Was/has there been any franchise info released?

[Hooe]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

--quote spoiler'd for length--

Spoiler

@CMHooe, my general issue with the "it's a video game" premise as a defense to a lack of realism, is that it being a video game is a given. Nobody has ever disputed or been confused as to if Madden is a video game or not, the question has been is it intended to be an arcade video game, simulation video game or some hybrid video game of the two. Well those working on the game have made it very clear that their intention is for Madden to be a simulation video game, ergo having it provide an enjoyable interactive experience one would want to find in a video game, in as realistic a manner as possible and applicable.

To that point, the XP system currently does not follow in that vein, meaning offering the User a progression system they can enjoy directly interacting with AND doing so in a reasonably realistic manner. It's fine that doesn't concern or bother you personally but it clearly doesn't logically coincide with the goal of creating a simulation video game. Simulation and video game are not at odds with each other, they coexist to create a distinct genre.

If Tiburon would embrace that fact to create an XP progression system that utilizes real world logic and parameters for collection and allocation, then that would be a reasonable offering in a simulation video game.

My overarching point is that Tiburon is basically paying lip service to the word "simulation" and nothing more because they are making a video game. A video game which is authentic to the NFL and its player experiences are designed with the NFL in mind, but at the end of the day it's still a video game. A video game which a user expects to have an active role in gameplay, be rewarded for successes in gameplay, and be punished for and learn from failures in gameplay.

Madden NFL is not intended and was never intended to be a full-on simulation, IMO. For starters, a simulation in the truest sense of the word wouldn't ever allow for user control of the players. A simulation wouldn't allow for me to hop in and throw passes, the AI would simulate where the passes are being thrown. A simulation wouldn't let me try to evade tacklers, the success or failure of any attempted tackle would be determined without my having any say in the matter. A simulation quite obviously wouldn't let me control how my players grow and decline over long spans time. To that end, any PC text-based football game or NFL Head Coach is more of a simulation than Madden has ever been. Hell, Head Coach might not even be a simulation because the user has control of play calling; the truest of simulations would just put the two teams in and spit out a result; i.e. AccuScore game forecasts.

The vast majority people who boot up their XBOXes or PlayStations expect to play a video game when they turn on their consoles and put a software disc in. To that end, Madden must cater to and rightly does cater to a crowd which expects to play a video game. What said vast majority do not expect is to turn on a video game and then watch it play itself.

There is an important distinction between these two products, a football simulation and an authentic football video game; which one do you really want? I personally prefer to play video games and decide the outcome rather than watch them decide the outcome for me, so I'd rather have the video game over the simulation. It's absolutely fine if you want the simulation, but if that's the case don't buy Madden. It's not a simulation, it never was a simulation, it never will be a simulation.

[Hooe]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

I did agree with some of the points in this post but I wanted to specifically talk about the bold. If we can get back on topic of franchise/CCM here, wouldn't you agree that for Madden, NCAA, MLB, etc where you have to build a team through draft, free agency, trades that the feeling of being rewarded is through franchise mode. Long game progress meaning the years it takes, no matter how many drafts it takes to rebuild a team, that reward is finally winning the Super Bowl. You finally win the World Series, you win the NBA Championship, the National Championship, that's the longevity and the award for playing franchise.

Yet it seems EA is content with CCM being 16 Play Now games that in the end, it really doesn't give you that feeling of winning the Super Bowl. Why not do everything to ensure the one mode that gives people longevity and reward actually does that. It's just strange to me that the one mode where you can get that reward and gives the game longevity is neglected.

I'm confused as to the question.

The game does in-fact actively reward the player for playing well in CFM games via XP awards to the on-roster players, team coach, and owner avatars, with which players may improve their abilities, coaches can unlock abilities to help players improve faster, and owners can do... heaven knows what, I don't ever touch Owner mode; build a better stadium I guess? This encourages the player to keep playing; his team is getting better, so he can do better against harder teams, at the same time while other teams are acting in the same world also working to build up their rosters.

If we're talking about keeping context with the individual games via commentary and overlays, that's a presentation issue, not a gameplay issue. Still relevant to CFM, yes; relevant to the XP loop conversation, no. I can't speak a whole lot to the presentation of games within CFM because Tiburon turns off all the presentation bells and whistles during online head-to-head games (which I really don't like, but that's another story for another thread), so I've never really seen much of whatever may or may not be there.

[Hooe]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

To keep it simple, picture the XP acquisition and allocation as being "under the hood", unseen, when choosing to use the coaching staff, player time, playcalling, etc progression UI, like in old Maddens. The XP system would just be a different way of having the AI calculate progression, while giving the User the option of having more but not complete like currently, control over the allocation.

This is effectively already in the game if you go to the progression screen and hit Y / Triangle on a player; the AI decides how to spend the XP for that player on its own. With this option, the user never has to spend XP on his own and effectively can ignore it.

Progression in Madden has always been at least partially (if not entirely, looking at the Madden games pre-M10 which did not feature quantified player potential) reliant on player statistics, so with respect to XP being explicitly tied to in-game statistical milestones nothing has really changed since franchise mode was introduced in Madden 2000.

[friscob]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

This is effectively already in the game if you go to the progression screen and hit Y / Triangle on a player; the AI decides how to spend the XP for that player on its own. With this option, the user never has to spend XP on his own and effectively can ignore it.

Only if youre offline. In an online lg it would create a competitive advantage for those who allocate their own xp while the cpu decides to upgrade my d ends kick power. And if youre offline and choose not to use xp that would completely ruin the experience with nobody
improving from yr to yr. The xp system needs to be fixed (or scrapped) and not have the onus put on the consumers to fix it for them.

I tend to agree that taking the players development out of our hands is best. They could keep the XP system but not allow you to purchase specific attributes. Instead you could purchase areas for your player to work on his game and upgrades are randomly selected from that group

Physical upgrade - spd, acc, str, jmp etc
Coverage - zone, man, rxn time, awr
Pass rushing - bsh, pmv, fmv, pursuit, etc

So on and so forth

[Big FN Deal]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

@CMHooe, I will address the posts without quoting them.

In regard to the simulation video game posts, it's not that deep of a term to be venturing into an abstract discussion on having a simulation so ideal no person actually plays it. We are discussing simulation video games, that's not some term I just coined for the sake of this discussion, the genre exists, Madden is classified in it and it's an achievable objective exemplified by a title like The Show.

As far as the current XP system in Madden, my underlying point was that the system allow there to be a reasonably realistic path or logic for how XP is collected and allocated, which it does not. My main point is one of common ground, that I believe there can be an XP progression system that offers "User reward" as you put it and still be reasonably realistic, which the progression system should be in a simulation video game.

[Jr.]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

This day in age, there doesn't need to be one or the other. Both can be implemented.

I'm sure there are millions of people who love the XP system and that they can mold any player precisely how they want. I'm sure there are millions of people who want something more realistic and less exact.

There doesn't need to be only one option.

[Big FN Deal]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

This day in age, there doesn't need to be one or the other. Both can be implemented.

I'm sure there are millions of people who love the XP system and that they can mold any player precisely how they want. I'm sure there are millions of people who want something more realistic and less exact.

There doesn't need to be only one option.

Yes under normal circumstances I would agree but alas this is Madden we are talking about. They don't have a good track record the last decade when it comes to implementing options, it's seemingly all about killing as many birds with one stone as possible. The current "option" for XP progression is to set it to auto and that probably wasn't a given to make the cut when designing it.

We don't have much info on CFM for M15 yet but I'm pretty sure whatever they implemented the only option will be to utilize or not.

[PatsSB2015]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

This day in age, there doesn't need to be one or the other. Both can be implemented.

I'm sure there are millions of people who love the XP system and that they can mold any player precisely how they want. I'm sure there are millions of people who want something more realistic and less exact.

There doesn't need to be only one option.

Exactly! Even if the simulation group is of a lesser percentage, why lose that percentage? Make a game to fit the needs of both types of gamer. Don't force a group out. Will everyone be happy? Of course not, but it's still the right thing to do. If I want CPU vs. CPU in my CFM mode...give it to me. If I want to edit the ratings myself, let me. For those who want to be challenged and rewarded, let them use the XP system.

[roadman]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

Well, logic tells me that they just implemented XP in Madden 13(two years ago), so, I would be very surprised if they replaced it with something else.

And as Big stated, we usually don't see options with Madden.

I could be wrong on this, too.

[Jr.]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

Well, logic tells me that they just implemented XP in Madden 13(two years ago), so, I would be very surprised if they replaced it with something else.

And as Big stated, we usually don't see options with Madden.

I could be wrong on this, too.

Oh, it's definitely not going to happen. This particular development team put their eggs into the RPG basket when it came to progression. I doubt they'll go back on that as long as they're there.

I would just love to see an option for a different progression system. It would be an area that Madden would actually lead when compared to other sports video games, as I don't think any other franchise/career mode offers multiple options for progressions.

[MajorSupreme]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

It was seem that a simple on/off switch can do wonders.

[bucky60]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

Hey bucky60, do you think that an XP progression system can be implemented to function in a realistic way or that there would have to be two separate systems, one XP and the other realistic?

I ask because, like I mentioned in another post that no one seemed to understand and/or care for, I think it's possible to maybe have a realistic or at least real world logical, XP progression system.

I think it would have to be 2 different systems. You may be able to use the XP variable as part of the realistic progressions system. But the underlying concepts of the two are so different. All the code to accumulate the XP would be different and all the code to use the XP would be different. And many aspects of a realistic progression system would actually do both the accumulating and using of the XP variable.

[bucky60]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

I don't see how rewarding a user for playing a game well isn't logical.

Rewarding for playing well isn't illogical. What's logical/illogical is the way the user is rewarded. In single person RPG games it's logical. In a team oriented sports game where progression is already defined and essential to the realism of a team oriented sports game franchise mode, XP progression is illogical. The logical way to reward the user for playing well is hiring the right balance of coaches with the right balance of coaching attributes, drafting the right type of players, hiring the right GM, scouting staff with the right attributes, setting up the best practice schedule to maximize your teams progression. The user is rewarded for making the right realistic choices.

It has proven examples of effectiveness in every genre of video games.

NBA2K uses a potential system with coaching attributes. Proven to be effective. MLB the show uses a potential system. Proven to be effective. Team oriented sports games all the way back to Sierra Front Page sports didn't use some RPG progression loop and they were successful.

Madden's progression path is completely logical; play football well, earn XP. It's not a path entirely grounded in reality, no, but it's quite logical; reward the user for playing the video game well.

XP does make some sense in an RPG superstar/player mode, but not in a team franchise mode. A team oriented sports franchise mode should have grounds in reality. Rewarding one of the players with progression for having good statistics is completely illogical. Progression doesn't follow performance, performance follows progression. What you are stating as logical is completely illogical.

Why? How is rewarding a user for playing a video game well a bad idea? What's the more engaging alternative for the average video game user?

Again, it's not rewarding a user that's a bad idea, it's how the user is rewarded that's a bad idea. You are looking for an unrealistic/illogical reward for a team oriented franchise mode. I'm looking for a realistic/logical reward.

A primary mark of a good video game - regardless of genre - is that it engages the user and makes the user feel directly responsible for any and all progress over the course of the game.

In a realistic progression system, you are responsible for the progression of your team. The only difference is how you are responsible.

[briax87]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

Wear & Tear Injury System from HC09. Year round rehab & PUP List. Offseason Player surgeries. Med Staff update.
8 Man Practice Squad - You Practice with these guys.
46 GameDay Roster
Fix having to pick teams home away uniform before game. (was correct in last gen)
Fix After first Season, able to select Pre-Season Opponents.
Draft Presentation - More info on trades (who, what, why),
Full Coaching Staff
Scouting staff, All players evaluated based on scouts info. Board put together based on their info. All scouts have strengths and weakness in their evaluation.
Player attitudes ($$$, Players drafted at their Position, Play time, scheme fit).

There is something similar in FIFA career mode. Sometimes, when you buy a great player that plays in a position you already have filled (like buying an attacking midfielder when you already have one), there will be news articles about your current player feeling like his position is under threat. Then you'll get a message from him asking to be played ahead of the new guy.

Some guys will just ask for a transfer right away if someone else comes in.

Then, you have guys with a "team player" trait who will never complain about any of this stuff, and other guys who will act like a complete diva if they're dropped for one game. It's been in since FIFA 12 or 13 IIRC (could be wrong, didn't play much 10/11).

They're small bits, but they add LOADS when a star player demands a transfer out of the blue

[StefJoeHalt]

Re: Was/has there been any franchise info released?

There is something similar in FIFA career mode. Sometimes, when you buy a great player that plays in a position you already have filled (like buying an attacking midfielder when you already have one), there will be news articles about your current player feeling like his position is under threat. Then you'll get a message from him asking to be played ahead of the new guy.



Some guys will just ask for a transfer right away if someone else comes in.



Then, you have guys with a "team player" trait who will never complain about any of this stuff, and other guys who will act like a complete diva if they're dropped for one game. It's been in since FIFA 12 or 13 IIRC (could be wrong, didn't play much 10/11).



They're small bits, but they add LOADS when a star player demands a transfer out of the blue

Which is funny we already had this..we were there once..it was nice they just needed to build from it..but they didn't


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