Five Essential Fixes for Madden NFL 11

[ChubbyBanana]

This would make me love Madden again.

[try122583]

They need to fire everyone who worked on this game and hire some people who not only have experience in making video games, but have experience in what football is. This game is a big fat pile of garbage, and I'm so mad at myself for giving EA $60 of my money to support this craptastic franchise. Your write-up is good, but you need to address is the online franchise. What a joke. Easy to score 60-70 points, even when the game is on All-Madden. Arena football has less offense than this game. They need to take a year off and figure out how to make a football game. Maybe if they let 2K make football again EA would care about what product they released to the public.

[mwjr]

Good ideas, but in my opinion, you're missing the most important feature: a functional, in-depth franchise mode, one that incorporates many of the features in Head Coach 08.

But I'm not holding my breath.

[superstarshad]

My top five:
1. Sensitive precision passing- stick skills should mean something

2. The ability to save online games- I want to asses myself and my previous opponent

3. Upload Ncaa football roster to online franchise-Duh...

4. Football IQ quizes-Madden football players should be the smartest football faction in the nation.

5 Rebuilt on the PS3- Blu ray has way more space...

[Cryolemon]

I think all 5 of the suggestions are needed. Whether any of them will happen s a different question.

[dhlord64]

How about actually making the game not look like a bunch of robots running around on ice? REDO the TERRIBLE game engine PLEASE! The game is unplayable and laughable at the moment. Those top 5 are very minor things compared to the REAL issues with the franchise...ugh

[alali24]

awesome, and one thing they should add to the players is a composer attribute. This way when you play in those big games(rivalrys, playoffs, playoff effecting regular season games) if you have a low composer rating your player won't play as well if he gets rattled.

[21 Guns]

1. They need to make IR actually function in franchise the way it should.

2. The QB avoidance stick is hardly ever used mainly cause of it's button configuration. Would be much easier if it was the left stick. They should make it so you have to click L3 (PS3) to activate the avoidance system then move the stick in any direction to execute a move. With it vbeing on the right stick you have to move your thumb off the face buttons which slows down reaction time.

3. Give us the option of starting year one of our franchise (online and offline) from the beginning of that offseason. While letting us redo that years free agency and rookie draft, if we choose to do so.

4. Add practice squads, and a waiver system.

5. Add FA, and a salary cap to online franchise.

6. Fix the stat engine in franchise mode

7. Give the kicking engine a complete face lift. It is way too easy to kick FG's. Accuracy should play a much bigger roll. ie even if you perfect the meter you should still miss on occasian, depending on your K acc

[SteelCityChamp]

That's why some are mentioning to do both the NFL Network and ESPN.

Maybe I misunderstood the devs when they addressed this. I thought the NFL Network simply did not want all of the presentation devoted to ESPN or any other network besides it's own. I didn't get the impression it had anything to do with it's other television partners. I could very well be incorrect though.

To be honest though, I sometimes wonder if the 'dont-want-to-piss-off-the-NFL' thing is overblown. I'm not one of the guys who labels the devs as liars or anything to that extent. I just personally find it hard to believe that a NFL rep was in a Madden planning meeting and said, "Where the hell does the NFL Network come in? Scrap these ESPN and FOX ideas immediately!" And if it is an issue, marry the two networks like NCAA is doing. Easier said than done obviously, just lending my opinions.

P.S. from what I understand, Madden was subjected to bland presentation [read radio guy] because of a design decision, the NFL didn't impact that. Apparently, they wanted to go with a on-the-field feel for the game.

As far as telecast intergration is concerned, they should emulate all of the games in franchise mode as closely as possible. You know, AFC home games on CBS, NFC home games on Fox, Sunday Night games on NBC, Monday Night games on ESPN and after week 8 or 9, Thursday night games on NFL Network. And some of the playoff games would be on ABC too, just like in real life. They can leave the pre-game, halftime show, post game and weekly review shows done by the NFL Network and that would satisfy the NFL as far as realism. Oh yeah, fix the bradcast cam also. It's way too far away and doesn't move like it would during an actual broadcast.

In addidtion Ian Cummings and crew should design a better animation engine and improve the AI. Maybe come up with some sort of Realism mode and do away with those silly rookie, pro, all-pro and all-madden levels. Ick! Ridiculous. Just make a realism mode and an arcade mode and man, EA would be ahead of the game at that point. Simulation for all of the sim heads out there who love realistic football and arcade mode for all the kids and those who just wanna have fun and play like most people online play anyway.

Now combine all of these things into one game and OMG! we all could finally stop updating rosters for NFL 2k5 and move on to the future. EA has a chance to make the best NFL football game in history when it comes to patching Madden NFL 10 or it can just come out fresh for Madden NFL 11 and knock our socks off with an awesome friggen football game. I really don't care which software company can get this done, I just want it done. But since EA Sports is in the driver's seat right now, show some leadership and foresight and make an attempt at pleasing both sim heads and casual football gamers with one game. I know it can be done, you just have to want to do it. I guarantee that sales would be ridiculous if EA made a game like this. My 2 cents!

[steelersfan7]

One other thing they need to address is how the CPU calls plays. Down by 14 late in the fourth they still run the ball and should be passing it all out shotgun formation. 4th and inches, less then 5:00 left, and down by 10 and the CPU punts???? Also I use the ask madden on offense and defense and its seems that all the plays are not being used with the ask madden feature, I see some plays again and again and others I do not. God bless

[rocknroll1968]

Re: Five Essential Fixes for Madden NFL 11

As others have said, the article mentions good ideas.

However, gameplay improvements are much more of a necessity, IMO. M10 is not a good enough simulator

[Black59Razr]

Re: Five Essential Fixes for Madden NFL 11

I wish the game was so good that those five things were essential.

What about WR catching everything? I had Russell get the record for 24 straight completions, lol!

What about not being able to throw a ball at a players feet or way over their head and out of the back of the end zone?

What about defenses being way too good during zone?

What about the fact that man coverage is totally broke? As long as you stay out of 3rd and long, you can destroy man coverage every time.

What about QBs still being way to accurate? See Russell ^

What about the fact that WR always run perfect routes? I have yet to see a WR run the wrong route.

What about the lack of defensive reaction during run action? You never see all linebackers stay in their gaps during run action.

What about the poor fatigue system? As long as you spell your player a play or two, they will be 100% in the 4th quarter. There is no long term fatigue.

What about the WRs speeding towards an overthrow? If a defender is running stride for stride on a drag route, just overthrow the ball and watch your 92spd WR turn into a 120 speed and catch the ball.

What about QBs being able to sprint away from the play 10 yards, then throwing a spinning backwards throw to the RB for a 40 yard screen every time?

All these major gameplay problems and you want to see the game like it looks on TV? What about how it looks in real life? Its posts like these that keep the game from being as sim as they need to be.

[fig1918]

They won't be able to add Custom playbooks for a long long time. The game just isn't good enough. It would totally kill the AI, the game would just be totally broken. As cool as it would be there would be too many unstoppable/glitchy plays to account for and be patched. I just can't see then do it until they make some major changes to the game.

[PGaither84]

Re: Five Essential Fixes for Madden NFL 11

While watching the Patriots Colts game on NBC with my friend who I have been getting into football, he made a coment that was awesome. "I notice that guy is wearing a visor, I bet he has a visor in Madden." Obviously he was cracking a joke on how detailed and pretty Madden looks and it's attention to visual detail but still doesn't emulate true football.

[carnalnirvana]

Re: Five Essential Fixes for Madden NFL 11

if they nailed the 5 things on that list perfectly this game still wont be worth a rental....

it needs better logic and AI for every postion on the field hands down the only thing 11 should be about is AI logic,

forget physics, forget graphics, forget momentum, just give us logical calculating AI

no pro tak
no player weapons
no fight for fumble
no lead blocker control
no vision cone
no more gimmicks

just give us CPU logic upgrades

for those who want momentum over logic i say look at live 10, the games has great movement but lacks basic logical gameplay such as transition easy baskets.