[TNT713]

Quote: Originally Posted by roadman

I used to blame Ortiz because I heard he was trying to make the game for the tournament crowd and because I truly believe the Madden 10 and 12 were better than 06-09.(yes, people, I know that isn't saying much) Now, I just blame the whole system instead of pointing the finger at one person. How the heck do I know what goes at in Orlando? All I know there is a ton of pent up anger year after year because Madden isn't replicating the NFL. I never said more on the team will make it better, but it's a start in the right direction. I expect the doubters to continue to doubt and the haters continue to hate until the game proves them otherwise.

Gotta disagree completely - but only because I've been to Orlando and had face to face conversations with devs who were working to reverse the course of the series after 3 years of NG creative direction under Ortiz. Whether those 3 dev teams (06-08) were making a game for the tournament crowd or not isn't certain - but they certainly weren't making a game consistent with what we knew as the "Madden" brand. I always assumed there was a 2K influence, but I've since been informed that the "Ortiz 06-08" didn't feel like 2K either.

I played 2 games of Madden '06 on 360 a few days after launch... HORRIBLE isn't strong enough a word to describe how alien the game felt despite having some of the basic controls. The sprint button became more like a "Turbo" when it moved to the trigger, the play call screen, and the movement of the players all felt extremely foreign (not US/Canada foreign - more like US/Borneo foreign).

When Madden '09 came out, so many elements had to be stripped out and rebuilt from scratch to give Madden back it's Madden feel.

Foundational elements as simple as the grass had to be rebuilt because the Ortiz led dev teams felt field degradation was more important enough to usurp the resources that would have been for game play. The result was a game that played STUPID. The flight of the ball was actually designed to move toward a player's hands instead of moving the hands toward the ball...

The dev teams that came after Ortiz, (Ian and Phil moving from LG to NG) couldn't FIX what was broken foundationally - they were forced to SCRAP and REBUILD.

If that's not reversing course, I don't know what is.

Quote: Originally Posted by kjcheezhead

The thing is, they didn't reverse course from the Ortiz years. As others suggested, they could've reworked Madden from scratch for a year or two and released updated versions of an "Ortiz year" game. They didn't. They chose to continue to build off of what was clearly a broken foundation instead. They have also made mistakes post Ortiz. The horrendous commentary in Madden 12 is based off coding done post Ortiz. The team also chose to get Madden Ultimate Team and Team play off the ground while completely ignoring both online/offline franchise in the process...more choices that delayed the growth of the current core game modes. You also bring up the only "good" games in football history, but fail to mention Gameday. Whenever I hear about how difficult it is to get Madden right, that game comes to mind. Remember, EA said 3d players weren't possible and 989 proved them wrong. Forgive me if I don't something can't be done because EA says it can't.

Yes. I agree there have been some mistakes post-Ortiz. I fully expect there to be mistakes post-Cummings and in the future post-Weber (he won't be there forever). If the pattern persists, Cam will be off the dev team in 3 years.

Also, the development of MUT didn't come from the dev teams, per se... They were charged with finding a way to make use of new technologies to drive more revenues from DLC and new game sales because the rise of the used game market drastically cuts into EA's profit margin.

I can't comment on commentary - I always turn mine OFF and listen to the field sounds instead.

I bring don't bring up GameDay when I mention good games because it SUCKED. Yes, GameDay 98 had 3D models but that's where the goodness ended. Despite the eye-candy of the player models - Madden '98 sprites still made it a better game to play and replay. But GameDay 98 was good enough for me to buy GameDay 99 - which remains the only game in any genre that I've ever returned to the store. It wasn't as good as the 98 title. IIRC, that year was the last time I bought a console football game NOT named Madden (that's right, I've never played 2K but I still know a good game when I see it).

Later