My attempt at cleaning up the mess that is Franchise Mode

[I Peench]

J Masta and nuckles, really like the ideas. Keep them comin!

[Outkizast]

I like this thread Peench. Franchise is THE most important game mode in Madden, and they really need to step it up.

[thudias]

Good Post J Masta

[PacMan3000]

Just wanted to bump this real quick to say that this was a great thread, and as franchise details begin to trickle out, it would be wise to compare what we wanted with what we got.

Hopefully there are some similarities.

[PacMan3000]

I also just want to quickly add something after delving back into franchise mode this weekend.

I was in year 6. I went 16-0 (which never happens to me) and I won the Super Bowl. It was never acknowledged that I was making history. There was never a countdown to my team breaking the record. There was never any discussion that I would be regarded as one of the best teams in history. It was just another game.

I won my second SB in three years. And it made me think--where is the Super Bowl history? Why aren't the commentators discussing how I've turned around the Cleveland Browns? Why no stat banner to show me who won the last five Super Bowls?

Coupled with this, I finally realized the problem with the stat banners. Sure, they're infrequent, but this issue I noticed was that nothing in the stat banners in terms of HISTORICAL INFORMATION is relevant to your franchise post-2010. Meaning, that in 2010, the Cleveland Browns have never been to a Super Bowl, so it makes sense that the stat banner tells me that they won multiple championships in the 1950's. There's not much else in terms of recent big wins and championships to hang your hat on.

When I'm in year 2014 in my franchise, and I've won two Super Bowls, there should be a banner that tells my that my team last won a Super Bowl in 2012. It should mention what coach I won it with. It should tell me that my 4th year RB broke the rushing record that season, too. It should give me relevant historical information that pertains to my progression in franchise mode.

Here's another thing. Two years prior in my franchise mode, I traded my young QB to the Vikings for a 2nd round draft pick. Two years later, I am playing the Vikings in the Super Bowl and he is quarterbacking the team. Where's the discussion of this incredibly juicy story line? There was none. I wish the game would recognize players that you cast off or traded to other teams and work that into both the commentary and stat banners. I'd love to have seen stats for when the QB played on my team compared to what he's done since coming to the Vikings two seasons ago.

After winning the Super Bowl, I remembered back to past Madden and 2K games and remembered that there used to be a fear of getting fired. They need to bring this back. I can't recall if it was Madden or 2K, but every season would begin with the owner giving you objectives: Win 10 games. Win a wildcard playoff game. Get to the conference championship game, etc. And each season, if you did well, the goals would get harder and harder to achieve.

The owner would forgive you if you did well for a couple seasons but didnt meet the goal. But after a few years, he would fire you, and you would have the option of signing with three or four teams that had coaching vacancies. I loved this, as it brought drama and a bit of pressure to the game.

This ended up being longer than I expected, but at the end of the day, I think I just realized that franchise mode is in dire need of information. Deep, analytical information that gives the impression that the game understands that the league you're playing in is constantly in motion.

[G-Men_in_Mass]

Quote: Originally Posted by Outkizast

I like this thread Peench. Franchise is THE most important game mode in Madden, and they really need to step it up.

I agree with you and Im sure all the people in this thread do, but I have a bad feeling the Devs, of this game and many more to come dont feel this way..

[PocketRocket]

The ratings, other than speed, have to carry more weight. That in itself will provide more depth to the franchise mode. Imagine if APF, with the way star players stood out, had some sort of a franchise mode. It would have been epic just because of that. In APF you had to account for star players; imagine if you picked up someone in the 7th round that opposing teams had account for each and every play.

We also need extended rosters in the preseason so preseason actually has a purpose. The potential ratings need to be invisible, period. Their could be projected potential ratings, maybe the head coach, coordinators and position coaches could all have their own projected potential ratings for a player, but a player's true potential rating should never be visible to the user.

[PocketRocket]

Quote: Originally Posted by nuckles2k2

They only have signing bonuses in Madden right now, players receive those just for signing the contract. But a roster bonus is conditional to if the player is on the active roster on a certain date (usually after the draft in the NFL.) So then the wheels begin to spin..."do we keep [insert player] on the roster or do we let him go and draft someone to replace him?" Is it worth it to keep that vet and have to pay him his roster bonus on top of his salary for that season? Or would it make more sense to cut ties and replace him? The Jets just did it with Faneca. He had a $7.5 mil roster bonus due this year on top of a $7.5 mil salary. The team didn't feel comfortable paying a 34 year old guard $15 mil this season so we parted ways and drafted Vlad Ducasse. Right now you can't really have a roster bonus in Madden because there are no dates during the off-season. Just stages: Retirements, resign player, free agency, draft, etc. But if we had actual weeks to sim through (MLB 10: The Show) then it would give us more leeway. You know that a player is due a roster bonus on May 1st and the draft is on April 22nd...well....it's decision time. Do you keep the vet around or are you going to try to get some value for him during the draft? Do you cut him outright if you can't move him during the draft or are you ready to take on his salary+bonus for one more year? If they tried to add a roster bonus to Madden right now you would have to make your decision during a stage before you advance to the next one, that's a part of the reason why Franchise is so stale. You can get through an off-season in like 15 mins....it should take longer than that.

You don't need a working calendar to have roster bonuses, just as you don't need a calendar for trade deadlines. At a certian point in the season there is a trade deadline. Roster bonuses could just be a stage in the off-season process like retirements, re-signing players, free agency and the draft. Just put it were it is supposed to be in relation to the sequence of the existing off-season tasks, and give the user the ability to pick and choose which players he wants to pay, or he can simulate it and let the CPU do it for him. It's essentially like a second re-signing period, except there is no negotiation.

A lot of the things we want in franchise shouldn't be that complicated to implement. Practice squads and extended rosters shouldn't be that complicated either. There's a free agent pool; give it more of a purpose than to just fill in you roster. During the off-season, allow us to simply select 20 players, or more, and then add another stage were we have to cut down to 61 players. 53 of those players would on the roster, and 8 of those players would be on the practice squad.