackles. Those need to stay in for certain situations.

Quote:

Instead of having tackles where guys are stood up and other defenders are adding on just for the sake of the gang tackle, now we have a much stronger, much more powerful impact that knocks the ball carrier down almost immediately. A lot of what we have right now are consecutive impact tackles. While we don't have eight or nine guys in a big scrum like Pro-Tak, what we have now is much faster. You'll have one guy who is actively in a tackle animation with the ball carrier, then another guy will come in and clean up the hit. A third guy can still come in and knock that pile to the side or knock it back, but it really just depends on how many guys come in contact with the tackle from the point of collision to the point they hit the ground. There's no more stand up where you have eight or nine guys chopping away.

Damn!

Quote:

To accomplish this, gamers will hit a new tackle button (works like "NCAA Football 12"). In the old days, this was simply the dive button, but now if you hold the button down, defenders will bow-up and attack the ball carrier.

So the tackle button has 2 features? I'm hoping this means if you DON't hold it, it's a safe tackle, but if you hold it, the defender "bows up". Nice!

Quote:

Now I feel like I can take a better angle if I'm taking an outside rush, and I don't feel like I'm just going to get sucked into a block. This enables me to take more realistic angles and gives me a better shot at getting to the quarterback.

I thought I saw a good edge rush in that Vick vid. Nice!

Hopefully, this also addresses the defender's ability to flow towards plays while engaged. Blocking has been way too sticky in the past, stopping defenders from moving laterally. This should help the spacing on run plays, inside & out.

Quote:

We added a new pump fake mechanic where you can actually pump fake towards a specific receiver. We think this is something the hardcore will utilize as it really ups the value of our double moves. Now you actually have a reason to call some of these double move routes like the post corner because when you pump fake towards a specific receiver, the defensive back is more likely to bite.

Nice!

Quote:

Another thing we added this year is the ability to adjust the shading of your defensive backs on receivers. Now you can play press on an individual receiver on a play as opposed to playing press on everybody. You can also have a defender shade inside or outside of the receiver depending on whether you press shade left or shade right. Or you can just back one guy off and give him extra space.

Wooooo!

It almost seems like they saved many of my CD suggestions for the past 2 years until now. I've been begging for everything I've quote for yeeeeears. Looks like they're getting around to them. If the AI is improved and special teams gets similar attention, the only major gripes I have left are tiered defense and general animations... and there's still time.

If this is "early news", I can't wait to hear more as they get closer to release. Looking good EA!

[TDKing]

I'm trying to understand the new tackle button. So I can't dive anymore if I want to ? The computer will decide when to dive at the ball carrier and when not to ? Hmmm... not sure if I like that, why didn't they just leave the dive and map tackle to another button. So now its like my defensive line moves where the computer decides what type of move to pull off. I'm very interested to see how this is going to work. All the new changes and the stuff they added back into the game do all sound good though but we'll see.

[Only1LT]

The other question I have, is with this new tackle button, is the Hit Stick even in the game? Will the holding of the tackle button replace it?

Probably a good thing if it is gone as the stick could be used for other things, and it has inherent suction and morphing properties to it.

Haven't read all the blogs yet. Is the Hit Stick mentioned?

[roadman]

Quote: Originally Posted by Only1LT

I must say that everything that they have said SOUNDS impressive. Unfortunately, I've danced this dance WAY too many times, so what they say and what I play, usually don't jive. I am definitely more optimistic than I have been for this franchise in a long, long time though. Even though I have heard great pitches from them before, somehow, this sounds different. I'm still not buying yet though lol. They mentioned that the new tackling system and how they eliminated morphing and suction also benefits the trench game. If rushers can actually play like real rushers now, and have movement while engaged, or at the very least can avoid blocks that they always should have been able to avoid, then this will be a huge improvement for the game. The problem is that when they said that Pro-tak would not just be for tackling, but would benefit blocking, that turned out to be hogwash (for both actually) so that has me worried that this is just more rhetoric, but again, IF true, this will be huge. Glad that the individual audibles are back. Glad to hear that the Football has been shrunk, finally. Custom playbooks? Awesome. The only thing is that we go from them saying it can't be done because of space limitations, to BLAM, 400 play playbooks. I'm sorry if no one else agrees, but I call bull ish. The new zone coverage AI SOUNDS great. Can't help but think that it will feel incomplete though without a means to actually LOOK defenders off, but I guess baby steps. Being able to pump fake to specific receivers (how they could not have this for so long is beyond...) could fill the void I guess, but it's a cut corner method in my book. I'm assuming that they will be using the 2K double tap the button method to fake now, which is intuitive, so that's good if my guess is right. I like that they are still focusing on the visual aspect of the game as I don't think this game is as great looking as most do (I know I'm in the minority, but I have a very critical eye lol). Still need more work in this department. Wish it weren't so bright and cartoony and were more dark and subtle like NCAA, or at least somewhere in the middle of both, but at least they are still tweaking it. And they haven't actually said it, but I will guess that dynamic lighting is in as well. Very cool on the 3D grass, uniform, and field degradation. Ditto snow and pellets being kicked up. Keep it up guys. Still in a wait and see mode (I have to be with these guys) but they have definitely awakened some dormant excitement in me. Long dormant lol. It seems like they might actually (miraculously?) get it. They are even using forum defined terms in their language (the actually said consecutive hit or impact or something along those lines lol). It's weird. It's like so many things that we have been asking for are all coming at once after years of pining. I'm no conspiracy theorist, but I would be remiss if I didn't at least ponder the plausibility or implausibility of two events having a correlation. Namely Ian leaving, and this seemingly new found perspective on the game, including the ridding of Pro-tak which was strongly linked to Ian, whether that is accurate or not. Not saying there is a correlation, just that it seems curious. Maybe my mind is the only one that works that way. In any event, I am not definitely buying, but I am much closer than I thought possible, this soon. I am really pumped for the demo, if that counts for anything. If these improvements pan out, and they ever did something (anything) with their animation tech, and did something to bring the passing game in to this century, Madden would be a game that I would be proud to have someone call me a fanboy for.

For a minute there, I had to do a retake. I thought it looked like Roadman wrote that.

haha

[roadman]

Quote: Originally Posted by bxgoods

Ok it sounds all good, I like that hits are more violent. But I need too see videos of it. I didn't the feeling of violent tackles watching the NCAA videos, in the Madden Video I need to see a WR getting popped coming over the middle.

I don't think you saw all the NCAA videos.

There is another video floating around with consecutive hit tackles with momentum.