Draft – NoobTubeTV

Madden 23 Franchise Mode House Rules

With a new iteration of our favorite annual digital disappointment coming in a matter of weeks, here are the new house rules I will be using for my Franchise Mode this year.
I hope to post regular updates throughout my journey in this mode as it will hopefully keep me interested as I move through a few seasons or more.

Trading Down – You can trade down once in the first two rounds and three times total.
Scouting – NEW – Regional Scouts must focus on different positions from other scouts. National Scouts can scout any position.
Big Board – NEW – You must draft according to your big board within the Top 5 Picks. This has changed in order to bring more challenge to drafting.
Sleeper Rule – You can choose any player up to one round before their projected position. This will keep you honest and give the CPU a chance to take these sleepers before you get the chance.
Draft Pick Limitations – NEW – You can only hold a limited amount of picks in each draft. The rules for your draft pick amounts are somewhat complicated, but they will make for a better experience.
- Maximum of 10 picks in any draft
- You can have two first round picks for up to two years in a row
- If you end up with three first round picks during any draft you must trade one of them to a division opponent for their lowest pick in the next season’s draft. Before the draft you are free to move any of your three first rounders how you see fit (within the rules).
- You cannot draft two QBs in two consecutive rounds
- You cannot draft more than two QBs, HBs, or TEs in any draft

Free Agency and Re-Signing –

You can only sign two 90+ OVR free agent player per off-season.
You can sign one player outside of each of your schemes during free agency bidding (1 on Offense, 1 on Defense).
You can make ONE offer to any player on your team with 90+ OVR during the re-signing period while in regular season. If they turn down your offer they must be allowed to test free agency – the rule above still applies.
QB Specific – If you have two QBs with 80+ OVR you must allow one of them to test free agency when their contract expires. If both are on expiring deals you must choose one to attempt to re-sign. This will allow CPU teams to have access to quality QBs and drive realism.
STAGE 1 – 5 Offer Limit – (1) Two Players Rated 90+ (2) Three Players Rated 80-89 (3) Any Amount of Players Rated 79 and Under.
STAGE 2 – 10 Offer Limit (1) Two Players Rated 90+ (2) Five Players Rated 80-89 (3) Any Amount of Players Rated 79 and Under.
STAGE 3 – No Limit – (1) One Player Rated 90+, (2) No Limit on other offers as of right now. This could change depending on how the AI acts in the first two stages.

Staff Points –

Each upgrade you purchase must rotate between each section (Coach, Off Coord, Def Coord, and Personnel). This means you can’t throw all of your points into making trades easier and you can’t put them all into your Head Coach either. Spread them out and it will add depth to your experience.

Trading – NEW – During the pre-season you are permitted to make a maximum of four trades (one per week). (1) Two trades can involve acquiring draft picks. (2) Two more trades can be made that are player for player. (3) Any player you acquire must have a lower OVR than what you are giving up OR if they are a greater OVR they must be over 30 years old.

In addition, if the CPU declines a trade offer you can make one more counter-offer. If that offer is declined you cannot offer them another trade that season.

GAMEPLAY HOUSE RULES

Play Calling – Set Play Limit to 10, Cooldown to 4.
Hot Routes – You can use one hot route per series.
Money Plays – If you find a play that works often enough against the CPU that it becomes a go to play, you must either remove it from your playbook or stop using it immediately.
Running Up The Score – If you are up by 21+ points in the fourth quarter you must switch to Chew Clock and choose a running play while rotating new HBs as well as a new QB in the final two minutes.
Passing No Switch – Do not user control a WR until after the catch has been made. This will add realism, challenge, and more animations! This is the same when you are playing defense unless you are controlling the DB from the start of the play.
No Huddle – This can be used only on the first drive of the game and during the final two minutes of either half. It cannot be used to keep other personnel on the field outside of the situations above.
4^th Down – You can go for it if you are losing the in the fourth quarter or if there are fewer than five seconds left in the half and you are within 60 yards of the endzone.

Draft Logic And Custom Draft Classes – Madden 19

As the news about custom draft classes hit me I could hardly stand it. Being happy about a CFM Feature was new to me. Any work on CFM that wasn’t surface level was something I had yet to see. However, certain things take time to marinade and allow logic to creep through instant happiness. Suddenly, I felt the pain of reality and the question hit me like a ton of bricks.

Have they fixed draft logic?

NFL: 2014 NFL Draft

The biggest problem with all Franchise Modes in almost every game is that they are flawed from the outset. The user can see good players and snatch them up whenever they want to when it comes to free agency. Once you get to scouting (what scouting?) and then the draft itself in Madden the AI doesn’t really seem to put as much thought into the most important off-season aspect as it should. It’s generally pretty easy to find hidden gems and such in the draft through the broken scouting system (for reference, take a look at the house rules developed for Madden 18). I have come up with a theoretical fix as we wait another two months for Madden 19 to come out.

Normal Should Be The Default Development Trait

While most of this depends on how often a development trait will change during a season, I would suggest that all players be changed to Normal as well. This will be one of my goals in Madden 19. I have been wishing for custom and shareable draft classes for quite some time. While some of you will undoubtedly be looking for real-world draft classes, I will be editing and creating fictional classes for multiple reasons. The development trait being set to normal is a big part of that. The other is that it will take away a lot of wasted time editing names, schools and such just to create a subjective rating that would be debated and scrutinized. I will be happy to try out a few of those classes, but that won’t be my focus.

Rookies Should Never Have A Default Overall Above 84 In CFM

Rookies are unproven talent. That’s it… period. I will be editing my rookie classes to not only have Normal development traits, but also in a manner that will see an even spread of OVR ratings that won’t pollute the CFM with a bunch of 90-99 players by season three or four.

I will be keeping a close watch on what else is announced in regards to CFM and especially fixes to the logic engine that I fear will still see minimal effort for yet another year.

Stay Tuned

Madden 19 Franchise Mode – Only One Direction To Go

As we near the NFL Draft in a matter of days it is starting to leak out of the rumor mill that Madden will be focusing on ramping up the quality of Franchise Mode. Hopefully this means we can expect a bit more depth in terms of how the mode is represented in a few different ways.

madden-nfl-15-screen-19png-e0e9e8 — Because EA is the Johnny Manziel of sports game developers.

They have tried to change how free agency works from the Auction system a few years ago to making offers before advancing and hoping the guy you wanted chose your low-ball offer. Between bad financial logic and worse player and team logic – Madden hasn’t exactly been a beacon of realism for wanna-be GMs.

They must find a way to push gamers in this mode to eventually spend their money on veterans without looking at every 28 and 29 year old player like they are going to become Stephen Hawking at the age of 30. Yes, there is certainly a youth movement in the thinking of NFL General Managers. Yes, this means that drafting top talent over keeping ‘aging’ players is a common strategy. It doesn’t mean that Madden should get a pass in making players in their late-20s and early 30s relevant in Franchise Mode.

On top of the age nosedive in terms of player ratings, the other aspect that needs the most help in Madden is the Draft and Scouting.

Scouting has quite simply been a lazy effort by the developers. It isn’t difficult to find the superstar players later in the draft. It isn’t hard to find the busts in the first round. By the time you figured out the scouting dynamics in Madden 17 you were more than okay with the point reversal in Madden 18 that was supposed to make that aspect more challenging. All you need to do is look for the first rating to be a B+ or higher and you are on your way. It’s not rocket science… and that makes for an insanely boring experience that is arguably one of the most involved and talked about in all of sports.

They must address the lack of immersion in our experience week by week. There is ZERO immersion in Franchise Mode from an overall league perspective. There is no feeling for the salary cap when it comes to managing the team. There is no excitement in Franchise Mode… NONE. The Super Bowl has been the same stupid celebration and musical experience for years.

Madden 18 was the final straw for me as a Madden fan in a lot of ways. It was the only Madden I have stopped playing before the Super Bowl was over. It says more about the staying power of Franchise Mode than anything else.

Madden Ultimate Team has killed what made Madden a fun experience for those of us that don’t enjoy online sports gaming. I am hoping that Madden 19 will make good on their chance to convince me to buy this game as a pre-order for the sake of giving my annual guides for all of you out there.

Making Your CFM Last For Decades – Team Building House Rules In Madden 17

In the words of Aaron Lewis (from Staind), It’s Been Awhile.

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In the spirit of not only updating NoobTubeTV with new and fresh things for the secular Holiday Season of Capitalism and video games during the winter snow and vortex. I am presenting a new way to play a part of your Madden 17 Connected Franchise Mode from the Owner/Coach perspective!

This will focus on house rules I have implemented over the course of playing multiple seasons with multiple teams in CFM. Before we get into the details of how to make a great experience more challenging and entertaining I have to give you the ‘why’.

Madden has improved in many regards as far as CFM goes. They really have made strides and complete jumps to another level in some cases. That said, they also have a lot of work to do with figuring out how teams deal with the salary cap and such. By the time you reach season 4 and 5 in your CFM (2019-2020) you will start to see that almost every team is in a dire situation with salary caps and such.

One easy fix is to turn off salary caps. I suggest not doing this simply because it’s nice to have a limitation placed on yourself during the offseason.

The other issue is that it is still way too easy to accumulated tons of first round picks and later picks as well. On top of that part being easy it is also relatively simple to scout for players that you can draft with assurance that they will be rated 75+ OVR. In order to preserve an ongoing CFM that will not only keep your team competitive, but also honest – here is my Madden 17 method of Team Management House Rules.

During The Season

Re-Signing Players – Because you get a chance to make three offers during the season before you have one final chance after the season and then into free agency this rule is easy.
NOTE – This doesn’t mean you are limited to having certain OVR players on your team. This is strictly a limit on re-signing players during the season. This is meant to make your team stay within the same general competitive level as others and give other teams a shot at signing great players as well.

Any player rated 90+ is permitted ONE offer at any point during the season and you can only re-sign ONE of these players during the season. If you have multiple 90+ rated players you must choose who you place the most value in keeping. If they decline you then have to wait until the final re-sign chance after your season is over.
Any player rated 80-89 is permitted TWO offers at any point during the season. The difference here is that you get to re-sign up to SEVEN players rated 80-89 during the season.
Players rated 79 and lower don’t have limits on offers. Do what you want to here.

Scouting and The Draft

Here’s the deal. You get to scout any players you want. Feel free to go bonkers and even get the Scouting Perk for your coach. The catch is that you are limited once the draft arrives.

Using the ‘Watch’ function is key to this rule and it will make the draft a hell of a lot more fun for you. Not to mention more challenging from the perspective of adding some realism.

First, your draft picks will have limitations (This will also help you avoid weird salary cap penalties if you want to cut a rookie with guaranteed money – this can and does happen).

Scouting and Watching –

Each draft pick you own will allow you to watch a certain number of players projected in that round (prior to drafting them)

1^st Round – 6 Watchable Players (2 Picks = 12 Watchable Players)

2^nd & 3^rd Round – 7 Watchable Players (two picks = 14 watchable players per round)

4^th – 7^th Round – 8 Watchable Players (three picks = 24 watchable players per round)

HERE IS THE CATCH!

You must select your watched players before the draft begins.
You only get to manually draft a player that you have watched.
You may draft any player from any projected round at any time.
If none of your watched players are available you have two options
- Simulate the pick (you get to keep any draft pick obtained if it is traded and you must keep the player drafted for at least one season, if only on the practice squad.)
- Trade the pick
  - You may trade this for any pick or set of picks. However, you need to even out your pick numbers prior to Week 9 of the regular season.

You get a maximum of 12 picks in any one draft each year.

1^st Round – Maximum of two picks in one draft (Never two years in a row). If you have two picks in one year you only get one the next year. If you find that a team wants to trade up and give you a pick you can only do it for lower round picks OR must trade the new First Round Pick to a team with one of the ten WORST records without giving them more than two picks as well.

If you make an Washington/St. Louis for RG3 kind of deal with a team you must count your 1^st Round Picks as two picks each. This means you lose two picks extra picks that year. You must trade two picks two another team.

2^nd Round – Maximum of two picks

3^rdRound – Maximum of two picks

4^th Round – Maximum of three picks

5^th Round – Maximum of three picks

6^th Round – Maximum of three picks

7^th Round – Maximum of three picks

These rules are meant to keep your CFM fair for the CPU and fun for your own benefit.

I have had to make tough decisions and even gamble on re-signing a few players because of weak draft classes. Usually, I roll with my Browns in Madden CFM and this year I made it through five seasons before realizing that building such a dominant team with multiple draft picks made the actual experience less enjoyable. I had to start a new one just to keep my interest in Madden (as I don’t particularly enjoy the lag fest and arcade feel of Madden Online).

Now that these new rules have fixed my CFM experience, it’s time to start fresh and this time I will be starting with the Bills.

Happy Holiday Gaming!

Taking Your Draft To The Next Level – Madden 16

Now that the order of the first twenty teams of the 2016 NFL Draft have been determined it is officially draft season for many fans. This includes yours truly… the constantly disappointed by my Browns ‘in real life’ Dawg Pound faithful Cleveland fan.

What makes it all better for me is knowing that I can at least build my team effectively in the draft on Madden 16. Fortunately, you don’t have to be an analytics wiz like Paul DePodesta to do this either. Here is a quick-ish guide to scouting and drafting better players in Madden 16.

Scouting…It Matters
It took me awhile to realize that the most valuable moment in Madden 16 scouting is the first and cheapest ‘letter grade’ for each player. This is because it only get worse after that first grade… seriously, once you realize that the best grade they have is the first one you find you can quickly determine who to cast away as a waste of resources.

Scout Needs and Schemes First
Now that we know that letter grades will be a good guide for investing more points we can eventually scout all of the players that fit our scheme first.

C+ Is Not Average, It’s Bad
When scouting any players you should never be excited to see a ‘C’ rating. This is never a good sign and should tell you to move on. If you want to take a chance on some WR with ‘A’ SPD and ‘C+’ catching, that’s on you.

Combine ‘Final Litmus Test’
Never judge your prospects solely by their combine score. Always check out where they ranked in the important categories. If your LT prospect was 12th in the 40 yd dash, who cares? If he is the strongest Bench Press LT you might be happy to take him. The combine scores aren’t as important as the rankings for each workout. Do the extra button press and judge your prospects accordingly.

Don’t Be Afraid To Trade Down
If you don’t believe there is a ‘must have’ player for your team where you are picking you should always look to trade for other picks. If you have a Top 5 or 10 pick and want to trade, you could find a lot of great offers. Don’t take a player in the Top 10 if he doesn’t have at least an ‘A’ or an ‘A-‘ Grade in one category with ‘B+’ after… otherwise, you will find you drafted too high.

Take A Chance In Rounds 3-7
You will find that some players projected well (green projections) will be worth taking in the round before their projection at times, especially in later rounds.

While I wouldn’t suggest taking a projected 5th Round player in the 2nd or 3rd round, they might actually be worth it if their combine and grades check out. Take your time and be picky with this as you learn what your team needs.

Don’t Forget Position Changes
What many people might forget is that some players that might not fit schemes as they are listed for the draft but they would be perfect if they changed positions. That 3-4 DE might be too fat and slow to be a DE for your Attacking 4-3, but that doesn’t mean you can ‘ draft him and edit his position to DT just after the draft. This is the only time you can do it for any player, so don’t forget. Also, take a look at changing CB to SS or FS as it may fit them better. You can always mess with these things to see which ratings will be the best for OVR.

You should now be on track to have a top draft every single year.

Top Rookies Gamers Will (Ab)Use In Madden 15

While we still have two weeks until the NFL draft and everything about it is uncertain, it is with almost total certainty that a lot of fans are curious if their team will draft certain players and game-changers. This is quite literal in the case of Madden 15. So, who are the players that will most likely jump up the depth charts and be instant starters? Better yet… Which players are gamers going to trade almost everything to get on their team in Madden 15?
#1 – Johnny Manziel – Face it, Madden is and always has been about speed and Madden 2004 showed that when it comes to having a speedster at QB your team will almost be unstoppable. On top of Manziel being a fast QB and simply running around with him, Madden now has the read option and Manziel will be a monster to deal with in that way as well. The Texas A&M prospect and former Heisman winner will be the most hyped QB since Tebow. The question is – Will Johnny Football suffer the same fate as Touchdown Tebow?

#2 – Dri Archer – He ran a 4.26 40-yard dash in the NFL combine. Who cares if he is only 5’8″? Archer is going to be moved to either starting WR or HB on Madden 15. All you need to do is hot route him in the slot and watch the amazing Madden arcade gameplay do the rest.

#3 – Jadeveon Clowney – This guy is going to be moved to LE and beat RTs in Madden almost every single play. For years Madden has had an issue with terrible blocking and especially on RT/LE interaction. Clowney has the athleticism to take advantage of Madden’s atrocious gameplay. Look for him coming off the edge on almost every passing play in Madden 15.

Madden 25 Connected Franchise Mode – Don’t Settle For Anything!

After Madden 25 announced a recent Gamestop promo for ‘Connected Franchise Mode’ and an article surfaced on Bleacher Report talking about the supposedly tweaked Connected Careers Mode; there seems to be a lot of work for us to do in order to make Madden better instead of simply allowing EA Tiburon to give us old features and call them ‘new’.

There is a poll on the Brian Mazique article asking if editing rosters, fantasy drafts and controlling every team are enough to make you completely satisfied. These aren’t new features! Madden 12 had every single ‘feature’ they are trying to re-implement into a mode that essentially disallowed them. While these features are a must and will only add more depth to the game they by no means should satiate your desire for a better football game.

Some of the (many) additions Franchise Mode needs in order to mimic the real NFL are below:

Player Morale – Player morale was in Madden 2005 and has been in the NBA 2K series for years. If there is one thing that Madden lacks in terms of bringing life into the players it is morale and mood when it comes to the actual players.
Free Agent/UDFA Signings – Madden seems to think that free agency is something that allows a team to go and simply sign anyone they want if they aren’t on a team. After this weekend’s draft there were many players that were picked up just seconds after it was over. These players don’t simply go to the first time that calls, they weigh their options and choose. Some players have no desire to play for a team that has too much depth or a team that simply doesn’t win. Madden needs to make this more realistic and that starts with a more true-to-life free agency.
Storylines – The addition of storylines for some of the draft prospects in Madden 13 was awesome. It was a nice way to give some of the players in the draft a personal touch. The downfall is that their stories all seemed to stop once they were drafted. The commentary doesn’t follow any of them and the updates on the ‘news feed’ seem to leave any of those stories high and dry. Continuity is something that Madden’s career modes always seem to lack and while it will take some work to fully implement – it will be worth it.
Fan Bases – Some teams sell out almost every game. Some stadiums are lucky to be at 50% capacity. Somehow, almost every game in Madden is a sell out according to the stands. While some games have low attendance due to weather it doesn’t seem to matter what is going on in a given city for a game to be sold out. I can promise you one thing, if the Browns ever host an AFC Championship Game and it is snowing like crazy… the stands will be FULL. On the other hand, if the Bengals are playing a game in the middle of the season at home and they are 2-7, they will be lucky to have any ‘fans’ show up. The NFL is nothing without the fans and that needs to be made apparent in Franchise Mode.
Team Movement – While this poses some sort of strange issues with licensing, etc. there were some serious shortcomings when Madden allowed you to move a team to a new city. Outside of the issues listed in the fan base section, you couldn’t keep the team logo and there wasn’t any real support for the gamer to create a team in a new city because the commentary was terrible and franchise mode lost its luster. If you look at the fact that many teams are looking to move to new cities because of stadium issues or simply for more money it is something that will be happening soon and should be given the proper attention in the game.
Injuries – Madden finally put in some sort of real-time physics last year with the Infinity Engine. The downfall was evident in many areas but injuries are one of the most obvious. As much as the NFL wants to censor Madden and try to convince people that it isn’t a violent sport – football is a violent sport and that is why we like it! Real time injuries need to be in the game and big hits need to matter. It makes no sense for my 6’4″ 260lb MLB to have a random injury when he crushes Joe Flacco or Mike Vick in the backfield and they get up like nothing happened. Fix the injury system… please.
Player Progression – While I have always been a proponent of performance based progression I do not like how Madden 13 allowed the user to simply accumulate points by stats and put them where ever we wanted to in each player. Abilities should progress as the player uses them and performs them. How can a strength rating go up randomly or just because we decide we want it to? Follow the lead of MLB The Show and let the user have the option to determine what areas players will work on in a given week or set it to auto and let the coaching tendencies determine it.
Player Value – After Joe Flacco won the Super Bowl he got a healthy contract renewal. I drafted a QB in my Browns CCM, Mark Mallett… He has thrown for over 4500 yards and 35 TDs in his first three seasons. He then won a Super Bowl in 2015 and is up for a new contract offer from our front office. His OVR is 84 but his abilities have been growing with his performance. His contract demands?… 5 Years, $4.6 Million per year. There is no thinking about this from my perspective – Mallett is never going to ask for the money he deserves and that is sad. Players with great speed or players we like using are typically going for crazy statistics in our Franchise Mode. We should have to pay a premium price to keep them around if that is the case. Player value shouldn’t be determined by OVR but by performance and that should make it harder for teams to sign players they want to abuse the other teams with and keep them forever.

We will continue our efforts to make Madden a better game and you shouldn’t let EA get away with calling old parts of the game ‘new features’. What are your thoughts? What is Madden missing the most in Franchise Mode?

Madden 25 – The Hype Train Is Leaving The Station

Now that we are getting ready to start football season in the minds of most NFL fans with the coming NFL Draft this Thursday there are a few things we can start sorting out when it comes to what Madden 25 will be pushing from the marketing end of the annual title.

The first thing we can plan on is the inclusion of some sort of ‘interview interface’ when it comes to CCM. This is primarily due to the fact that NHL 13 is taking up where NBA 2K has been for a couple years now. The idea of interacting with the media and having a simulation experience

It has been twenty-five years since John Madden demanded a true simulation football game. We are still waiting on EA Sports to provide us with one.

isn’t really new but EA is starting to take more of 2K’s features to heart. My personal hopes are that Madden’s CCM (which is still going to be in the next iteration) will feature an interaction for people that prefer to be a ‘coach’ rather than a single player. This will add depth to a mode that was off to a decent start last year.

Better physics and refined tackling are something that people have been clamoring for ever since the 360/PS3 released. Last year we got the Infinity Engine and got to see some interesting animations play out (a lot of Gumby motions, especially). Regardless, we can be almost certain that Madden 25 will have more refined player physics and tackling animations assuming they keep working with the same engine. This leads us into one of the more intensely discussed topics on hardcore Madden forums – OL/DL interaction and blocking in general.

While it is highly unlikely that we will ever see a true end to ‘suction blocking’ it has been mentioned for NCAA 14 that there has been serious work put in towards improving blocking decisions and interactions. This has been highlighted in discussing the inclusion of a deeper CPU intelligence that focuses on second-level blocking. What is ‘Second Level Blocking’? Second level blocking is basically any blocking that occurs after an initial block has been made. So, if the Right Tackle blocks the defensive end and then starts running up the field – they will actually look for the next opponent to block rather than running blindly past a defender that will be looking to bring down the ball carrier. Sounds like something that should have been in the game for years, right? EA Sports isn’t exactly on top of things to pay attention to what seems like fundamentals sometimes. Hopefully they will make good on the improvements in blocking for Madden 25 as this will be a positive direction for the direction of the gameplay in general.

Madden 13 Roster Update – Top Rookies Included

The Madden 13 Roster Update 4-14-13 is available now! – Download Here

The time has come to get your fix of updated rosters. There have been some moves around the league lately and those moves have been accounted for (Cleveland’s recent trade for Dion Lewis being one of them). While some of the rookies have been re-rated due to prior creation having them too high for their projections in the original roster file.

If you don’t know how to transfer rosters here is a walkthrough for you.

If you would like fresh links for the USB Re-Hasher or Modio click the links below.

USB Re-Hasher

Modio

I cannot take full credit for these rosters as the base roster can be found here.

Madden 25 and Infinity Engine 2.0

As many sports fans finish watching the Final Four tomorrow there will be a new direction for their attention to go in the coming weeks (assuming they are NFL fans). The NFL Draft is this month and while there aren’t any real high profile ‘must draft’ prospects out there there is plenty of hype to be started for some teams and especially for Madden 25.

NCAA Football 14 just announced through their typical trailer promo that it would have Infinity Engine 2.0. While this isn’t much of a surprise as Madden had it first (last year), it is something that should make Madden fans wonder what is coming this year. Now that EA has started to push yet another cover vote (as if it really matters) they are once again pushing the old players into the mix with a bracket that seems to be played out after the Peyton Hillis cover debacle – why I voted for him to curse my

I wonder if they will still keep brittle QBs damn-near invincible...? — I wonder if they will still keep brittle QBs damn-near invincible…?

Browns is beyond me.

Now that the Madden 13 cycle is almost over (most Madden fans will put this game on the shelf until July, when NFL Camps grab their attention and they can’t help themselves) we are looking to the next iteration of the same game we buy in droves every August. With NCAA’s announcement there are some things we can all but assume for Madden 25’s improvements.

Better tackle physics are something that happen incrementally every year for Madden. However, now that the NFL is making rules against certain player centered moves (tucking your head when running the ball – IE, The Truck Stick) we will most likely see a trend for Madden to be even more toned down as time goes forward.

Another hope for Madden is better O-Line/D-Line interactions. This has as much to do with physics as it does with how the game is programmed. It has been shown on numerous occasions that Madden’s blocking system is broken at best. There have been multiple occasions in the past where I have had a punter or kicker mysteriously jump into the O-Line and easily handle a 350 lb defensive lineman. While this goes beyond the infinity engine, it is something that should be made apparent regardless.

Pass Interference has been non-existent in Madden for almost the entire generation of 360/PS3 titles. There are high hopes that Madden 25 and Infinity 2.0 will actually have this often-called penalty fully functional this year (on both sides of the ball).

As far as gaming goes in 2013, it has been a surprisingly dull start with little to look forward to in terms of games and even the new consoles. It seems that we have hit a bit of a lull when it comes to this generation’s games. Everything is a sequel, prequel or some other sort of half-assed effort with a big name company stamp on it (I am looking at you SimCity). I always start out my year by saying I won’t buy Madden because it is the same game every single year. Now that we are firmly set to start draft season, I am sure my tune will change for a few months before we are once again asking for patches the day after the game comes out.

As more Madden info comes out we will have it here for you – with completely honest opinions and reactions.

If you are curious about the roster update for Madden 13 – it is in progress and will be out in a couple weeks.
The draft is often a busy time for roster updating, so it will be a good time to get that work started.