Football, 5 years after.

[Radioactiveman]

It's funny, all the games that most people consider "great sports games" on next gen are all games that weren't recreated for the hardware. MLB The Show, NBA 2k, EA's Hockey to name a few franchises. These games were built on the previous foundation of it's predisessor on last gen.

We the consumer have been through this whole development cycle before on last gen. And it as painful now as it was back then. We're still slap dab in the middle of the whole process again and it's frustrating because our palettes have already been exposed to great game play and what IS possible and we're not getting it. Year after year. Even the simple things haven't made their way back into the Madden series.

IMO the whole thing has gone massively backwards and then has progressed from there. Is this years Madden better than last years? Yep, I think it is. Is it better than "last gen"? Nope. They're still not there yet (in terms of gameplay) and I personally don't see it getting there with the path that they're on.

[bigsmallwood]

Quote: Originally Posted by tazdevil20

I'm not willing to blame everything on the NFL. EA had a tremendous opportunity here to really shut out the football market had they made a spectacular game. Instead they took the lazy approach (which was what everyone knew they would do the day the license deal was announced). From a business point of view, can you really blame them? Of course not. In all honesty, being embarrassed by 5 year old games and unlicensed football games doesn't really seem to matter. Not trying to sound harsh, but that's the term that comes to mind, embarrassed. Had Madden 10 been better than 2k5, would that even have meant much? Why would you be shooting for a 5 year old game that a competing company made to be your watermark? To me, that's a red flag and a problem in itself. You should be shooting for real football, and to innovate where your simulation emulates the real gridiron like nothing else has ever done before. Attempting to finally move past a 5 year old game and still not even doing it in so many areas is a bit shameful. It really is unfortunate, since those who are losing out here are the gamers.

I agree! They still have yet to pass up a game from 5yrs ago...and all we get are exuses. That VC developmental team had one year to make a game as well...and look at what they gave us! SO after 5yrs of owning the NFL License and ESPN...they still have not taken us to infinity and beyond? And to top it off, Ian and crew have disappeared.

[jira2004]

Im jut thinking out loud what can we do as consumers.....What I mean should we at some point and be very serious about this not buy next years game and seriously send a message to $EA that enough is enough!!!

I know i know people will say that it won't matter..But hey I was a bank mgr for Wells Fargo believe me when i tell you it hurts when peolpe pull their money out and close their accounts....

I remember being excited about a new release football game now im just hoping they at least got decent gameplay now which is a shame...We all have choices and if everyone is for some kind of boycott and not the " next year piece" I'm 100% in for not buying next yr's game.....

[rufusone]

Quote: Originally Posted by sois

This is so depressing. It's gotten so bad, my casual friends are even questioning the game they used to buy blindly. People are starting to notice. I guess people are getting smarter about what to expect from video games.

You are right, people are starting to get tired of the same old song and dance regarding Madden and also NCAA, they are starting to realize that the games are getting stale and are boring and is it worth $120.00 to buy these every year especially the way the whole world econmy is. IMO the games have become stale, and not much fun to play for weeks on end. I have a fealling though that we are stuck with these engines until the next consoles comes out or until someone else can also carry the license.

[Paytonsplace]

Quote: Originally Posted by jira2004

Im jut thinking out loud what can we do as consumers.....What I mean should we at some point and be very serious about this not buy next years game and seriously send a message to $EA that enough is enough!!! I know i know people will say that it won't matter..But hey I was a bank mgr for Wells Fargo believe me when i tell you it hurts when peolpe pull their money out and close their accounts.... I remember being excited about a new release football game now im just hoping they at least got decent gameplay now which is a shame...We all have choices and if everyone is for some kind of boycott and not the " next year piece" I'm 100% in for not buying next yr's game.....

The only thing you can do as a consumer is vote with your feet i.e. don't buy the game. It doesn't matter if you not buying won't make a difference. The point is that you are being true to yourself and will not accept an inferior product. I was very happy when I passed up on Madden '08 and '09. All I had to do was come to these forums and see how wise my decision was. This year I was not as wise. I thought Madden was going to turn it around, so I bought it on day one. Mistake. I was sold on adaptive AI . Well adaptive AI does not seem to be going the way I thought it would so now I feel a bit foolish for spending the money. My point is there are always other games that will play in your 360. It does not have to be football, it just has to be good.

[Paytonsplace]

Quote: Originally Posted by NEWYORICAN

All great post!... Of all this depressing exculusivity stuff, I have to blame the NFL and MLB and not EA and 2K. Hey, they need to run and protect their business and their shareholders so they had to do what they did. No, the ones at fault here are the greedy NFL and MLB, they could have said no, but they didn't and took EA's and 2K's $$$ and didn't give a rats arse about the consumers. peace

You know I understand blaming the NFL. However EA then went out and secured exclusives for NCAA, ESPN and Arena football. They knocked out any chance for a company to compete. You can't blame that on the NFL alone.

[CRMosier_LM]

Sorry guys but I'll take a fun game that doesn't have revolutionary graphics/animations over a beautiful looking turd anyday. Lair anyone?!?

[budsticky]

Whether you're a hockey gamer or not I don't think you need to look any further than the hockey offering of 2K and EA to see what competition can do to revitalize a dead series. EA was getting it's but kicked by 2k in the hockey gaming community year after year. As of the last couple years EA has completely turned the tables and they now dominate in hockey with a product that as of last year was superior in just about every way. Would this huge turn around have happened if EA had exclusive NHL rights? Who knows. The point is, even with a game that is probably dwarfed in sales numbers compared to Madden, EA had to get its you know what together or they were just going to get flat out beat on the NHL front.

You can say the same thing for the FIFA vs. PES war. EA was getting thumped as far as quality soccer by Konami and PES. Now many believe that EA has turned the tables there as well.

So how can EA turn things around and produce superior products in two sports that aren't exclusive to them..both of which sell markedly less units (at least in the US). The answer is clear: they don't have to turn anything around with their NFL football game. They have nobody to threaten their sales numbers...which ironically enough was the whole reason the exclusivity thing happened. They were scared to death of what 2K could do to their cash cow. In retrospect I think 2K's biggest mistake was selling that game at 20 bucks. I mean it's just unheard of to release a game that eventually many people considered the best ever and you drop the price 30 dollars from previous years. Wow. EA had to do something. They could no longer compete on a game play front and they were getting beat on the price front as well. Ironically though, 2k probably shot themselves in the foot by putting it out at 20 bills....a sound strategy at the time, but hindsight is 20/20. Truth be told the exclusivity deal may have happened anyway, but that had to at least somewhat accelerate it behind the scenes.