Madden 11 Impressions

[Rodster]

Wrt the sound cutting out the devs have mentioned they are in the process of compressing the audio and it shouldn't be a problem in the final build.

I think it's cool they put Obama in the game. I remember playing Madden on the first Playstation and playing a whole season just so I could get into the Playoffs and get J.B., John and Pat to do their pregame stuff. I always thought that was a fun part of past Madden game's.

[vader29]

Also is the difficulty on rookie, because I beat the Colts 34-3 and got over 200 yards rushing with Greene.

The default is set to Pro, I bumped it up to All Pro and lost to the Colts 24-10.


Using the dpad for coverage changes will take a few games to get used to and will probably end up being better than the old way.

Fight for the fumble is back again.

[matthewk]

Tried the demo out last night. Not impressed based on my first game. It looks and feels way too much like '10 . Even the intro looked to be the same with the team shields coming down on the field.

The d-pad for adjustments would be fine if you had enough time to make them on defense. Unless the CPU calls a audible (giving you a little time), you have to press the buttons frantically like it's some kind of mini-game.

On Pro I was able to beat the Colts 35-7. Sanchez had over 400 yards passing. I used gamplay and with the exception of a few audibles I used the plays the coordinator chose.

Picking up Madden 10 for cheap and finding updated rosters seems like a better idea right now than spending $60 on '11.

[Brando70]

Now, I'm all for proper celebrations and atmosphere in a sports game, but digitizing Obama? Really?

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/110/1108432p1.html

He is the president and teams visit the white house after winning the super bowl. I'm amazed by the number of complaints on this at OS, it's a nice touch.

Just funny that they've NEVER done that before, and weird to have a sitting president give his permission to be a videogame character. It just seems a little superfluous to me, that's all. The rest of it was pretty damn cool.

An aside on this: I don't know if EA needs permission to use the likeness of a politician. That may be public domain, the way any speeches by elected officials are. Maybe there's a cheat code to change who's in the White House after the 2012-2013 season

I also can't muster up any enthusiasm for this game yet because we just finished the DSP online franchise. I need a little bit of a Madden offseason.

[Danimal]

If there is no way to fix this it has to be one of the worst design decisions ever. I tried turning off Gameflow, well the coordinator still talks over the crowd and stadium sounds anyway, so then I went into the options and turned coordinator's voices to OFF. There is still a moment of deafening silence as you walk to the line, which completely ruins the immersion factor for me. Not a complete gamekiller, but damn annoying to say the least.

Also is the difficulty on rookie, because I beat the Colts 34-3 and got over 200 yards rushing with Greene.

I do like the new kickmeter if it really is based more on the kicker's skill. I guess we'll find out when some of the weaker kickers start nailing 58 yard field goals.

All in all I liked the demo except for the annoying complete loss of sound in between plays and I do hope there is a way to keep that from happening. I love Gus Johnson and I think the commentary is probably the best we've had since Madden/Summerall. Still a definite buy for me.

The sound is that way because it is a demo, same reason the Doritos play of the game is the last play. Go watch some videos of full games on YouTube and see for yourself, apparently the game is leaked on Torrent's now.

You can pause the game and go in and change a lot of things such as difficulty, cpu sliders etc.

As for the kicking meter I think you can see a difference between the Jets kicker and the Colts. With the Colts if I did hit the accuracy right and was close I still got decent results. With the Jets kicker I missed 3 field goals by being a little off and I think his meter moves faster as well.

[ScoopBrady]

I played the demo last night and was grinning from ear to ear. Removing speed burst is the best thing to happen to videogame football in a while. I'm loving NCAA and the early returns on the Madden demo for me are favorable. Kudos to EA with what they've done with their football franchises IMO.

[dbdynsty25]

I played the demo last night and was grinning from ear to ear. Removing speed burst is the best thing to happen to videogame football in a while. I'm loving NCAA and the early returns on the Madden demo for me are favorable. Kudos to EA with what they've done with their football franchises IMO.

Completely agree...now if I could just stop mashing the trigger for no apparent reason, all would be well in the world of football.

The new gimmicks in 11 are stupid/pointless/f'n lame...but the on the field play is probably better than it ever has been (especially this generation).

[Wilk5280]

Started my 'chize with the Broncos last night. Just as I was complaining about no pass rush I get 4 sacks in this game and knock Gerrard out of the game.

Whenever MJD gets a nice run the crowd yells out "Dreeeewwwwwwwww!"

[Danimal]

Some other things I noticed in the demo.

1. Long Drives - Unlike NCAA where an average drive is 7-9 plays, the drives i am seeing in Madden are long. I has an 18 play drive last night, the Cpu a 16 and 20 play drive. I've seen a few big plays, but mostly for me it is a war to move up and down the field.

2. Bad Safety play - I don't know what to make of this because sometimes the coverage is really good. But occasionally a guy will get behind the safeties, I mean 10-15 yards behind them. I gave up a few of those plays with the Jets last night.

3, Defensive Holding - Good lord the WR get mugged sometimes in press coverage, I mean it's really bas when I am 5 seconds in the pocket and my slot receiver hasn't even made his cut on the slant because the CB is dry humping him.

4. Inconsistent Line play - Sometimes guys come in untouched it is football, send more then they can block. In this game sometiems guys get in for no good reason. I watched a replay last night where I was acked so fast i wanted to see why. The LB blitzed, but my center stepped left and blocked no one, my RG stepped right and blocked no one and my RT well he fanned on his blocked. I ad 3 guys on me in a New York Minute.

[10spro]

3, Defensive Holding - Good lord the WR get mugged sometimes in press coverage, I mean it's really bas when I am 5 seconds in the pocket and my slot receiver hasn't even made his cut on the slant because the CB is dry humping him.

Yeah, I see that a lot and I was like WTF it takes for the zebras to blow the whistle. Having said that, I had a 20 yards TD called back because the holding was called on one of the OL.

Personally I don't mind Gus Johnson, while Collinsworth brings his usual insight to the game. I liked the overall pace of the on-field gameplay edging NCAA's flow by a FG. I feel like I have to nickel and dime my way down the field to put together a successful drive, rather than go for the long bomb every single play. I like a game that forces me to slow the game down and exhibit patience. Couldn't see the locomotion feature work as well as the College game but I certainly enjoyed running the ball in the demo.

It'll take me some time to learn the strategy pad, but I welcome the new strategy.

[Teal]

I think that's the thing with me and NCAA, 10spro. NCAA *feels* like college football, which I greatly prefer over the pros. I love the unpredictability, love the speed, all that. Being in a state with no pro football team, pro football video games become sort of yawn inducing after awhile.

So, really, Madden may play a really good game of pro ball, but since I prefer the college game, I'm skewed toward it. Same reason why I can't get into a hockey game or footie.

[snaz16]

I think that's the thing with me and NCAA, 10spro. NCAA *feels* like college football, which I greatly prefer over the pros. I love the unpredictability, love the speed, all that. Being in a state with no pro football team,

Isn't there a pro team in Tuscaloosa

[tmdba37]

I thought the demo was solid. It plays a lot like a mix between M10 and NCAA11 so the good thing there is that passing is a lot easier and running is a little more realistic. Although I noticed that the CB death grip still comes into play as well as somewhat unrealistic swats by Linemen/LB's. . .I see that in NCAA from time to time as well. . .

As I imagined, I hate Gameflow, but I enjoy the Gameplan feature. That is certainly a lot more realistic and makes sense from a what you see on Sunday perspective. . .the AI coaches are morons and should be fired. . .if I hear we need a sack here again I am going to scream.

I love Gus Johnson but they needed to tone him down in the game. . .it's not "Daylight" every time a back gets past the D-Line. . .it's a nice change of pace from half-dead Tom Hammond, but I hope they ratchet it down a bit in the final build.

One positive from the presentation. . .it looks like you can skip through nearly everything so no more waiting 10 seconds here, 15 seconds there for filler video caps or the seemingly endless measure for first down animation.

Finally, I think at the end of the day, the problem with this version this year is that we've got a really great online dynasty for NCAA and essentially the same nuts and bolts for Offline/Online Franchise for Madden. . .that's going to be the big letdown for some people. . .

I hate the fact that so much time is being put into Ultimate Team. . .the video in the demo alluded to the best of Franchise and Fantasy, but it's not. . .it's a BS version of Fantasy and plays nothing like a Franchise. . .so I think that inference is a colossal fail on their part.

At the end of the day, I am an NFL junkie so I was getting the game no matter what, but the demo made me feel slightly better about it than what I had previously feared. . .I can see where folks are going to hold off or pass though--there's not a whole lot more here than in NCAA or in M10. . .

[JRod]

Ya it does feel like NCAA 11.5. But that's always the case so that's not really new news. LOL.

So Gameflow is just the CPU selecting the plays. I have read nothing about it so that was a shock but it's how I play games these days because I simply don't care what plays I call nor does it matter. It's not like there's real football strategy going on in Madden.

I like the ball physics for the most part.


Oh ya and because Gus Johnson is in Madden he will probably be the #1 guy on some network for sports. I can't help to feel like Al Michaels needs to be replaced on SNF for Gus Johnson.

[Teal]

I think that's the thing with me and NCAA, 10spro. NCAA *feels* like college football, which I greatly prefer over the pros. I love the unpredictability, love the speed, all that. Being in a state with no pro football team,

Isn't there a pro team in Tuscaloosa

No, just one who thinks it is...

[kevinpars]

I hated the demo at first, but it started to grow on me. I could not run the ball, but that may be the Colts offense against the Jets defense. Passing was easy - a combination of Manning and Pro level. It took a while to get a feel for the game, but it started to grab me after a while. Considering the final product will be as big a step up as NCAA was from demo to retail (I assume) it will be a day 1 purchase.

I can see why they made audibles harder for online cheesers, but why not give off line games a choice of doing it the old way?

[Wilk5280]

Those audibles and presnap adjustments aren't any harder to pull off once u learn the strat pad. Online folks might be a bit slower at first, but it won't take them long to do all the same stuff they did in years past.

[MizzouRah]

Call me silly.. but for the first time I'm loving Madden. For me, gameflow is just awesome.. I can let my head coach call the plays and call some of my own if I choose so. It makes the game flow very nice.

I only have time for one football game, and it might be Madden this year.. really love what I'm seeing thus far.

[JRod]

Passing seems really easy. Even the Jets passing game seems too good. Maybe they just did this for the demo. I think the game suffers from the same thing NCAA suffers from which can be addressed with sliders but the running game isn't that good and the passing game is slightly too good. I'm on All-Pro so maybe the level this year is All-Madden.

[matthewk]

Well, I gave this another try last night, this time a little earlier so that I wasn't so damn tired like I was the night before.

I still feel like it's very boring. The graphics are pretty impressive, and there are some nice details like gameplanning. There just isn't any excitement to playing this game, even with Gus over-enunciating (did I just make up a word?) all the time. The coaching text and audio is annoying after only two short games. Hearing that we need to stop the run on 2nd and short is a big "DUH!".

I also couldn't help but feel like it was 2004 all over again with the old school kicking meter and the never-get-past-the-20-yard-line kickoff returns. This made me pop in 2k5 for comparison (yes, I know people hate to hear this). Much more fun game to play for me. Madden has become much to sanitized and lifeless for me. This demo reminded me why I sold '10, and likely won't even pick that one up again unless I can find it for $15 or less.

[GTHobbes]

I only had a chance to play a quarter last night before I got an invite to play BackBreaker, but even in my limited time I could see it was an improvement over 10. I had read the comments about pro default being too easy so I put it on All Madden and still went right down the field with a series of short to mid range passes (the couple runs that were called got stuffed for little gains). I've never been that good at Madden so I'm not sure if it was just beginner's luck or if I'd need to use a higher difficulty and/or make some slider adjustments. Regardless, after playing so much Backbreaker, it would be pretty much impossible for me to go back to Madden's canned animations. Glad to see that Madden fans are getting a game that they enjoy though.

[AJColossal]

I really liked the demo. I think your take on things is relative to what you were expecting going in. Is it a radical re-invention of the franchise? Oh, hell no. Does the franchise still seem to be moving in the right direction? I think so.

For starters, I really wasn't sure about Gameflow, but for the sake of shaking things up, I think it's a welcome addition. Just the simple act of not having to cycle through the same old plays in the same old way -- therein lies most of the appeal for me. Some of the playcalling can be suspect, but you can work around it. I like it.

The other new thing is the addition of Gus Johnson, another welcome change. Again, another little improvement that makes the game feel a little fresher.

As for the gameplay itself, here are a few thoughts:

-Passing feels very good. There is more separation, which I think is important. Some may say it can be too easy, but gone are the days where fly pattern after fly pattern is tipped by magical CBs. Couple that with passes that can be very inaccurate (love it) and you're starting to see some semblance of what the passing game actually looks like in real football.

-"Magic LBs" that tip or intercept balls unrealistically seem to be toned down, but it will rear it's head on occasion.

-Running with the Colts against the Jets D was challenging, which is what it should be. And against the Colts D, the Jets could move the ball. Out of the box, the AI runs much better than in NCAA 11.

-There appears to be something goofy going on with blocking on kick returns. Making it to the 20 on a KR is probably harder than it should be. It's one of those things in the game where every year it alternates between being too hard and too easy. And the AI ran one back so I guess it can be done. Right now I'm enjoying the challenge.

-Sacks are well done, IMO. At times it seems like the AI will do that annoying "throw the ball at the last possible instant" thing to avoid a sack but then I've had games where I had 4 sacks.

-I really hope that Pro-Tak is a little more refined in the retail version, I've see gang tackles or two or three guys take down a ball carrier, but still, a little too often the game wants to animate one-on-one tackles when you'd see defenders kind of bounce or slide off the tackling animation.

-Probably most importantly, the game seems to pass the all important "game variety" test. Playing as the Colts, I've had close games and blowouts on each side.

-More testing needs to be done with the kicking meter. I like the idea of the ratings of the kicker playing more into the success of the kick, but the old-school tri-click meter implementation seems kinda funny to go back to.

So, while things seem to be improving, it is essentially the same game, warts and all. I think that more than anything else that is where the frustration with so many people lies.

Not sure if I'd trade NCAA for this yet, though. Both appear to be good with their own set of issues, but I'm much more of an NFL guy. Curious how the retail version ends up.

[vinny-b]

This made me pop in NFL 2k5 for comparison (yes, I know people hate to hear this)

they do? I had took it, gamers on this site valued that particular title.

[matthewk]

I mean that people are tired of seeing 2k5 get mentioned in Madden threads every year.

[vinny-b]

the gameplay, graphics/animations/cut-scenes look okay.

however, the commentary really SUCKS.