Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

[252Life]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

What are you being exactly because anyone paying attention to next gen would gladly take you up on that.

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk 2

I hope i'm wrong but I won't get my hopes up.

They learned from their mistakes on the current gen in this department. It won't be bare-bones, doesn't mean the game will be good but it will at least be full-featured.



Cost a lot of money to get all that stuff together, its gonna have to be a 2 year process, I think 2K will make a run at it but the lawsuit (putting an end to exclusive licensing for EA) was settled last year and the fact that they haven't started the process now means it won't be any time soon. Also 989 Sports hasn't made game since 2006, it was absorbed into SCEA San Diego, there's no way they take focus away from the Show to start what could be a failure.

What amazes me is how many people are automatically attributing this to consumers finally having enough with the product... Really? They've been buying it for years, regardless of quality (and fyi the general public doesn't have as many negative things to say about various sports franchises as the visitors to this site do,), and now that sales are down with the Next Generation of consoles set to debut in 2 months and 13 days your gonna ignore that fact and come to the conclusion that they are finally going to come to their sense?

Sales are down because of the Next Gen anticipation, that's a fact. The only question is how much of that is purely because they are waiting for Next Gen and how much is because they heard bad things about the game and aren't bothering with the current gen in the meantime. Yes there are some who have sworn off the series entirely, but they are the minority.

650,000 people haven't quit the series, there are a lot of reasons to look forward to Madden on the Next Gen and this is influencing people's purchase decision.

And its important to note that 1M in the first week is still extremely good, just down from recent years, this isn't going to hurt EA's bottom-line and it is easily explainable to shareholders that its due to the Next Gen.

You're fooling yourselves if you think this is going to hurt EA, cause the NFL to pull their rights (no one is there to take over, and its no longer legal to grab exclusive rights, the NFL would literally be losing a video game deal for the year if they "rethought their partnership with EA). EA is going to keep making Madden, hopefully someone will step in and create some competition, because even if M25 on the XB1 and PS4 is everything we have been hoping for, it is always better for their to be great incentive to improve upon the last iteration. Without competition things become stagnant, even if they are working to bring you the best game possible (see MLB the Show, still a fantastic game but its review scores are dropping by the year, its hard to improve on perfection, especially when their is no legitimate competition trying to one-up your perfect game).

Agree with everything. 989 sports was a joke by the way.

[roadman]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

all i can say to anyone wishing/hoping/praying that ps4/next-gen madden 25 will be better than this madden 25 is..

the hell are you on?!

it's almost guaranteed to be the same game with a bit better gfx.. we all remember the debacle of 360/ps3 first edition maddens when they ditched their old sim roots and went strictly arcadeish

it'll be like that

first-edition games for new consoles generally speaking aren't that good

And they've been working on it for a few years, too. You don't think they recall 06?

[BigJT1083]

Keep it up and don't buy into the hype that it will be better on next-gen, we know that is NOT true! Want EA Sports to actually listen to you? Hurt them in the only area they care about, sales. I've been getting my football fix by playing NCAA 06 and Madden 06 in the last few weeks and it is crazy how much more fun I have with it than I ever had with any of the 360 versions. The graphics are no where near as good, but you can actually play a working game and immerse yourself in the dynasty/franchise and race for the heisman/superstar modes. Much rather pay $60 to play these old gems again than waste my money on the new crap they try to sell us (which most of it was already used at some point).

[kjcheezhead]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

Not surprised. A few reasons for it...

1. The game isn't great. In many ways, particularly the defense, the game went backwards from 13 which itself was a buggy mess introducing IE and CCM.

2. Next gen is coming and people want a different experience after only playing current gen madden for several years now.

3. The exclusive license is still set to end after this year, people wanting it to end have more insentive to skip this year.

4. A lot of reviews have been scoring the game low. Gamespot gave it a six.

5. GTA V.

Personally, I love the timing. With the exclusive agreement set to expire, EA is settling and paying out $11 million to Robin Antonick and $27 million to gamers from the class action suit. The game already costs them $2 million to John Madden and $50 million to the NFL. Not to mention the Obannon, NCAA situation. Maybe, just maybe there is hope for new NFL video games in the future.

Source and interesting read: http://money.cnn.com/2013/09/05/tech...source=cnn_bin

One other factor that occurred to me. There is a fair number of madden fans that buy the game in 2 year cycles. With 13 introducing physics I think a lot of these guys made a purchase in a year they usually don't.

It sort makes sense when you look at both games sales. Madden 13 had a big spike in sales compared to every other version this gen. Maybe things just balanced out this year.

At any rate, there are several potential reasons for a decline in sales, and none I can think of for EA to have expected increased sales. I know quality was the main reason for me personally tho.

[bkrich83]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

Would love to see a next gen version of this

Why? That game was an AWFUL representation of football, which actually got worse with a patch.

I'd love to see more and better games of football on the market, but Backbreaker was certainly not an example of one. It was a ridiculously bad game, that couldn't get the most basic of football principles down. Nothing more than an over the top tech demo.

[bkrich83]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

My biggest fear with a decline in Madden sales is that EA makes the game even more accesible to casual fans, and cater to the lowest common denominator.

I think the unfortunate reality is a large majority of Madden gamers don't want an exact replication of the NFL. I think we even see that here. We see people who clamor for more sim and more "realism" and on the odd occasions EA delivers that realism, those people still complain.

[JerseySuave4]

I haven't thought Madden was any good for the last few years but playing the demo a few times I don't think this years game is that bad. However, i'm not spending money and putting in time on Madden on the current systems when i'll be getting it for the PS4. I don't care what incentive programs they have it's a waste of money to do that.

[JerseySuave4]

Also, i'm not a big EA fan but those that keep saying EA needs to go belly up or EA needs to fail or suffer so Madden tanks and someone else makes a game, you people need to get over yourselves. I'm not a big Madden fan these days, haven't bought the game in at least 3-4 years. But this idea that 2k will jump right in and we'll get NFL 2K but better is people holding on to the past.

[JohnDoe8865]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

I'm personally taking a wait and see approach on next-generation consoles. I'm strongly leaning towards PS4 after being XBOX/XBOX 360 since 2002. The difference maker for me is baseball. I NEED a solid baseball game, and MLB: The Show is a game I've salivated over as a 360 owner for years. I don't know for sure which console I'll get but either way I'm doing what is, IMO, the smart thing and waiting until after Christmas to get console impression and game impressions and THEN make my decision. If M25 next-gen is an improvement over current gen, I will likely buy it being an NFL fan first and foremost. Same goes with NBA 2K14 and their stellar reputation, I have reason to believe that next-gen NBA 2K might be special. Past that, I'm in wait and see mode.

In the meantime I'm satisfied with getting games for my 360 such as GTA V and WWE '14. After those two game, I'll definitely turn my focus to next-gen, unless a sleeper hit comes to current gen. Going to take a wait and see approach for this generation, the same way I did for the 360.

[TeeDogg]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

Why? That game was an AWFUL representation of football, which actually got worse with a patch.

I'd love to see more and better games of football on the market, but Backbreaker was certainly not an example of one. It was ridiculously bad, that couldn't get the most basic of football principles down. Nothing more than an over the top tech demo.

a tech demo sums it up best

[Eddie1967]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

I am having fun with this year's version but this is great news. The folks at EA have been putting out a less than mediocre product for the last couple of years and hopefully this will show the NFL that it much better to have multiple football games to represent their sport rather than one. This years version of madden football should have been the best of everything, presentation, gameplay etc. etc. While it has improved it is still behind games that were on the last version of xbox.

[infemous]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

I hope sales continue to plummet and forces the NFL to realise that EA are not representing their brand sufficiently, and open up the license to competition.

Until this happens, I hope that EA see this as an incentive to finally start making a simulation game, much like the FIFA brand.

At the end of the day, the logic is inescapable. People buy officially licensed sports games to recreate what they see and feel from that sport.

As soon as they start to feel that what they are playing does not accurately represent what they see on the field, they lose interest.

This is the same for every spectrum of sports gamer, from SIM to Arcade to everything in between.

$60 is a lot of money that people cannot afford to spend every year on a poor product.

[simbayless]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

Call of duty tried the same rinse and repeat concept. look what happen when compitition came thru and took half if not most of next gen pre orders.The next Call of duty has no choice but to bring it next tme.My biggest concern Is Ea not showing more footage of next gen madden intill Oct if so,thats a big white flag letting me know there is no confidents this year.NBA Live is a perfect example of that,you mean to tell me that you been out the game for 3 years and you gonna wait till your number one selling competitor show its hand first?They don't mind showing next gen fifa.Marketng the hype train is not gonna cut it next gen and no more 3yr plans.Im gonna wait for impressions on here and reviews just like I did current gen im glad I did whew

[bkrich83]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

Why do so many people hate carriage returns/formatting their posts?

[Afrikan]

Re: Madden Sales Down Significantly This Year

Why? That game was an AWFUL representation of football, which actually got worse with a patch.

I'd love to see more and better games of football on the market, but Backbreaker was certainly not an example of one. It was a ridiculously bad game, that couldn't get the most basic of football principles down. Nothing more than an over the top tech demo.

and of course Mestevo tags along..lol.

look, with BackBreaker there were little things that most didn't even notice that made it realistic (especially compared to Madden), from having to focus on a receiver if you wanted to be more accurate...to also having to focus as a receiver, to be able to hold on to a ball if you were collided with. It wasn't easy pulling these moves off, and it shouldn't be.

looking the coverage away as a QB, or just going through your progressions.

for their very first football game, let alone their very first videogame...imo they did a pretty damn good job....especially compared to a football series that is in its 25th edition.

the main things that stood out about BackBreaker that weren't not realistic, stamina and no left handed QBs.

and before some think I'm just hating on Madden or whatever, I actually like what they have done since Madden 12 (but my expectations were pretty low to start with)...sure there are things that still frustrate me about the game, but I'm having fun playing online like 4-5 times a night... (with most people quitting by halftime..lol)