So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

[kehlis]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

But the only people that can call them untalented are fellow designers that know what restrictions were put in place by upper management. I don't think any of us are qualified.

Yea, that's where you are completely wrong......

I certainly am not, but there are many people here who are and I know you know that by now.

^^

Your last paragraph has been asked many times over for several years.

The people in Orlando will make the game they want, what they feel will sell the most copies.

I might be Debbie Downer, but I've given up.

Time to throw in the white flag for me.

Which three year plan are we on right now? The third?

[TheBuddyHobbs]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

This whole thread is just depressing for all football fans. Welcome to the "new" age.

[TheBuddyHobbs]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

Don't give the Live team any credit for that apology, lol. They aren't any better. They basically canceled out that apology by saying the initial reviews of the game were unfair. They also lied about the update feature they were supposed to have this year. Something is seriously wrong down there in Florida.

The heat melts our brains lol.

[reddogmaddogbul]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

Are there any other Game Changers OFFENDED that Ea believes this is what the fans want besides Rgiles?(and he's a offline gamer)..no pun intended ...Come on now you guys know just as well as all of us,this is not the stuff that Ea needs to be wasting time on in this game!

[bucky60]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

Yea, that's where you are completely wrong......

I certainly am not, but there are many people here who are and I know you know that by now.



Which three year plan are we on right now? The third?

Well I've been in Software Design since the early 80's. My first 7 years writing support software for simulators (debuggers, linkers, compilers, etc). I can tell you that trying to get game play correct, one that would produce realistic game stats, would be very difficult. Not impossible by any means, but that's the most difficult part of writing a real time 3D football sim.

The part that really is telling about Madden, and the choices being made by those designing Madden, is that even the simple things to implement are not done well or with any depth. A Football Franchise with incredible off-season, pre-season and season depth could have been implemented by now. Now of this would have been HARD to do. Instead we get a very arcade feeling XP system where your ONE coaches function is mainly general management and outside of actual coaching duties (player contract and retirement packages).

Everything about Madden "off the field" keeps reminding me that I'm going to an arcade and sticking a quarter into a machine.

[4thQtrStre5S]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

Agreed Terry.

Also, just look at what the NBA live team is attempting to do. They actually wrote a public apology to the fans for the quality of NBA LIve with a promise to make the game better. Where is my apology for ruining football gaming? What Tiburon has done with Madden is an atrocity. I don't blame a lot of guys for leaving the studio, I'd be embarrassed to admit I worked on it. Just goes to show you what competition will do. There isn't a single person who works at Tiburon who does not know that if the license hadn't happened, Madden would be NBA Live. NBA 2k is a simulation, yet you have 12 year old kids clamoring to play it. Same thing with the Show. The nonsense that they mention about Madden needing to appease all fans is complete and utter BS. Make a simulation game, and pay attention to details. Prove to us that more than 6 weeks of work goes into the game each year. 2 years to implement pass trajectories? (Which don't even work). Give me a break.

As I believe we all know, the reason they apologized about NBA Live was because there is competition...No need to apologize for Madden, where else is anyone gonna go?

[PGaither84]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

We know what Tiburon could do to make the game better. Tiburon knows what they should do to make the game better. Yet, where are we?


I put Madden 09, 10, 11, and 12 on Friday Feb. 28 and Saturday March 1st. Looking back you can see the improvments that were made and some of the good things that we lost. Does the game get better? Yes. On the whole it does. Is it where it should be? not even close. Is it even where it could be? Still, no... not even close.


There are so many fundamental flaws to the core game play, some of which can literally be fixed, or at least addressed, over night or during a luch break as we have seen jsut that with our own eyes at community days. imagine if they kept those "fixes" instead of throwing them out later... and expanded on them.

A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day. *cough* excuse me I mean to say:

A day may come when Tiburon will try to make an authentic football game, when we see proper line interactions and a truely immerive experience, but it is not this day!

[Rebel10]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

I know how hard it is to make good software and even harder to make GREAT software. However, people who belong in the software business ALWAYS find a way to do it (unless you are at Tiburon). Making excuses isn't what gets things done. LIke I said, I like guys like Vic Lugo, Scantlebury and Clint Odenburgh. These guys "get it", but there are others who don't and won't. You ever look at the Madden draft classes? Riddled with receivers with 65 speed and offensive lineman who have 75 speed. Wow - show me a combine where a receiver ran a slower 40 time than ANY offensive lineman. You'd maybe have to watch a LITTLE bit of football to actually see that. Not to mention, have a tie in your playoff hunt? Looman tells me on twitter that the tie breakers work "just like the NFL". Wrong again. Season 2, there was a wild card tie - didn't work, screwed a guy out of the playoffs. How hard is it to get that right? The entire algorithm is spelled out for you from the NFL, it's not like you have to design it! This is exactly what I mean by talent. That has nothing to do with the "suits".

The day to day engineers and programmers share responsibility with the littany of repeat bugs in this game, but I do think a lot of it comes down to management as well -- though, when I think of management, I don't think of "suits," I think of programmers, engineers, and developers who have -- usually -- been promoted into management either by tenure, skill, or a mixture of both.

As someone who works at a software company that does make great software and is successful, I am astounded by the repeat bugs, lack of attention to detail, and the complete head scratching gaffs that Madden ships with every year. Those things, to me, scream of bad mid-level management... of not knowing how to allocate resources to handling bugs, of not being able to manage a team, of lack of responsibility for errors, of a lack of design reviews, etc. I've been playing a decent clip of Madden 25 lately, and so many times I ask myself, "did anybody actually design review this idea? Did anybody ask why is this setup a certain way?"

Case in point, in CCM mode in the yearly awards screen, the Rookie of the Year screen... you have a long list of defensive and offensive rookies of the year. Not once on that screen are there any player positions mentioned or stats for the players... instead, you get Player Name, Team, and the players total Legend Points or something. This is beyond absurd. Who on earth even knows what Legend Points or Legend XP or whatever it is even means. I've never once, in my life, seen a presentation of Top 10 Rookies of the Year, that did not list their name, team, position, and then relevant stats. Not in a videogame, not on a website, not in the newspaper, nowhere. A list of rookies of the year that is just a random list of names ... is ... beyond irrelevant to anybody who wants to look at it, and those ultra irrelevant "Legend Points" is just beyond comprehension because they don't mean anything.

To me that shows an utter lack of design review. I work at a company that has 2 major releases of the software a year, and any change that is made to the software... any new feature, any visual change, anything, goes under a tremendous amount of review. It's all signed off by managers, QA, QE, it's code reviewed by the members of your team, etc. At some point in that process, if you're proposing something that basically does not make any sense, somebody will ask "Does this make any sense?" And if you say "No, this does not make sense," then the feature/change won't be made, or something else will be made.

The attention to detail with overtime, tie breakers, other rule changes, the problem with wind in the game, SuperSim engine, and other issues, are multi-year bugs that were probably written out incorrectly with requirements, and some group of programmers followed the requirements, and then at some point, somebody realized -- or a customer reported it -- that "this is broken." The requirements were wrong or the team coded it incorrectly, and then, mid-level management never followed up to ensure that it was fixed. Or, maybe they told an upper branch of management that the "overtime bug has been fixed," which then bounces up to the suits (the guys who communicate out to us on twitter, and so on, but have no real look into what's actually happening with the product), and then they don't check on it, they just report it as fixed. And, of course, it isn't.

It amazes me that a software company with $4b in revenue has such a poor structure that bugs get handed down from game to game without ever being resolved. There are bugs or issues in this game that were introduced 10 years ago, that have been customer reported, and somehow, they skip over them every year. Then there are the "what are you thinking?!" features that ship with the game every year where you have to wonder to yourself "did anybody design review this idea?!" the sort of "How could this ever be approved??" type of thing.

It astounds me.

[GiantBlue76]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

The day to day engineers and programmers share responsibility with the littany of repeat bugs in this game, but I do think a lot of it comes down to management as well -- though, when I think of management, I don't think of "suits," I think of programmers, engineers, and developers who have -- usually -- been promoted into management either by tenure, skill, or a mixture of both.

As someone who works at a software company that does make great software and is successful, I am astounded by the repeat bugs, lack of attention to detail, and the complete head scratching gaffs that Madden ships with every year. Those things, to me, scream of bad mid-level management... of not knowing how to allocate resources to handling bugs, of not being able to manage a team, of lack of responsibility for errors, of a lack of design reviews, etc. I've been playing a decent clip of Madden 25 lately, and so many times I ask myself, "did anybody actually design review this idea? Did anybody ask why is this setup a certain way?"

Case in point, in CCM mode in the yearly awards screen, the Rookie of the Year screen... you have a long list of defensive and offensive rookies of the year. Not once on that screen are there any player positions mentioned or stats for the players... instead, you get Player Name, Team, and the players total Legend Points or something. This is beyond absurd. Who on earth even knows what Legend Points or Legend XP or whatever it is even means. I've never once, in my life, seen a presentation of Top 10 Rookies of the Year, that did not list their name, team, position, and then relevant stats. Not in a videogame, not on a website, not in the newspaper, nowhere. A list of rookies of the year that is just a random list of names ... is ... beyond irrelevant to anybody who wants to look at it, and those ultra irrelevant "Legend Points" is just beyond comprehension because they don't mean anything.

To me that shows an utter lack of design review. I work at a company that has 2 major releases of the software a year, and any change that is made to the software... any new feature, any visual change, anything, goes under a tremendous amount of review. It's all signed off by managers, QA, QE, it's code reviewed by the members of your team, etc. At some point in that process, if you're proposing something that basically does not make any sense, somebody will ask "Does this make any sense?" And if you say "No, this does not make sense," then the feature/change won't be made, or something else will be made.

The attention to detail with overtime, tie breakers, other rule changes, the problem with wind in the game, SuperSim engine, and other issues, are multi-year bugs that were probably written out incorrectly with requirements, and some group of programmers followed the requirements, and then at some point, somebody realized -- or a customer reported it -- that "this is broken." The requirements were wrong or the team coded it incorrectly, and then, mid-level management never followed up to ensure that it was fixed. Or, maybe they told an upper branch of management that the "overtime bug has been fixed," which then bounces up to the suits (the guys who communicate out to us on twitter, and so on, but have no real look into what's actually happening with the product), and then they don't check on it, they just report it as fixed. And, of course, it isn't.

It amazes me that a software company with $4b in revenue has such a poor structure that bugs get handed down from game to game without ever being resolved. There are bugs or issues in this game that were introduced 10 years ago, that have been customer reported, and somehow, they skip over them every year. Then there are the "what are you thinking?!" features that ship with the game every year where you have to wonder to yourself "did anybody design review this idea?!" the sort of "How could this ever be approved??" type of thing.

It astounds me.

Rebel, like you, I've been a developer for a long, long time. I've worked on a lot of enterprise software and I am a coder. There is no such thing as "perfect" software. I can completely understand minor bugs or glitches sneaking through. It happens. What I can't accept is the repeated missteps year after year, and the same lingering bugs that go untouched. This is the product of exclusivity, and EA knows it. It's also the product of laziness and unpolished developers who seem to know little to nothing about football. However, that excuse doesn't even fly, because the NFL provides them ALL of the resources necessary. How long has the wind meter been messed up? Do these guys actually play the game? I mean, how hard is it to fix the wind meter? Tiburon is the only major game studio I've ever heard use an excuse that says, "it's actually not as simple as it sounds to do that". Nothing is simple when you put in about a month's worth of work on something. You have to actually work at it, and have the passion and desire to create something special.

[Rebel10]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

Rebel, like you, I've been a developer for a long, long time. I've worked on a lot of enterprise software and I am a coder. There is no such thing as "perfect" software. I can completely understand minor bugs or glitches sneaking through. It happens. What I can't accept is the repeated missteps year after year, and the same lingering bugs that go untouched. This is the product of exclusivity, and EA knows it. It's also the product of laziness and unpolished developers who seem to know little to nothing about football. However, that excuse doesn't even fly, because the NFL provides them ALL of the resources necessary. How long has the wind meter been messed up? Do these guys actually play the game? I mean, how hard is it to fix the wind meter? Tiburon is the only major game studio I've ever heard use an excuse that says, "it's actually not as simple as it sounds to do that". Nothing is simple when you put in about a month's worth of work on something. You have to actually work at it, and have the passion and desire to create something special.

Agreed.

I don't mind silly bugs that make the game (as long as they are not "game killing," ie the game crashes after Season 4 or all players are rated zero in a game), but the bugs that are customer reported year in and year out that haven't been fixed for four, five, six years. Ever since since they introduced SuperSim, I go in in my first game and test to see whether SuperSim is still broken. Every year, it still is. Now, I know that this was a customer reported bug... but... it's still broken, every year. To me, you could have one sprint by like 2 or 3 developers (at the most) and they could get this working. Or you have one manager that asks "listen, guys, we've had this one bug in the game for five years... we need to save face and just fix it."

What surprises me also is when bad features make the game. The weird XP system in CCM mode that dictates everything but literally means nothing. It just seems like this feature never went to a design review, nobody ever asked "what is the value of this XP system?" Obviously, they were trying to capitalize on something like Call of Duty which introduced an XP system and is very popular. But, Madden's implementation of the XP system would be as if Call of Duty replaced actually completing the objective of the game with being awarded XP (and in some criticisms of the game, people actually say that, but usually it's not the case). In CCM, in the coach of the year screen, you can't see their Win/Loss record or any statistics about them, but you can see some arbitrary, meaningless "Legend Stats," thing... As if, hypothetically, let's say when the NFL writers were awarding coach of the year for the 2013 season they said "well, guys, win/loss really doesn't matter.. What is Bill Belichek's LEGEND XP RATING?"

I see things like that and just wonder like ... what the hell is going on? Who approves these things? What direction does the game have?

When I go into a meeting with my manager and I show him what I've been working on, and I show him some expected user interaction with something, or a new component... If it doesn't make sense to him he'll say "this.. doesn't really make sense." Now, of course, I'm usually just following requirements that I agreed to with someone else, but I take that feedback back to the people who we defined the requirements with.. and I say, "why did we decide on this particular interaction?" If they have a bunch of use cases and usability feedback, I'll go ahead and continue working, but more often than not, they'll say "YEah.. that needs to be revised." It's just so bizarre to me that this doesn't happen at a software company that has $4billion in revenue...

*edit*

One idea that I think EA is doing very well with is Ultimate Team. I don't play this mode and I have zero interest in it, but I think it's a brilliant idea and a great way for the product to generate revenue. Madden will probably never be the huge revenue generator that it was in the early 2000s. And, in general, publishers are struggling to generate continued revenue with games on the yearly release model. MUT is a great bridge between the micro-transactions revenue generators that you see with games like Clash of Clans and a typical video game. Frankly, part of me wishes they just splitered the product... Sell MUT as a stand alone, $30 game, with all of those microtransactions and focus on the core 1 to 1 arcade gameplay, and then move the Career mode to it's own platform... with a longer release cycle and a focus on the legacy product. That may not be a great idea, but it might be the only way to bridge these two audiences that EA has to appeal to with Madden.

[coke hogan]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

honestly I don't think they have the talent in them for these things to happen.

[Rebel10]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

I was thinking to myself after my last post, and thought whether Madden could ever break from the annual release cycle... And while I never thought it could work, I think they should be willing to entertain it. Thinking of other games that appeal to a "sim" audience, like Forza. Forza is a successful racing game that is very simulation based but still manages to be profitable and a good franchise, it appeals to both "sim" driving fans and arcade style racers.

Turn10 bridged out, though, with Forza Horizon, which seemingly has a much more aggressive release cycle, or at least, release in the "non numbered" years in between the major Forza numbered releases. Activision explored a similar model with the CoD franchise, usually releasing numbered, major releases once every 24 - 30 months, and incremental releases developed by a third party using assets from the major game. CoD4 was followed by World at War; CoD:MW2 (major release), was followed by Black Ops.

I wonder if EA could ever explore this approach. Release a "non-numbered" Madden that may focus more so on casual players, the 1v1 online gamer, and the MUT crowd, using shared assets from the major, numbered release. The numbered release, like Forza, would cater to both the "sim" fans and those who might be more interested in the "1v1 arcade" experience. In the off years, downloadable (Premium) roster packs, team adjustments, and other mid-level modifications, would fill in the gaps.

I don't know if this is viable, but it might be worth exploring, because I don't think that the current release cycle is cutting it. And if MUT runs out of steam over the next ~24 months, I'm not sure where they'll supplant lost revenue from.

[23]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

As I believe we all know, the reason they apologized about NBA Live was because there is competition...No need to apologize for Madden, where else is anyone gonna go?

It amazes me that a software company with $4b in revenue has such a poor structure that bugs get handed down from game to game without ever being resolved. There are bugs or issues in this game that were introduced 10 years ago, that have been customer reported, and somehow, they skip over them every year. Then there are the "what are you thinking?!" features that ship with the game every year where you have to wonder to yourself "did anybody design review this idea?!" the sort of "How could this ever be approved??" type of thing.

It astounds me.

Rebel is right on the money. Its funny that the Live team gave and apology but sent a patch that not only did NOT fix any bugs, but introduced more.

You hate to not give anyone a fair shake by there year but EA has more than earned its reputation for this stuff multiple times and keeps going like the energizer bunny. Just can't give my dollars here.

[GiantBlue76]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

I was thinking to myself after my last post, and thought whether Madden could ever break from the annual release cycle... And while I never thought it could work, I think they should be willing to entertain it. Thinking of other games that appeal to a "sim" audience, like Forza. Forza is a successful racing game that is very simulation based but still manages to be profitable and a good franchise, it appeals to both "sim" driving fans and arcade style racers.

Turn10 bridged out, though, with Forza Horizon, which seemingly has a much more aggressive release cycle, or at least, release in the "non numbered" years in between the major Forza numbered releases. Activision explored a similar model with the CoD franchise, usually releasing numbered, major releases once every 24 - 30 months, and incremental releases developed by a third party using assets from the major game. CoD4 was followed by World at War; CoD:MW2 (major release), was followed by Black Ops.

I wonder if EA could ever explore this approach. Release a "non-numbered" Madden that may focus more so on casual players, the 1v1 online gamer, and the MUT crowd, using shared assets from the major, numbered release. The numbered release, like Forza, would cater to both the "sim" fans and those who might be more interested in the "1v1 arcade" experience. In the off years, downloadable (Premium) roster packs, team adjustments, and other mid-level modifications, would fill in the gaps.

I don't know if this is viable, but it might be worth exploring, because I don't think that the current release cycle is cutting it. And if MUT runs out of steam over the next ~24 months, I'm not sure where they'll supplant lost revenue from.

See here is where we disagree. The reason the game is in the state it is in is not because of the yearly release cycle. The majority of features that go into this game are never even done in a single release cycle. It takes this calamity of developers years to do something simple. By the time it makes the game (if it even works), it's obsolete. It took them 3 years to get a working online franchise component in the game. They still have no draft board, no way to draft from a phone, no way to assign more than one commish, no way to reset games, etc. 2k had ALL of this in 2004 and it all worked from a web page as well as the console. Not only that, but an amateur web developer wrote a web application that allowed you to do everything I just mentioned way before Tiburon could. This was just one guy who did all of that in less than a year in his spare time.

The developers are very bad who work on this game. Anyone who works in software development knows that this crap could never get released in the state it's in with a competing product on the market. It's THAT bad.

[dghustla]

Re: So who do we believe when it comes to the GameChanger program?

See here is where we disagree. The reason the game is in the state it is in is not because of the yearly release cycle. The majority of features that go into this game are never even done in a single release cycle. It takes this calamity of developers years to do something simple. By the time it makes the game (if it even works), it's obsolete. It took them 3 years to get a working online franchise component in the game. They still have no draft board, no way to draft from a phone, no way to assign more than one commish, no way to reset games, etc. 2k had ALL of this in 2004 and it all worked from a web page as well as the console. Not only that, but an amateur web developer wrote a web application that allowed you to do everything I just mentioned way before Tiburon could. This was just one guy who did all of that in less than a year in his spare time.

The developers are very bad who work on this game. Anyone who works in software development knows that this crap could never get released in the state it's in with a competing product on the market. It's THAT bad.

if anyone submitted work like this on their job they would be fired in a week.
We know the suits at EA don't care a long as their pockets are lined. But the Developers they always tells us they care and have passion for the game but it's have to continue believing that. As others have mentioned if you care how come basic stuff like tie breakers and OT don't work properly? When I play this game sometimes I question if the developers have any clue what football is. I'm stilling trying to figure how an NPC in GTA recognizes when I point a gun at them that I am trying to kill them and they either fight back or flee but Highly Rated DEs/OLB still don't know what gap they are responsible for covering.