Madden 12 free agency vid... love it or hate it?

[jaymo76]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQxZYRVmehE&feature=player_embedded

[steelerfan]

Looks like NFL Head Coach. Fine by me.

The real question will be whether teams spend up to the cap, fill needs, re-sign realistically, and award huge contracts to players they deem worthy.

[SmoothPancakes]

Looks almost exactly like the free agent bidding system for the undrafted players in NFL Head Coach 09. Which is great. I ended up getting exactly everyone I was going for in my first offseason in NFL HC 09. Just have to have a plan when going in and manage and watch your time.

[JeffHCross]

Love it, love it, love it. I was considering updating my copy of NFL Head Coach 09 to more accurately reflect the current rosters, but I might end up picking up Madden 12 instead ...


Side note: I'm glad that they didn't try to shoehorn this into Online Franchise this year. That's my only dislike of this system ... it will be VERY difficult to port to Online. I'm guessing it won't ever happen, actually.

[skipwondah33]

Jeff, actually I believe you could do all of this through the League Manger site last year. We didn't use it for our franchise though. I only used the site for draft prospect scouting and statistics.

[jaymo76]

The video does relieve some of my concerns. I thought the timer started on all free agents at the same time. I am also glad to see you can see all of the players you bid on in one screen so that you up the ante easily per player if you so wish. Also, I found out on another site that the terms of the contract are worked out AFTER the free agency period.

Hopefully this week they will come out with some scouting,draft,combine footage...

[SmoothPancakes]

The video does relieve some of my concerns. I thought the timer started on all free agents at the same time. I am also glad to see you can see all of the players you bid on in one screen so that you up the ante easily per player if you so wish. Also, I found out on another site that the terms of the contract are worked out AFTER the free agency period.

Hopefully this week they will come out with some scouting,draft,combine footage...

Yeah, it looks like they took the exact system from Head Coach 09 and put it into Madden, between the free agency bidding, and the working out a contract after free agency, etc. That's awesome. Madden was going to be a holiday season buy for me (since there a bunch of games already coming out the next few months that are higher up my list than Madden, but it might just get bumped up to an earlier purchase date after hearing and seeing this stuff.

[morsdraconis]

Now, have the player's overall change based on the system you're running, have scouts that determine if you even know how well they'll play in your system, and, above all, have a draft process that isn't so scripted to have elite players and non-elite players (all with the same damn name, every time) and you'll be getting close to what the Head Coach team did 4 years ago...

[morsdraconis]

All this really does is make me want to play Head Coach 09 again.

[jaymo76]

You know, I owned Head Coach and actually played it... BUT... before the post season I suffered the RROD Experience and had to turf my 360 ang get a PS3 so I have never actually played through a full season of head coach. I am looking forward to seeing it (via Madden 12) in action though.

[JBHuskers]

Yeah I'm pretty sure the main guy behind the system of Head Coach was working on bring some of that over to Madden.

[Rudy]

It looks cool. I guess the most important thing is that it sounds fun and people that have tried it seem to like it. It's been forever since I played a full franchise mode in Madden and I remember how easy it was in free agency to get exactly who you wanted so this should be a lot better.

[morsdraconis]

All this really does is make me want to play Head Coach 09 again.

Yup, definitely gonna start fuckin' around with HC09 again. Especially if I can find updated rosters.

[SmoothPancakes]

It looks cool. I guess the most important thing is that it sounds fun and people that have tried it seem to like it. It's been forever since I played a full franchise mode in Madden and I remember how easy it was in free agency to get exactly who you wanted so this should be a lot better.

Yep, while it will still probably be a bit easy to get exactly who you want, you're going to have to manage your time carefully on people with active bids and timers, keep an eye on the bids, and have back-up contingencies ready to go at a moment's notice if one of your main bids falls through. If you just waltz into it with no plan or nothing laid out in advance, you're going to miss out a bunch of people you want.

[jaymo76]

I see that the HC 09 demo is still on PSN.... anyone know how much you can do on the demo? I would like to try the free agency thing out to see what it was(is) like.