[KBLover]

I think Madden just needs to bring back weekly progression AND represent weekly prep.

NFL 2k5 did this and it didn't require the user to actually study film or whatever.

You set up how you want to run your drills that week and the game gives you the results, and progression can be tied to what you did (or didn't) practice that week.

If you want a performance component, fine. I don't think ratings are evaluations as the game uses them, but instead help determine the actual result of plays, but if you want part of the system to make it so that if a player succeeded far lower than their "expected" rating to lose ratings points - that's fine. He'd have to work harder in practice to get back up and that has some basis in reality.

Could use a "experience point" system like in HC. Talent could modify how much "progression points" the player gains/loses towards a rating. When the bar fills up to the next rating, the player gains a point in that rating, if it empties out and falls "below zero" the player loses a point, but the bar would still be largely filled (say 75%).

But I think Madden needs a weekly prep system to really make progression realistic.

Using a Talent system would be interesting. A modifier to the progression of a player basically is a roundabout way to cap max ratings growth (if only because players have limited amounts of time for their careers).