| Madden NFL | |
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Madden NFL logo. |
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| Developer(s) | High Score Entertainment |
| Publisher(s) | EA Tiburon |
| Distributor(s) | EA Sports |
| Platform(s) | Apple II, Macintosh, SNES, Sega Genesis, 3DO, Nintendo DS, Nintendo GameCube, Nintendo 64, Windows PC, DOS, PlayStation, Xbox, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Sega Saturn, Wii, Xbox 360, PlayStation Portable, iOS, Nintendo 3DS, Android |
| Release date(s) | First released in 1988 |
| Genre(s) | Football Simulation |
| Mode(s) | Single player, Multiplayer |
| Rating(s) | Everyone |
Madden NFL (known as John Madden Football before 1993) is an American football video game series developed by Electronic Arts Tiburon for EA Sports. The game series is named after Pro Football Hall of Famer John Madden, a well-known former Super Bowl-winning coach of the Oakland Raiders and color commentator. The games have consistently been a best seller, and has even spawned TV shows where players compete. Among the game's realistic features include sophisticated playbooks and player statistics, and voice commentary that allows players to hear the game as if it was a real TV broadcast.
The series was originally conceived by Electronic Arts founder Trip Hawkins, who then approached Madden in 1984 for his endorsement and expertise. Due to Madden's insistence that the game be as realistic as possible, the first version of John Madden Football was not released until 1988. The second version of the game was released in 1990, and annual versions since then. The series' name was changed to Madden NFL in 1993 after EA acquired the rights to use NFL teams and players.
Despite Madden's retirement as a broadcaster in 2009, he still continues to lend his name, as well as provide creative input, for the game.[1]
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| Madden recalled a time in San Francisco when a Philadelphia Eagles player rushed into a hotel room asking, "Where's Madden?" Someone pointed out the commentator.
"No, not that Madden. I want the game!" Madden recounted.[2] |
As of 2010[update] Electronic Arts has sold more than 85 million copies of Madden NFL since 1988, and as many as two million in one week, for more than $3 billion in total sales. A team of 30 developers and more than 100 game testers works on each new Madden NFL at EA Tiburon in Orlando, Florida. Madden continues to participate in each Madden's development:
He breaks down upcoming rules changes. He brings up concussions, helmet-to-helmet hits and gimmick quarterbacks. A digression on how the Dome Patrol-era Saints used to frustrate Bill Walsh's 49ers teams with short linebacker drops becomes a lecture on the obsolescence of the fullback, which then morphs into a short aside on player character.[3]
The game series is popular among both football fans and players; the latter often complain to Madden and EA about allegedly inaccurate ratings of their abilities, or ask for changes in their in-game appearance. Such complaints began as early as 1990, confusing the broadcaster, who did not contribute the player statistics for that year's version due to lack of time.[3]
Voice commentary in Madden allows players or watchers to hear the game being called as if it were a real game on TV.[4] For most versions of the game, this commentary was performed by Madden himself and his contemporary broadcast partner. Initially, this was Pat Summerall (Madden's partner during his days at CBS and Fox during the early 1980s on through the early 2000s) until Summerall retired; the role was then filled by Al Michaels, John's broadcast partner on ABC Monday Night Football (2002 – 2005) and NBC Sunday Night Football (2006 – 2008). Madden NFL 09 would end up being the last version to feature Madden's commentary. By that time, he felt that reciting a script covering every single scenario in the game was boring and tedious,[5] but said that in the decision to remove him from game commentary, "I feel that something is being taken away from me".[3] Madden was replaced by Cris Collinsworth as color commentator, who was then paired with Tom Hammond in Madden NFL 10, and Gus Johnson in Madden NFL 11.[6]
Trip Hawkins created a clone of the Strat-o-Matic paper and dice-based football simulation game as a teenager. The game was unsuccessful due to its complexity, and Hawkins hoped to one day delegate its rules to a computer. He wrote a football simulation for the PDP-11 minicomputer at Harvard College, and after founding Electronic Arts in 1982 the company began designing a football game for the era's microcomputers. Hawkins first approached Joe Montana to endorse the proposed game but the quarterback already had an endorsement deal with Atari, and his second choice, Cal coach Joe Kapp, demanded royalties.[3]
In 1984 Hawkins approached Madden. The CEO and game producer Joe Ybarra arranged a followup meeting with the broadcaster during an Amtrak train trip over two days because of Madden's fear of flying.[2][3][7] The EA executives promised that the proposed game would be a sophisticated football simulation, and asked the retired Oakland Raiders coach for his name and expertise. Madden knew nothing about computers beyond his telestrator but agreed; he had once taught a class at the University of California, Berkeley called "Football for Fans", and initially envisioned the program as a tool for teaching and testing plays.[3][5] Hawkins and Ybarra spent the train trip learning football plays and strategies from Madden "from dawn to midnight".[3]
Early plans for the game envisioned six or seven players per team because of technical limitations but Madden insisted on having 11 players per team,[3] stating "I'm not putting my name on it if it's not real."[7] Ybarra, who had played chess, not football, in high school, became an expert on the subject through his work, but found that 11 players overwhelmed contemporary home computers. The project took three years, more than twice the length of the average development process, and became known within the company as "Trip's Folly"; Madden believed at times that EA had given up.[3] The company hired Bethesda Softworks to finish the game, but the relationship ended when Bethesda sued for EA's failure to publish new versions of its Gridiron! football game as promised, adding to the delay.[7]
EA already had a copy of Madden's 1980 Raiders playbook, and hired San Francisco Chronicle writer Frank Cooney, who had designed his own figurine football game with numerical skill ratings. Although the company could not yet legally use NFL teams' or players' names, Cooney obtained real plays from NFL teams. Madden turned down the opportunity to buy an "unlimited" number of options for EA stock in its initial public offering, a decision he later called "the dumbest thing I ever did in my life."[3]
Using Bethesda's physics engine,[8] John Madden Football debuted in 1988 for the Apple II series of computers.[3] While the game had a sophisticated playbook its interface was complex, and Madden's insistence on 11 players per team caused it to run slowly.[7]
In early 1990 EA hired Park Place Productions to develop Madden for the Sega Genesis videogame console. The company had already developed ABC Monday Night Football with "arcade-style, action-heavy" game play, and its Madden also emphasized hyperreality compared to the computer version's focus on exact simulation.[3]
EA reverse engineered the console in hopes of selling the game without paying the standard $8 to $10 license fee per cartridge, then proposed to Sega a compromise of $2 per cartridge and a $2 million cap on the fee. The console maker agreed, afraid that EA would sell its reverse-engineered knowledge to other companies; the agreement saved EA $35 million over the next three years. As its own Joe Montana-endorsed football game would miss the 1990 Christmas shopping season, Sega asked EA to let it sell Madden with the Montana name. EA refused, but offered a crippled alternative that lacked Madden's 3-D graphics and most of its 113 plays.[3] Joe Montana Football sold well despite shipping after Christmas 1990, and remained popular after BlueSky Software took over development.[7] John Madden Football for the Genesis became the first "industry game-changer" for EA and Sega, however, helping the console to gain market share against the Super Nintendo.[3][7] From 1992 to 1994, Mega placed the game at #1 in their monthly Top 100 Mega Drive Games of All Time.
In 1990, EA producer Richard Hilleman brought in veteran sports game designer Scott Orr, who had founded the mid-1980s Commodore 64 game publisher GameStar, and had led the design of their best-selling sports games. The team of Orr and Hilleman designed and led the development of what is today still recognizable as the modern Madden. Early versions of Madden were created by external development studios such as Bethesda, Visual Concepts, and Stormfront Studios. After Visual Concepts failed to deliver Madden NFL '96 for the new PlayStation in 1995, EA hired Tiburon Entertainment for Madden NFL '97[7] and later acquired the company, centralizing development in-house.[3] EA's refusal to release Madden and other sports titles for the Sega Dreamcast in 1999 contributed to the console's lack of success and Sega's exit from the hardware market.[7]
In 1998 Electronic Arts added Franchise Mode to Madden, giving players the ability to play multiple seasons, make off-season draft picks, and trade players.
There are multiple modes of game play, from a quick head-to-head game to running a team for a whole season or even multiple seasons. Online play, which was a new feature for Madden NFL 2003 (in this version there are also mini-camp challenges) was only available for users of the PlayStation 2 console, Xbox console, or a Microsoft Windows PC until early 2004. At E3 2004, Microsoft and EA Sports released a press statement announcing that games made from July 2004 on would now be Xbox Live-enabled. In August 2004, EA Sports released Madden NFL 2005 and this game and all future versions of Madden became very popular games on Xbox Live.
Also, starting with Madden NFL 2004, EA Sports created the new Playmaker tool, using the right analog joystick found on each of the adjustments previously unavailable in prior installments of the franchise.[9] One such adjustment includes the ability to switch which direction a running play will go without changing the formation. Prior to the Playmaker tool, the Player could only call one of four available "hot routes." With Playmaker and the use of the right thumb stick the player is given 4 additional Hot Route options. When the quarterback has the ball the Playmaker Tool can be used to make receivers alter their routes mid-play. When running the ball on offense, the runner can control the direction in which the blocker is going. Defensive alignment adjustments, however, were not available leading to obvious unbalance in favor of the Offensive player.
In Madden NFL 2005, EA Sports ran a campaign with the Theme "Fear the D" emphasising their improvements on the "other side of the ball." In an attempt to re-balance the players experience, EA gave a Playmaker Tool to the defense. Similar to the offensive Playmaker Tool, the defensive Playmaker allows the player to make pre-snap defensive adjustments. EA Sports further utilized the right analog joystick on defense by creating the "Hit Stick", an option on defense that allows the controlled player to make big hits, with a simple flick, that increases the chances the ball carrier will fumble. Also introduced for the first time is the "Formation Shift." This new feature allowed players to shift their formation in the pre-snap audible menu without actually changing the play. For example if you call a run play up the middle out of a goal line formation, you could then call a formation shift and make your players spread out into a four wide receiver formation while still in the same running play. The problem with this new function was that EA also added a fatigue penalty for the defense causing defensive players to get more tired each time there was a formation shift. This led to players on offense calling multiple formation shifts each play making the defensive players too exhausted to keep up and force them to substitute out of the game until they are fully rested. This led to more unbalance that could only be fixed by turning off fatigue and leads to an unrealistic football game.
2005 also added "EA Sports Radio", a fictional show that plays during the menu screen of Franchise mode to provide a greater sense of a storyline during gameplay. It features Tony Bruno as the host, who often interviews players and coaches about how the season is going and also has quiz questions in which fake listeners call in to make attempts at answering football-related questions. It included mock interviews of famous NFL players and coaches throughout the in-game season. Some fans have criticized EA Sports for not including new features to the 'programming' as the radio became stale after only two seasons in franchise mode, but the feature drew acclaim for adding content to the Franchise menu. Also added was the Newspaper where the player could look at National News from licensed USA Today and Licensed Local papers for almost each of the 32 NFL teams. Lastly, 2005 also saw the introduction of multiple progressions during franchise mode. Previously NFL players in Madden would only progress or regress at the end of each season. Now at the end of Week 5, 11, and 17 the game would use a program to "progress" your players based on their performance in addition to end of season progression.
In Madden NFL 06, the "Truck Stick" was introduced. This feature allows the offensive player to lower his shoulder and break a tackle, or back juke to avoid one. Another new feature is the Superstar Mode, which allows the player to take control of a rookie, and progress through his career.[10] This includes an IQ test, interviews, workouts, the NFL Draft, hiring an agent, and other aspects of a superstar's life.
EA also introduced the QB Vision feature in the 2006 installment. With this feature, a cone of spotlight emits from the quarterback during passing plays, simulating his field of vision. To make an accurate pass, the quarterback must have his intended receiver in his field of vision. Passing to a receiver not in the cone reduces pass accuracy significantly. The size of the quarterback's vision cone is directly correlated to his Awareness and Passer Accuracy rating; Brett Favre and Peyton Manning see nearly the entire field at once, whereas an inexperienced quarterback such as J.P. Losman or Kyle Boller sees only a sliver of the field.[3] This feature also allows for bigger plays and more interceptions.
Also, EA sports added the Smart Route. This means that when pressing a hot route to the corresponding receiver, you put the analog stick down and the receiver will run to the first down, and you can throw him the ball.
In Madden NFL 07, EA introduced Lead Blocker Controls which allow users to control blockers during running plays. In addition, EA redefined the Truck Stick into the Highlight Stick. With the Highlight Stick, users can have their running backs perform different running moves and combos, instead of just bowling over defenders. Truck Stick features still exist for bigger backs, but not for smaller backs who would never realistically use them anyway. Instead, more agile backs perform acrobatic ducks and dodges to avoid tackles.[11]
EA Sports also introduced "Smart Routes" on offense. Previously receivers only ran the routes they were assigned and the only change that could be made is to change the entire route. Now the player is able to tell receivers to adjust their route to go past the first down marker. For example if it is 3rd an 11 and you have a 10 yard curl route, you will be short of the first. With a Smart Route you can now tell that receiver to run his route a little deeper and past that first down marker. Similarly if it is 3rd and 3 and you have a 10 yard route you can tell that receiver to shorten that route so you can make a quick pass play.
In Madden NFL 08, the Weapons feature was added, allowing superstar players to be noticed. Randy Moss, for example, is a Go-To-Guy, allowing him to make amazing one-handed grabs. Peyton Manning is a Franchise QB. It also includes new skill drills, Hit Stick 2.0, and Ring of a Champion features.
Madden NFL 09 was released on August 12, 2008. Citing business concerns, EA chose not to release it on the PC platform.[12] The game features quarterback Brett Favre on the front cover wearing a uniform for his former team, the Green Bay Packers.[13] EA Sports announced on August 7, 2008 that they would be offering a free download alternative cover featuring Favre in a New York Jets jersey, which was the team Favre played for during the 2008 season. The downloadable plug-in will also include the newly revised Jets 2008–2009 Squad with Favre at the helm. Madden NFL 09 was the first of the series to offer online, league game play, allowing up to 32 players to compete in an online, simulated NFL season. According to EA Sports Senior Producer Phil Frazier, up to 32 players will be able to participate in competitive games, the NFL Draft and conduct trades between their teams. The game was also be the first of the series to incorporate a Madden IQ. The Madden IQ is used to automatically gauge your skills through a series of mini-games consisting of run offense, pass offense, run defense, and pass defense. At the end of each of the drills, the player receives a score ranging from rookie to all-Madden. The final Madden IQ is a mixture of those scores which is used to control the game's difficulty. As a player’s skill increases or decreases the game automatically adjusts its difficulty ratings to coincide with their Madden IQ.[14][15] Madden NFL 09 also removed the "passing cone" feature due to unpopularity with game players.[3]
Madden NFL 10 was released on August 14, 2009, though a version for the PC was again not created.[16] Compared to previous iterations, Madden NFL 10 has been extremely transparent with its development efforts, maintaining a weekly blog updates as well as a constant presence on various message boards. A new design team has also taken over the game, including members from NFL Head Coach 09. The direction of Madden NFL 10 has been shifted to much more of a realistic and simulation focus, with info already released including Procedural Awareness (a robust head tracking system), a new philosophy on player ratings, and big improvements to realism in QB play, WR/DB play, and other areas across the game. Also added for in-game color commentary is broadcaster/analyst Cris Collinsworth. In addition to this, he also frequently criticizes mistakes in a segment known as Backtrack. There are also cut scenes on close first down situations where the officials bring the chains to measure the exact spot of the ball. Madden 10 has several new features including the PRO-TAK animation technology, which allows up to nine man gang tackles and fumble pile-ups to help players 'fight for every yard', in this year's tagline. Madden 10 also features an in-game weekly recap show with NFL Network hosts Fran Charles and Alex Flanagan called The Extra Point. Madden 10 offers a series of multiple play packages. This allows for more options to score. Madden 10 also offers over 200 plays to choose from. Troy Polamalu and Larry Fitzgerald appear on the cover of Madden 2010, the first time two athletes appeared on the cover in the history of the series. This version features a completely overhauled rating system for players, featuring new categories such as throw on the run and specific ratings for short, medium, and deep passes. The new rating system has also dropped many players rankings down, creating resentment from these very players. T.J. Houshmandzadeh, wide receiver for the Baltimore Ravens organization announced via an ESPN interview that he is boycotting the game until his rating on the game is 'correct'.[17] The Wii version has been criticized for the cartoon-like graphics, as opposed to the more realistic graphics of the other platform releases. The game's soundtrack features established rap, alternative rock, rap metal and hard rock bands such as Nirvana, Pantera, Black Sabbath, System of a Down, Alice in Chains, and Kid Rock.
Madden NFL 11 was released on July 27, 2010, (moved up from its original release date of August 10, 2010 for promotional reasons[18]) and features Drew Brees on the cover. It features several new additions to the franchise, such as Online Team Play,[19] Online Scouting[20] and online attribute boosts for co-op play.[21] Along with these new game additions is a new rating (sponsored by Old Spice) known as Swagger.[22] Although early speculation was that this new rating would be reflective of "confidence" or "composure," it was quickly confirmed to be directly tied to a player's personality for celebrations.[23]
Madden NFL 12 was released on August 30, 2011. The release was delayed by two weeks due to the NFL lockout,[24] and features Cleveland Browns running back Peyton Hillis on the cover. Several new features have been added to meet demands of the people that play the game such as expanded rosters and future draft picks in Franchise mode.
Until 1993, the Madden series did not have official licenses from the National Football League or National Football League Players Association (NFLPA). Madden NFL '94 was the first game in the series to include real NFL teams, and Madden NFL '95 added an NFLPA license for real players.[25] The NFL Coaches Association sold the rights to have NFL coaches' names appear in the Madden NFL games; Madden NFL 2001 was the first game in the series to feature this license.[26] Neither New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick nor Bill Parcells appeared in the game as they are not members of the NFL Coaches Association.
On December 13, 2004, EA Sports announced it had secured exclusive rights to the NFL and its players' union for the subsequent five years, precluding any other third party from selling a football game using NFL players, teams, stadiums or other licenses. This was extended in 2008 to 2012 and is considered a monopoly in the NFL video game business.[27]
In August 2006, EA Sports debuted NFL Head Coach, which utilized the Madden engine to create a football management simulation. The game was criticized as buggy and unrealistic. EA Tiburon rebuilt the game from the ground up, addressing flaws and creating a proprietary engine, over the course of three years. NFL Head Coach 09 was released on August 12, 2008 bundled with the special edition of Madden NFL 09 and as a standalone game on September 2, 2008.
Released on November 24, 2009,[28] the game is 5-on-5 and takes the best 10 players from each of the 32 NFL teams.[29]
Madden NFL Football was released as the launch title for the Nintendo 3DS on March 27.[30]
In 2004, EA signed an exclusive license through 2009 with the NFL and the NFLPA to give them the exclusive rights to use the NFL's teams, stadiums, and players in a video game.[31] The deal, reportedly worth $300 million and later extended to 2013,[3] has been both criticized and praised. This exclusive license has put an end to competition from other official NFL video games and, some, like Gamespot, have suggested, this gives EA less incentive to maintain quality and a greater opportunity to increase prices. In this climate, some football games, such as the Blitz: The League series, have elected to continue, seeking to distinguish themselves through innovative gameplay, while others such as the NFL 2K series have ceased production. In 2007, 2K Sports released All Pro Football 2K8, which used former NFL stars.
Prior to 1999, every annual installment of the Madden NFL series primarily featured John Madden on its cover.[3][32] In 1999, Electronic Arts selected Garrison Hearst to appear on the PAL version's cover, and has since featured one of the league’s top players on every annual installment.[33] While appearing on the cover has become an honor akin to appearing on the Wheaties box,[3] much like the Sports Illustrated Cover Jinx certain players who appeared on Madden video game box art have experienced a decline in performance, usually due to an injury. In fact, since 2001, Larry Fitzgerald is the only player not to suffer an extreme decline in performance immediately after appearing on the game's cover.
When asked about the "Madden Curse", Chris Erb, the EA Sports director of marketing, commented, “I don't know that we believe in the curse. The players don't believe in the curse.”[35] Greg Pearson, a writer for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, commented that the string of injuries that Madden cover athletes experience can be attributed to the physical nature of football.[35]
Furthermore, to earn the honor of being put on the game cover, a player is usually coming off of a career year. Some regression the following year is to be expected, whether that player is featured on the cover or not, because players generally don't produce two career years in a row. This is particularly the case among players with relatively short NFL careers and high rates of injury, such as running backs, which partially explains the cases of Eddie George, Marshall Faulk, Shaun Alexander, and Peyton Hillis. Starting with Madden NFL 12, the cover athlete was decided by a fan vote by EA and it is believed that many fans voted against their favorite player in hopes of avoiding the curse.[48]
In December 2010, EA announced their plans on developing a movie based on the Curse, which will be a comedy, and not based on fate-based horror movies like Final Destination.[49]
The Madden Bowl is a single elimination tournament held on the most current edition of Madden NFL. It has been held since 1995 during Super Bowl weekend in the host city and, in the past, participation included NFL players and celebrities. The Madden Bowl's participation has changed over the years from being an event held with athletes, musicians, and celebrities, to become an event where only NFL players who are invited to participate get a chance to play. Participants in the Madden Bowl are free to choose whichever team they like. Winners receive a Madden Bowl trophy and recognition in the upcoming Madden video game.
The 2006 Madden Bowl, held during the weekend of Super Bowl XL in Detroit, Michigan, was televised on ESPN and premiered in April 2006. It is not to be confused with Madden Nation, which was a reality television show that chronicled a cross-country trip to crown the best Madden player in America, which also aired on ESPN.
As of 2011, the Madden Bowl competition utilizes the new Online Team Play feature included in Madden NFL 11. Rather than competing as individuals, players form groups of three to square-off for the trophy.
Since 2004, EA games has run a simulation of the Super Bowl using the latest game in the "Madden NFL" series and announced the result. The game simulations conducted by EA have predicted six of the last eight Super Bowl winners (both cases where the prediction ran counter to the actual outcome featured wild card teams winning the Super Bowl). EA also releases a computer-generated description of the simulated game as if it were a summary of the real Super Bowl. The results of the simulated and actual Super Bowl games are listed below.
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