We're Skeptical The New 'Madden' Will Get Any Better

A couple of months ago I wrote An Open Letter To The Makers Of Madden expressing how pissed I was about features that were vanishing (particularly from franchise mode) in the iconic football gaming series. Technology is typically supposed to improve over time, but somehow, in the same 15-year period where we went from an iPod Shuffle to a supercomputer in your pocket, Madden has managed to lose a good chunk of face variations.

There's more facial diversity in Attack Of The Clones. But that's just one of so many details stripped away from the game for seemingly no reason. We've lost many features as EA has implemented their strategy of subtraction by subtraction and its part of the reason that #fixmaddenfranchise was trending on Twitter last week.

Now EA is promising to fix franchise mode...

... But forgive me if I remain skeptical. Their recent announcement of 'The Yard'  - a game mode that seems similar to the NFL Street games of the past - looks like a cool addition, if I had any confidence it would remain in the series longer than 2021. But even if it does, this isn't a franchise improvement or even a core gameplay improvement. It's like throwing in a brand new toaster when the car we're buying is missing a wheel.

Here is the latest update from Executive Producer Seann Graddy in an interview with Gamespot:

It's a long video and, if you don't have time to watch, the most he says about Franchise Mode is this:

"We hear you. We are working on basically some features and new things that we will share as we head into the launch window, both for our live services through title updates, and a long-term road map for Madden 22 and beyond. It's still too early to get into specifics on that, but it's something for franchise fans to look forward to in the coming weeks."

So who knows? Maybe they'll come through, but I'm not holding my breath until I see the gameplay footage or NFL2K comes along to crack this free market wide open.

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Top Image: EA