Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

[Kingd803]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

This is nonsense. As someone that played six online seasons of APFB 2K8, and loved 2K football to death, Madden eclipsed 2K's gameplay years ago. That doesn't make Madden perfect. But let's not pretend that 2K8 was so perfect.

No, that is wrong.

APF still animates better. Fact. The running game is way better. Dline and oline interaction blows madden away. The passing game is miles ahead. I mean look at QB drop backs. Heck simple things like the ball actually being in the QBs hands. I mean QB drop backs and throwing motion are so much better in APF it’s unbelievable.

Basically it’s 2k vs live animation wise. But the difference is much worse than that.

All of these are indisputable. Madden has improved its not terrible. Some new animations look really good. But it’s still so far behind. In many areas.

[secondsolution]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

I've noticed my interest in sports games in general drop considerably this year. As someone who essentially only plays solo offline franchise it feel like this preference is being left behind in favour of storylines and continual sale models (MUT).

This award and the consensus from the casual gamers are putting the nail in the coffin for the traditional franchise mode in sports games going forward. If it's too complicated, doesn't include enough fluff and can't make millions after sale revenue then it won't be included in upcoming releases

[Cowboy008]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

[DaGreatOne21]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

This is nonsense. As someone that played six online seasons of APFB 2K8, and loved 2K football to death, Madden eclipsed 2K's gameplay years ago. That doesn't make Madden perfect. But let's not pretend that 2K8 was so perfect.

Well, I mean, I wont deny there are aspects of Madden's gameplay that are better, but lets be real here....the animation and physics in 2K are still better than anything Madden has ever been, and that directly translates to superior gameplay in many ways.....and beyond gameplay, youll see hings happen in 2K that youll never see happen in Madden.

I could list a ton of examples, but Ill just leave it at this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngG0v5Lt2us

I know some people on here dont care for him, but this video is spot on. Ive been complaining about fade routes in Madden forever.

[Devaster]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

Well, I mean, I wont deny there are aspects of Madden's gameplay that are better, but lets be real here....the animation and physics in 2K are still better than anything Madden has ever been, and that directly translates to superior gameplay in many ways.....and beyond gameplay, youll see hings happen in 2K that youll never see happen in Madden.

I could list a ton of examples, but Ill just leave it at this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngG0v5Lt2us

I know some people on here dont care for him, but this video is spot on. Ive been complaining about fade routes in Madden forever.

The new passing mechanic can be used to throw proper fade routes. But yes, it is a fundamental issue with the way the game is programmed. Unless it is an errant pass the ball gets thrown to the receiver. Never over the receiver or a back shoulder.

[RogerDodger]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

Owen Good and Samit Sarkar have gone with Madden 18 as Polygon's 2017's Sports Game of the Year.



As much as I have enjoyed Madden this year, I have hard time believing NBA 2K18 or MLB The Show 17 were not strong entires. And really, NBA Live 18 is getting most of my sports gaming time. I also think that NHL 18's Threes was a bigger risk, and paid off a lot better than Longshot.

But man, combine that with The Sixth Access also choosing Madden 18 as it's Sports Game of the Year, also in large part due to the "success" of Longshot, and the strong sales of the game so far, sim gamers are going to have a hard time convincing the the powers that be that Madden 18 is an abomination that needs to be completely reworked.

They pay a lot of attention to their Metacritic scores though and the last time I checked the *user* score on there was a 3.8. Reviewers are still only one customer out of many and don't carry the influence they once did. Maybe EA will ignore customers who want a better all around product - gambling that the storyline and MUT audience will stick around for the length of time that some of us 'sim' gamers have.

[Thunderhorse]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

No, that is wrong.

APF still animates better. Fact. The running game is way better. Dline and oline interaction blows madden away. The passing game is miles ahead. I mean look at QB drop backs. Heck simple things like the ball actually being in the QBs hands. I mean QB drop backs and throwing motion are so much better in APF it’s unbelievable.

Basically it’s 2k vs live animation wise. But the difference is much worse than that.

All of these are indisputable. Madden has improved its not terrible. Some new animations look really good. But it’s still so far behind. In many areas.

Anyone who has invested any legitimate amount of time in All Pro would never have said that.

It's still night and day. The one thing I'll give Madden credit for is I believe their product actually understands run concepts a little better. The power O and Zone run plays are actually readable now, and All Pro wasn't entirely there yet outside of their power plays. The Madden dev team deserves real praise for that.

That said, The individual that tried to assert this falsehood has already proven themselves not to be taken seriously. I never, in my life, saw anyone call that game "APFB2K8".

"Football" is one word, and the game was APF2K8.

[jfsolo]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

They pay a lot of attention to their Metacritic scores though and the last time I checked the *user* score on there was a 3.8. Reviewers are still only one customer out of many and don't carry the influence they once did. Maybe EA will ignore customers who want a better all around product - gambling that the storyline and MUT audience will stick around for the length of time that some of us 'sim' gamers have.

NBA 2K18's User Metacritic score is 1.6. That score we know is not indicative of the true quality of the game, but is of course primarily composed of protest scores because of anger over VC. The game is still on pace for record sales again. Does one think that Take Two is going to let those scores be a strong motivator for the direction of 2K19's development or will they look at sales and the revenue that they made from micro-transactions.

The BattleFront 2 User Metacritic is 0.9. There may be some legitimate criticisms about games from some of the user Metacritic scores, but lets be real, since most of the votes are protest votes or trolling now, I'm pretty sure that executives think of it as mostly noise. Many Users have rendered their opinion useless because of their intellectual dishonesty. Withholding their money is now their only weapon.

[kinsmen7]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

I'd say that if you go to any one of the forums on OS (NHL, NBA, Madden, MLB, FIFA), that there are multiple threads with serious gripes about every single one of them. NHL hasn't changed in years, NBA and FIFA decided to play the micro transaction game, Madden hasn't done a thing to the CFM, MLB had to release a million patches and ended up basically negating the whole "Improved ball physics" selling point that they pushed this year (And didn't update franchise mode).

I haven't played FIFA yet, and MLB will likely always be my favorite, but I'll be honest and say that I really do enjoy firing up M18, and can understand why it would be their choice for sports game of the year.

[bad_philanthropy]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

Madden 18 was a really good game by mid-November with 1.07, and before 1.08 introduced the running in mud bug. Didn't play NBA this year, but The Show, FIFA, PES, and yes, NHL 18, were better sports games imo.

[Lexicon]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

I think it's real interesting that a lot of the people giving Madden 18 their Sports Game of the Year site that it's because, while other games were better, they all had controversy and fan backlash.

That's interesting because a lot of things in Madden 18 were either tuned due to fan backlash, broken, or just underwhelming. Not to mention there was that whole incident where one of their competitive players screamed how bad the game sucked on stage. It just sounds like, from what I've listened to and read, that some like to talk about all the problems with the other games, but either don't know about the problems with M18 or they don't want to bring them up. And this isn't isolated to this year. This has been a trend for some journalists for a while now.

Longshot was definitely a thumbs up for me, so I personally understand sighting that as a big positive for M18, and Madden looks great and benefitted the best from the X1X. But I can't help but feel like certain journalists and people who vote on these awards give Madden a lot of slack.

Why that is (I don't want to speculate) I don't know.

Now, none of this really matters, and it's all a matter of personal opinion. If they had the most fun with M18 this, then good on them. I just worry that Rex will use this, as he has other metrics in the past, to excuse the product.

[Darth Aegis]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

I think it's real interesting that a lot of the people giving Madden 18 their Sports Game of the Year site that it's because, while other games were better, they all had controversy and fan backlash.

That's interesting because a lot of things in Madden 18 were either tuned due to fan backlash, broken, or just underwhelming. Not to mention there was that whole incident where one of their competitive players screamed how bad the game sucked on stage. It just sounds like, from what I've listened to and read, that some like to talk about all the problems with the other games, but either don't know about the problems with M18 or they don't want to bring them up. And this isn't isolated to this year. This has been a trend for some journalists for a while now.

Longshot was definitely a thumbs up for me, so I personally understand sighting that as a big positive for M18, and Madden looks great and benefitted the best from the X1X. But I can't help but feel like certain journalists and people who vote on these awards give Madden a lot of slack.

Why that is (I don't want to speculate) I don't know.

Now, none of this really matters, and it's all a matter of personal opinion. If they had the most fun with M18 this, then good on them. I just worry that Rex will use this, as he has other metrics in the past, to excuse the product.

I think everyone makes valid points. Whats a concern to me is that the top execs at EA will see this and go see we dont need to improve on this or that at this time or dump addititonal resources into that, we did get sports game of the yr from so & so remember. Like any company their going to stretch their dollar to maximze the most profit right.. I do enjoy Madden, but the core gamplay itself imo needs improvement in so many areas and their efforts fall short of sports game of the yr. Not saying Madden doesnt or wont improve its just harder for the teams to maybe push for things that they know need to be fixed or improved upon. I think we all want a better Madden but i think we all want them to be forced to pin the needle at some point. Maybe im expecting to much from a company thats been making a liscensed NFL football game since the early 90's. Maybe EA has hit their ceiling.

[JayhawkerStL]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

That said, The individual that tried to assert this falsehood has already proven themselves not to be taken seriously. I never, in my life, saw anyone call that game "APFB2K8".

"Football" is one word, and the game was APF2K8.

???

Ever play FBPro 98?

[itsmb8]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

Madden is never changing...

[GisherJohn24]

Re: Polygon: Sports Game of the Year 2017 - Madden 18

Owen Good and Samit Sarkar have gone with Madden 18 as Polygon's 2017's Sports Game of the Year.



As much as I have enjoyed Madden this year, I have hard time believing NBA 2K18 or MLB The Show 17 were not strong entires. And really, NBA Live 18 is getting most of my sports gaming time. I also think that NHL 18's Threes was a bigger risk, and paid off a lot better than Longshot.

But man, combine that with The Sixth Access also choosing Madden 18 as it's Sports Game of the Year, also in large part due to the "success" of Longshot, and the strong sales of the game so far, sim gamers are going to have a hard time convincing the the powers that be that Madden 18 is an abomination that needs to be completely reworked.

Probably mentioned. But sports really stunk this year for me and from what I heard, I'm not the only one. 2K really was disappointing and honestly it's so disappointing I can see why they picked madden. Honestly, what else really is there? NBA Live? Fun, but lacking. FIFA. Nah. NHL? Nah. MLB was probably the next best choice this year. So I'm fine with them picking Madden. Any other year. NBA 2K IMO should get it. It's really been that good for quite some time. But the standard of greatness has dropped off.