Operation Sports Forums - View Single Post - The Best Madden? A Look Back at Madden NFL 10

TTD71 · 11-12-2013, 01:16 PM

The thing about EA that has just killed me is the lack of BUILDING on the foundation and constant need to tear out things that would have made M25 a definitive experience instead of another mish-mash slop fest. If they had married PRO-TAK and Infinity features - given us the pile-up animations as part of the game but removed the button mashing and truly randomized the results, or if they had kept all of the pre-game and post-game stuff and just kept adding more instead of adding a few new and taking out a few old animations every iteration (looks like they had ample disc space to do this judging by the file size thread) then we could have had a much better game.

Additionally, if the devs has swallowed some pride and EA had recognized the need to make a GREAT Madden game instead of maintaining the "differences" between two mediocre football titles, they could have taken a bit of the NCAA feature set - things like more replay options (or something as simple as being able to start viewing a replay in one angle AND THEN STOP to choose another without watching the whole thing), or maybe actually being able to save replays at all in Franchise (you CAN in Dynasty mode), or allowing custom stadium sounds for specific game situations (NCAA OWNS Madden on that count), or allowing people to save snapshots from in-game plays (again, NCAA = yes, Madden = no....FOR THE EXACT SAME ANIMATIONS in a lot of cases!!!)...

I could go on and on and on, but the fact is EA has got to rid itself of the philosophy that ALL things from previous titles or little brother title or defunct competitor's titles must be ignored or remvoed...they need a game that incorporates the accumulated hits and misses of the past into a growing title isntead of a Peter Pan game that never, ever grows up!

Other games and franchises have figured this out, yet Madden remains stuck in a paradigm from three generations ago...I'm an old timer (been playing Madden since the first days on Sega Genesis all the way through today), but I remember the single best thing that happened to Madden was Sony's NFL Gameday on PS1 completely annihilated Madden...it was not even a debate at the time, more like an NBA2k-vs. NBA Live curb stomping. THAT forced EA to redo the game completely and by the PS2 era they made what were some of the best games ever in the genre to that time between Madden NFL 2003-2006.

All I know is that I got my nice fat price fixing check from EA yesterday and thanks to their decisions and the settlement, I will getting an essentially free PS-Vita! We may never get back to the way the game used to build on itself, but at least I can play it while sitting on the can....which just may end up being the most appropriate thing to happen to Madden in years!!!

11-12-2013, 01:16 PM	#9
TTD71 Rookie OVR: 0 Join Date: Apr 2011	The thing about EA that has just killed me is the lack of BUILDING on the foundation and constant need to tear out things that would have made M25 a definitive experience instead of another mish-mash slop fest. If they had married PRO-TAK and Infinity features - given us the pile-up animations as part of the game but removed the button mashing and truly randomized the results, or if they had kept all of the pre-game and post-game stuff and just kept adding more instead of adding a few new and taking out a few old animations every iteration (looks like they had ample disc space to do this judging by the file size thread) then we could have had a much better game. Additionally, if the devs has swallowed some pride and EA had recognized the need to make a GREAT Madden game instead of maintaining the "differences" between two mediocre football titles, they could have taken a bit of the NCAA feature set - things like more replay options (or something as simple as being able to start viewing a replay in one angle AND THEN STOP to choose another without watching the whole thing), or maybe actually being able to save replays at all in Franchise (you CAN in Dynasty mode), or allowing custom stadium sounds for specific game situations (NCAA OWNS Madden on that count), or allowing people to save snapshots from in-game plays (again, NCAA = yes, Madden = no....FOR THE EXACT SAME ANIMATIONS in a lot of cases!!!)... I could go on and on and on, but the fact is EA has got to rid itself of the philosophy that ALL things from previous titles or little brother title or defunct competitor's titles must be ignored or remvoed...they need a game that incorporates the accumulated hits and misses of the past into a growing title isntead of a Peter Pan game that never, ever grows up! Other games and franchises have figured this out, yet Madden remains stuck in a paradigm from three generations ago...I'm an old timer (been playing Madden since the first days on Sega Genesis all the way through today), but I remember the single best thing that happened to Madden was Sony's NFL Gameday on PS1 completely annihilated Madden...it was not even a debate at the time, more like an NBA2k-vs. NBA Live curb stomping. THAT forced EA to redo the game completely and by the PS2 era they made what were some of the best games ever in the genre to that time between Madden NFL 2003-2006. All I know is that I got my nice fat price fixing check from EA yesterday and thanks to their decisions and the settlement, I will getting an essentially free PS-Vita! We may never get back to the way the game used to build on itself, but at least I can play it while sitting on the can....which just may end up being the most appropriate thing to happen to Madden in years!!!