frustrated madden player willing to give ESPN a try

[Nutzzz414]

I've been playing Madden since forever. I always buy both game and I end up playing madden for 2 main reasons. #1 all of my friends play madden so it is easier to get games going. #2 The player controls are better.( espn seems like they are on a swivel). But this year madden has pissed me off to no end. All You have to do is play bump and run, bring your safeties down, loop your ends and you can play D. I, know how to play football games, and if someone blitzes U, you should be able to exploit them with the power runs and screens. if you bring your safeties up to the line U should be able to get burned with long ball. If you loop your ends, U should be able to power run on it. In other words, for every defense there should be a weakness. Now if you fellas can convince me that this doesn't exists on ESPN, then I will make a hard effort to convert. I have espn on the BOX, with a big screen, component cables, so I know the graphics are top notch. I don't care about that. I'm talking about player controls.
1-Do U get used to the swivel controls of the players. ESP on defense. It seems that when the ballis in the air that I can't pick the defender and make a play on it like I can in madden. I always seems to pick him and put him out of posistion. I like manually controling my men and don't want to rely on my computer to make the plays.
2- Kickoffs and punt returns seems boring and pointless. Unreturnable. Is this true ? or do U get better as you play more.
-3 some people tell me that the strafe buttons helps U out on D. But it dosen't seems to help me (I think that it is the R trigg. )
Fellas, I am a manager at a gamestop, so I have a lot of influence on what games people buy. If you can convince me that this is a better game , I will tell people. I been a madden player all of my life, but these glitches on the game (quicksand, juke glitch , nanos, etc) are turning me off. Are there glitches in ESPN that people use online that makes the game crappy, of is it much like a realistic football game. Thank you in advancce for the responses.

[bears5122]

I'm in the same boat. Big time Madden player for years and just couldn't take it anymore.

1) You get used to the controls, although it took me awhile. I mean 10 years of Madden is hard to get out of my body. What I've noticed is that it isn't like Madden where you can cut on a dime and go left then hard right. You need to move like a real player does by slowly pushing the control in the other direction.

2) Kickoffs and Punt Returns are a joke. By far the worst aspect of the game.

3) It does help I guess, depends who you have. It's tougher to get sacks with the sliders I use and I end up with 1-2 a game like in real life. It was tough to move away from the 5 sack games I could get with my DT in Madden.

Online sucks like most football games because there are always idiots playing. Games aren't being built for gameplay, they are being built for getting the 11 year old kids to tell their Moms that they want to build a crib. The game is better than Madden, that is true, but it's not miles ahead.

[Nutzzz414]

Quote: Originally Posted by bears5122

I'm in the same boat. Big time Madden player for years and just couldn't take it anymore. 1) You get used to the controls, although it took me awhile. I mean 10 years of Madden is hard to get out of my body. What I've noticed is that it isn't like Madden where you can cut on a dime and go left then hard right. You need to move like a real player does by slowly pushing the control in the other direction. 2) Kickoffs and Punt Returns are a joke. By far the worst aspect of the game. 3) It does help I guess, depends who you have. It's tougher to get sacks with the sliders I use and I end up with 1-2 a game like in real life. It was tough to move away from the 5 sack games I could get with my DT in Madden. Online sucks like most football games because there are always idiots playing. Games aren't being built for gameplay, they are being built for getting the 11 year old kids to tell their Moms that they want to build a crib. The game is better than Madden, that is true, but it's not miles ahead.

Thanks for the feedback. But I do agree that the Sp. tms are a joke on this game.

[azn_essence]

it was even worse last year when everybody gets blocked on SP, almost eveyr 3-4 kickoffs was a td.

[truckie16]

I'm having a hard time with the player controls. Like you I'm putting my guy out of position more often than not. The analog stick is pretty sensative, if cut to hard your player goes into this huge cut animation when all you really needed was a little body leen.
I've been burnt many times on the blitz and I've burned the CPU many times when they blitz.
Kickoffs and punts are definetly the weakest part of the game. I've yet to get past the 30 on a kickoff.
As far as online goes, I really don't play it online from negative experience in the past.

Overall though ESPN is a more realistic sim. Unfortunetly like most Sega sports games the players just don't control as well as EA's IMO.

[HMcCoy]

Quote: Originally Posted by NUTZZZ

Fellas, I am a manager at a gamestop, so I have a lot of influence on what games people buy. If you can convince me that this is a better game , I will tell people. I been a madden player all of my life, but these glitches on the game (quicksand, juke glitch , nanos, etc) are turning me off

Lets say we convince you, and you change to an ESPN convert...You begin to really like the game, and get used to its quirks. That would mean that for the last 2 months you've been giving your customers piss poor, uninformed opinions based on an old bias, and apparently blind favoritism. Thats a shame. When I managed an EB, I played EVERY sports title thoroughly, whether I liked it initially or not...just so I could really give detailed pros and cons for both. You know why? Because like any game, you will OF COURSE get used to the swivel effect, just like you've gotten used to pinball physics in Maddens run game. It takes time to see past a titles flaws, and it sounds like it's taken you WAAAY too long to give 2K5 that time.

Your customers shouldn't have to wait for you to be "convinced" on a website to get the real dirt on their purchases. I'll just bet you've been shoving Madden down peoples throats for WEEKS now. Now that you see how flawed it is, are you going to accept returns on it?


BTW, no offense.

[Heelfan71]

Returning a kickoff past the 30yd lines isn't possible (very rare) unless you use the right analog stick. press up to stutter step then hit left or right to spin off the first guy.


another small tip is when you are on defense. Press "Y" xbox (I think it is triangle for ps2) and your DB will go for the interception or knock the pass down. you don't have to have control of the guy either.

[Moegames]

Quote: Originally Posted by Nutzzz414

I've been playing Madden since forever. I always buy both game and I end up playing madden for 2 main reasons. #1 all of my friends play madden so it is easier to get games going. #2 The player controls are better.( espn seems like they are on a swivel). But this year madden has pissed me off to no end. All You have to do is play bump and run, bring your safeties down, loop your ends and you can play D. I, know how to play football games, and if someone blitzes U, you should be able to exploit them with the power runs and screens. if you bring your safeties up to the line U should be able to get burned with long ball. If you loop your ends, U should be able to power run on it. In other words, for every defense there should be a weakness. Now if you fellas can convince me that this doesn't exists on ESPN, then I will make a hard effort to convert. I have espn on the BOX, with a big screen, component cables, so I know the graphics are top notch. I don't care about that. I'm talking about player controls. 1-Do U get used to the swivel controls of the players. ESP on defense. It seems that when the ballis in the air that I can't pick the defender and make a play on it like I can in madden. I always seems to pick him and put him out of posistion. I like manually controling my men and don't want to rely on my computer to make the plays. 2- Kickoffs and punt returns seems boring and pointless. Unreturnable. Is this true ? or do U get better as you play more. -3 some people tell me that the strafe buttons helps U out on D. But it dosen't seems to help me (I think that it is the R trigg. ) Fellas, I am a manager at a gamestop, so I have a lot of influence on what games people buy. If you can convince me that this is a better game , I will tell people. I been a madden player all of my life, but these glitches on the game (quicksand, juke glitch , nanos, etc) are turning me off. Are there glitches in ESPN that people use online that makes the game crappy, of is it much like a realistic football game. Thank you in advancce for the responses.

Here's a BIG tip i'll give ya that most Madden die hards fail to do. Give the game time, what i mean is not a few games but play a full season or 10 or so games. ESPN NFL 05 is the pinnicle of NFL Football replicated into a videogame.