Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

[SyncereBlackout]

Many people have said it over the years “there are no changes in the game. It’s just an over priced roster update”

Well that may be the future, or a version of it

We as a community ought to give some real thought as to what we can reasonably expect/demand/request from a live update service. As other threads have illustrated, for CFM (especially online players) it’s not as simple to execute as MUT or Longshot live updates.

https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/a...ew-madden-game


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Toupal]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

Many people have said it over the years “there are no changes in the game. It’s just an over priced roster update”

Well that may be the future, or a version of it

We as a community ought to give some real thought as to what we can reasonably expect/demand/request from a live update service. As other threads have illustrated, for CFM (especially online players) it’s not as simple to execute as MUT or Longshot live updates.

https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/a...ew-madden-game


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I don't know why, but I just see this being one more nail in the coffin for offline franchise.

Every Time they release something "new and exciting", it usually means bad news for the offline crowd

[DaGreatOne21]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

I mean, part of me gets excited to hear this. Why? Because Ive said for years and years and years that one of the biggest issues with sports games is the fact thats its an annual release, which IMO hinders the product. EA already uses that "short development cycle" excuse year after year after year, so I would hope that if they did skip a year, it could give them more time to implement features that otherwise wouldnt get into the game, or maybe completely redo as aspect of the game they couldnt do with short development cycles.

The reason Im not optimistic? It's EA. They will take a year off, come back, and they will have completely gutted franchise mode, and a few years later, release revolutionary new features like "play multiple seasons in franchise mode" and the ability to trade players....and maybe release an "NFL Draft" expansion for $39.99 that allows us to experience the fun of being a GM by drafting college players. Unfortunately, they wont have time to implement fully editable and sharable draft classes. Maybe in two more years....

[bloobloouk]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

I mean, part of me gets excited to hear this. Why? Because Ive said for years and years and years that one of the biggest issues with sports games is the fact thats its an annual release, which IMO hinders the product. EA already uses that "short development cycle" excuse year after year after year, so I would hope that if they did skip a year, it could give them more time to implement features that otherwise wouldnt get into the game, or maybe completely redo as aspect of the game they couldnt do with short development cycles.

The reason Im not optimistic? It's EA. They will take a year off, come back, and they will have completely gutted franchise mode, and a few years later, release revolutionary new features like "play multiple seasons in franchise mode" and the ability to trade players....and maybe release an "NFL Draft" expansion for $39.99 that allows us to experience the fun of being a GM by drafting college players. Unfortunately, they wont have time to implement fully editable and sharable draft classes. Maybe in two more years....

I'm minded to agree, that's why I would look at the model mentioned in the Bloomberg article. Sports games are perfectly suited to the subscription model - why not just charge a straight fee for monthly access? You can roll out features as and when they are ready rather than having to force them into a development cycle and you kill the used games market in one stroke.

Online Pass was a PR disaster because gamers had "already paid for the game", but this would be a completely different model. Would people begrudge a $7 a month subscription (Maybe $50 for an annual pass?) if it meant that they got to spread the cost of the game across the year and got more frequent updates?

Software as a service is the future - it doesn't have to be rubbish...

EDIT: Of course this model would also mean we would get pre-season rosters at the start of pre-season. Maybe we could even find ourselves doing our own iteration of the draft with real players? Imagine being able to go back and play historical seasons again but using the latest version of the game.

[Aestis]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

If Blizzard developed/published Madden, I'd call this great news. For those ragging on the subscription/service model itself, it can lend itself to far *superior* product quality!

However, I certainly understand and to some degree share the pessimism from EA making this seem more like a way to not have to invest development resources while still getting folks to pay for the game. Hopefully that is not the case. The model itself can work great.

[bad_philanthropy]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

Even as a no ultimate team player, I think it's time for this move. I only play Franchise, but let's face it, EA Sports games aren't developed to an adequate standard with their current release cycle. It usually takes Madden until November to get most things fixed.

If moving to the games as a service model can significantly improve the quality of the game. If Madden didn't significantly improve in quality under the new model I think I'd just sign off for good.

[T4VERTS]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

This would a smart move, by blurring the lines of "releases" you can manage expectations better. It is better to release a new feature every month or two over a couple year period rather than having expectations sky high for a single release ever year. This continuous development strategy keeps you agile so that if a single new feature doesn't go over well you can pivot rather than having multiple features drop at once with none of them being well received and creating a let down until the next year where you attempt it again.

[triplechin]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

With how they are trashing and exploiting Star Wars BF2 I don't have hopes of anything extremely positive from this model. I agree with the above, franchise will be pushed to the side even further with focus on MUT and Longshot. Feels like the game would trend even further away from real football with these moves.

[BadAssHskr]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

I only read the first Paragraph, as I am driving, but what Id say is why has it taken them this long.

As soon as they got the game geared for online it really only makes sense.

[KSUowls]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

Could go either way. I'm always very much against games as a service. Paying some kind of on going fee for a video game is absurd outside of MMO's which maintain large servers, frequent content updates, etc...

However, with sports games maybe it makes sense. Sports games are released annually and are often nothing more than a roster update with some animation improvements. So, maybe it could work, but it would be entirely dependent on the financial model.

Even then though, I can't wrap my head around any model that I would support. I had 2 different drafts of this post where I outlined certain things that would need to happen for me to pay for a live service, but at the end of both I just deleted because I didn't like it from either the game perspective or my trust in EA.

[Toupal]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

Could go either way. I'm always very much against games as a service. Paying some kind of on going fee for a video game is absurd outside of MMO's which maintain large servers, frequent content updates, etc...

However, with sports games maybe it makes sense. Sports games are released annually and are often nothing more than a roster update with some animation improvements. So, maybe it could work, but it would be entirely dependent on the financial model.

Even then though, I can't wrap my head around any model that I would support. I had 2 different drafts of this post where I outlined certain things that would need to happen for me to pay for a live service, but at the end of both I just deleted because I didn't like it from either the game perspective or my trust in EA.

The only reason this scares me is because of what we have seen from Madden 18 updates so far.

0 updates to CFM
5 million to MUT (I am exaggerating)

So if Madden 19 came out as a deal where you continuously have to depend on updates.... the franchise community is screwed..... Again....

[vrtkolman]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

There is pretty much no hope for the offline franchise crowd. This just further enforces that.

[cch99]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

Here's the problem with the subscription model, at least the way it works with software i have at work.

You pay a monthly fee and all is well, you get fixes and generally 2 big updates a year. But if you want to stop paying you don't just lose access to updates you lose total access to the software.

So you spent your $60 on Madden. At the end of the year you decide I don't want to keep paying this. Well now you can't play Madden anymore at all.

Right now you can get 17 and get the patches and updates until that ends. Sure they don't update it anymore but you can still play it. You will always have this version you can play.

Subscription model well now you spent $60 for the year but you can't trade it in. You can't play the old version.

This may not bother some people but for some of us it will. I played NBA 2k16 for 2 years. I didn't upgrade the Show this year because I wasn't impressed enough with the updates and I kept 16 for that as well. You can't do that anymore.

On their end I am sure it makes sense or they wouldn't go down that road but I have never liked the subscription model

Just something to think about...

[timhere1970]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

I love the idea of a continous cycle just so when they fix something it will not make a return the next year. However, the fact that things return after being fixed leaves me to wonder if the team can actually pull it off.

[Brightline]

Re: Madden May Be A Roster Update After all

Probably not a big deal to work around with NFL but under the current agreement EA must release a game every year.