The Broncos' Defense Dominated Super Bowl 50, But Can't in Madden

[schnaidt1]

Amazing read!! I am so excited to see articles like this point out maddens massive head scratchers as to why features and mechanics from games 8 years and older arent being utilized....

the fact of the matter, you look at the size of madden games..checking in around 26 gigabytes...and its very lackluster in what it offers...

and then you see nba 2k16 check in at over 50 gigabytes...

11 on 11 is 26 gigs...but 5 on 5 is double the size?

and look how feature and mechanic rich 2k is..

kinda tells ya the difference between each company..




I wish that soon articles like this start being reflected in the games score you give them...because like you said at the end...if madden keeps going in this trend it will be a game you watch not play...yet OS's score for the game encourages people that its a solid product worth playing,


I agree with your write up 100% I just think more needs to be done Initially in your reviews of games to stay consistent...if Madden is leaving enough to be desired to not want to play, a review score should indicate that as well for us users who make purchasing decisions heavily based off what OS writers have to say about it.

[ChaseB]

Quote: Originally Posted by schnaidt1

Amazing read!! I am so excited to see articles like this point out maddens massive head scratchers as to why features and mechanics from games 8 years and older arent being utilized.... the fact of the matter, you look at the size of madden games..checking in around 26 gigabytes...and its very lackluster in what it offers... and then you see nba 2k16 check in at over 50 gigabytes... 11 on 11 is 26 gigs...but 5 on 5 is double the size? and look how feature and mechanic rich 2k is.. I wish that soon articles like this start being reflected in the games score you give them...because like you said at the end...if madden keeps going in this trend it will be a game you watch not play...yet OS's score for the game encourages people that its a solid product worth playing, I agree with your write up 100% I just think more needs to be done Initially in your reviews of games to stay consistent...if Madden is leaving enough to be desired to not want to play, a review score should indicate that as well for us users who make purchasing decisions heavily based off what OS writers have to say about it.

Just a heads up but the massive size differences are usually going to be art-related. 2K may just keep a bunch of stuff uncompressed art-wise and so on as every game does compression and all that differently, which can lead to MASSIVE difference in GB size.

And we can't control if one reviewer on OS likes the game more than another reviewer, you know? So if one person thinks it's a really good game and the other doesn't, there's still only one "official" review and we don't know which person will like the game more before assigning the review. But we do try to allow everyone on staff to give their opinion on new games -- and thus an audience and more perspectives -- beyond just the official review during that launch window so you all can read them. And, of course, even now we're still providing more viewpoints as this article shows.

[X_isBringingSexyBack]

Quote: Originally Posted by ChaseB

Just a heads up but the massive size differences are usually going to be art-related. 2K may just keep a bunch of stuff uncompressed art-wise and so on as every game does compression and all that differently, which can lead to MASSIVE difference in GB size. And we can't control if one reviewer on OS likes the game more than another reviewer, you know? So if one person thinks it's a really good game and the other doesn't, there's still only one "official" review and we don't know which person will like the game more before assigning the review. But we do try to allow everyone on staff to give their opinion on new games -- and thus an audience and more perspectives -- beyond just the official review during that launch window so you all can read them. And, of course, even now we're still providing more viewpoints as this article shows.

Compression is one thing, but content still plays a part no matter what because you can only compress so much until it's detrimental to stability. The content itself is still going to show through a weight regardless, and at 19.78 gigs, that's still much lower than one would expect.

It should also be pointed out that all of EA's sports games have smaller install sizes than SCEA's and 2K's, and one can make a case that the respective sports games of those other labels all contain more content than Madden.

But I'm less concerned with that than I am with the AI issues particularly on the offensive line which to me gives the defense a lot of cheap successes by simply missing painfully obvious assignments and responsibilities, consistently.

[darknmild]

Quote: Originally Posted by gr18

I only play offline against the CPU and can tell a big difference between Denver and Cleveland's defense and pass rush,especially against a bad offensive line but understand that online against a human is much different.High rates of success using certain plays and such. A little surprised though that a thread so pro 2k,anti EA was approved .

I agree. I have fun playing against the cpu offline. Online gamers cheese and exploit the game. Whether its Madden or 2k.

[charter04]

Wow. Such a great article! This has been an issue with Madden for years. I know some would hate if these things were added because they like being able to run 5 plays all game. Then it might actually require running a real football offense.

I just want Madden to look less and less like Madden and more and more like NFL football.

You can just watch that Madden challenge tournament they just had to see how little Madden looks like an actual NFL game when users can do the foolishness they were doing.

Anyway. Big big props for getting this out there

[michapop9]

Quote: Originally Posted by charter04

Wow. Such a great article! This has been an issue with Madden for years. I know some would hate if these things were added because they like being able to run 5 plays all game. Then it might actually require running a real football offense. I just want Madden to look less and less like Madden and more and more like NFL football. You can just watch that Madden challenge tournament they just had to see how little Madden looks like an actual NFL game when users can do the foolishness they were doing. Anyway. Big big props for getting this out there

Bump! Less and less like Madden, and more like real football, 10 years of gripes summed up in that one statement. We still have a loong way to go boys and girls.

[roadman]

As women sometimes say, size has nothing to do with it.

Here we go again with size matters, but here is a quote from a resident game designer:

From CM Hooe, a game designer.

http://www.operationsports.com/forum...offseason.html

Disc footprint has absolutely no correlation with game quality. It is solely the amount of content (specifically textures, audio, meshes, and other game assets) used in the game. Rather, it's how the developers use the content that affects the quality of the game.

I wish I could say that this was the first time I've said this on this forum.

(By the way, the thread is almost 2 years old)

If Madden doubled its disc footprint, the only immediate results you'd see are higher-res textures, higher-poly-count geometry, and a larger sound bank to draw from for commentary (note that this is completely separate from the commentary being any smarter, that is all code-side).

Again, file size absolutely has no bearing on how fun a game is.

Point once again being that you don't need a massive amount of content to make a great game, even in this generation of consoles. There's absolutely no correlation. Game design and game mechanics matter foremost.

To repeat myself from earlier, the thing that changes by adding more content with specific regard to a sports game is atmosphere and presentation. More content adds more player faces, more player-specific animations, more stadiums, more lines of commentary, etc. These things are nice and can make a good game great, but they cannot make a bad game good. A good game must stand up foremost solely on the gameplay itself. With respect to Madden, the offensive line play, WR-DB interaction, defensive play calling AI, defensive run fits, and what not don't magically improve because the game has a bigger disc footprint. Seeing those gameplay mechanics addressed are the things that everyone in the simulation sports community wants, and those things are almost entirely code implementation and refactoring (admittedly with some supporting animation additions will be needed, yes, but that's a difference on a scale of megabytes, not gigabytes).

[Jr.]

Really great article. Defense is light years behind offense in playcalling and set up.

The things that Madden has added to help defense are very cumbersome to set up, and I'm not even sure they work most of the time (especially shading). There are numerous times per game when I shade to the correct side, but the DB still allows 3-4 yards of separation for the receiver.