Madden NFL 13 - Season Ticket & Retail Impressions

[JeffHCross]

Well, I clearly wasted ... well, not money ... on Season Ticket, but time. Bought it Friday, didn't have a chance to play it until now, and Jaymo's impressions, among others, would have already convinced me not to get it. Could've at least gotten a couple extra days or weeks out of Season Ticket (because I know I'll be getting it for NHL).

Oh well. Grand scheme, not much.

So far I only have a few things:

• The menu structure within CCM is ... well, not intuitive in the least. I've never used the R-Stick to navigate except in 2k games (and I hated it in 2k games).
• The Checklist is very nice as a central location. I really liked the "Clipboard" in Head Coach 09, though it was more fluid and wouldn't work quite as well in Madden/NCAA.
• Advancing week by week has killed my ability to "do something quick" like I was hoping to. I was hoping to go straight to the postsseason/offseason and do some stuff in there, just to see how I like it.
• One of the upsides to Head Coach 09 was that you could delegate anything you wanted to. Don't feel like Scouting? Delegate it. Don't feel like playing your games? Delegate it. And you could even choose not to even be prompted for those things, beyond simply delegating it. Madden and NCAA don't have that. I hoped Madden would with the college scouting, but it's obvious they don't. There's some stuff you can choose to have the CPU do for you at the opening menu, but you're still prompted.

One of my reasons for checking out Madden is that, every year, I think it might replace my interest in Head Coach 09. Nope. I'd already cancelled my pre-order (not going to have any time to play it anyway), but if something blew me away I was willing to re-consider. Nope.

[Rudy]

So you can't set scouting to auto if you want? That kind of sucks. I plan on doing it all but after realizing that scouting sucked and was largely useless last year I quit doing it after my second year with Miami.

Madden's menus were bad last year. I was hoping it would be better but it sounds like they are still weak. I know Pastapadre wrote that he EA didn't even display the countdown for his draft and ended up having his pick being done automatically by the cpu. Even in the demo the play call screen doesn't always show the down, distance and clock. That is a bad design decision but the worst decision was to go with the NCAA style replays. Awful imo.

Madden made a really strong push towards TV style presentation last year and I really enjoyed the instant replays and the cut scenes. M13 takes a big step down in this area for me. The infinity engine has not been a big deal. It's nice but I thought Madden 12's tackling engine was pretty good and I still consider it better than what NCAA 13 has. Part of me has actually thought of buying Madden 12 instead of buying Madden 13. But the commentary is better and the passing game is WAY better than Madden 12 for me. I don't think I can go back to some of the frustrations of M12's passing game. I'm hoping the draft and free agency are a lot better too.

[JeffHCross]

So you can't set scouting to auto if you want?

Far as I can tell, no.

I was hoping it would be better but it sounds like they are still weak.

They may be better, I'm just more used to NCAA. I haven't played Madden since '10, and while '10 was pretty intuitive (and shared a lot of similarities with NCAA), '13 isn't, IMO.

I know Pastapadre wrote that he EA didn't even display the countdown for his draft and ended up having his pick being done automatically by the cpu.

That's a half-truth, I think. The countdown is displayed on the primary screen, but once you go inside one of the menus (like "Trade Up" or "Draft Player"), I think it's not obviously seen from in there.

The infinity engine has not been a big deal. It's nice but I thought Madden 12's tackling engine was pretty good

I've played very little on the field, but there's nothing I'm seeing, so far, that makes me say "obviously that wouldn't have happened last year". Or in NCAA.

I'm hoping the draft and free agency are a lot better too.

Free Agency is meh. Personally I would have liked '12's system, with it's auction-style. That's something I really enjoyed in HC09. The draft has nice presentation, though it's not clear when the bottom ticker is showing you real news versus in-game news (FWIW, that's a problem across all of CCM, IMO).

[I OU a Beatn]

I can't believe some of the tactics these douche bags will resort to. Just got IP flooded and booted while up 24-7 in the 2nd. Unbelievable.

[JeffHCross]

Okay, just saw something that probably wouldn't happen in '12 or NCAA. Had a ball bounce off my receiver's chest, and another receiver managed to snag it before it hit the ground. 4th and 1, too!

Also, the default Pro is laughably easy. Just took at QB with 59 Deep Accuracy and was throwing spot on Corner routes.

The #1 projected player in the draft fell to the Jets at #7. There were some very questionable draft choices made by the teams in front of us, including the Rams taking a QB.

[JeffHCross]

I can't believe some of the tactics these douche bags will resort to. Just got IP flooded and booted while up 24-7 in the 2nd. Unbelievable.

The fact that I can easily find tons of discussions on IP flooding for NCAA or Madden is enough to make me never play Random Online ever again. Really? DDoS to win a [censored] video game? Get over yourselves.

[JeffHCross]

In the 2013 pre-season, Nantz and Simms are still reflecting on the 2011 Jets. Oops.

Also, the "Gridiron Club" wants to reward me for playing Madden 10. Apparently the game does not notice I have? Hoping that's just something of a quirk with the Early Release factor (since things like UMT aren't available) and not evidence that it fails to go back and look at past played titles. Or it could be because I no longer have the Game Data stored on my PS3 (that may be the most likely) ... which would disappoint anyone that had to change consoles.

[jaymo76]

Okay, just saw something that probably wouldn't happen in '12 or NCAA. Had a ball bounce off my receiver's chest, and another receiver managed to snag it before it hit the ground. 4th and 1, too!

Also, the default Pro is laughably easy. Just took at QB with 59 Deep Accuracy and was throwing spot on Corner routes.

The #1 projected player in the draft fell to the Jets at #7. There were some very questionable draft choices made by the teams in front of us, including the Rams taking a QB.

I have seen this quite a few times now. It looks really good... at first but it gets more frustrating with time.

[jaymo76]

I forgot to mention this in my earlier posts... the cpu runs the ball too much. Normally I wold be happy to see the cpu run but unless they are losing they don't pass enough, even though Simms goes on and on about how it's a passing league. As I mentioned when I played Miami Garrard through the ball 8 times... Slaton had 43 carries!!!

[jaymo76]

So you can't set scouting to auto if you want? That kind of sucks. I plan on doing it all but after realizing that scouting sucked and was largely useless last year I quit doing it after my second year with Miami.

Madden's menus were bad last year. I was hoping it would be better but it sounds like they are still weak. I know Pastapadre wrote that he EA didn't even display the countdown for his draft and ended up having his pick being done automatically by the cpu. Even in the demo the play call screen doesn't always show the down, distance and clock. That is a bad design decision but the worst decision was to go with the NCAA style replays. Awful imo.

Madden made a really strong push towards TV style presentation last year and I really enjoyed the instant replays and the cut scenes. M13 takes a big step down in this area for me. The infinity engine has not been a big deal. It's nice but I thought Madden 12's tackling engine was pretty good and I still consider it better than what NCAA 13 has. Part of me has actually thought of buying Madden 12 instead of buying Madden 13. But the commentary is better and the passing game is WAY better than Madden 12 for me. I don't think I can go back to some of the frustrations of M12's passing game. I'm hoping the draft and free agency are a lot better too.

Rudy, it's not that the menus are bad it's just that you have to navigate through so many different levels to access information. It is cumbersome to remember where everything is. Have fun looking for the offline save franchise... it's well burried. I really prefered MADDEN 10's simple screen format with all of the information down the right-side

I think the presentation is hugely better than Gus Johnson last year but with only one year in it just doesn't have the depth thus far.

Well, I clearly wasted ... well, not money ... on Season Ticket, but time. Bought it Friday, didn't have a chance to play it until now, and Jaymo's impressions, among others, would have already convinced me not to get it. Could've at least gotten a couple extra days or weeks out of Season Ticket (because I know I'll be getting it for NHL).

Oh well. Grand scheme, not much.

So far I only have a few things:

• The menu structure within CCM is ... well, not intuitive in the least. I've never used the R-Stick to navigate except in 2k games (and I hated it in 2k games).
• The Checklist is very nice as a central location. I really liked the "Clipboard" in Head Coach 09, though it was more fluid and wouldn't work quite as well in Madden/NCAA.
• Advancing week by week has killed my ability to "do something quick" like I was hoping to. I was hoping to go straight to the postsseason/offseason and do some stuff in there, just to see how I like it.
• One of the upsides to Head Coach 09 was that you could delegate anything you wanted to. Don't feel like Scouting? Delegate it. Don't feel like playing your games? Delegate it. And you could even choose not to even be prompted for those things, beyond simply delegating it. Madden and NCAA don't have that. I hoped Madden would with the college scouting, but it's obvious they don't. There's some stuff you can choose to have the CPU do for you at the opening menu, but you're still prompted.

One of my reasons for checking out Madden is that, every year, I think it might replace my interest in Head Coach 09. Nope. I'd already cancelled my pre-order (not going to have any time to play it anyway), but if something blew me away I was willing to re-consider. Nope.

Jeff, I totally agree about the R stick navigation. Who does that? It's just really awkard to use it to scroll the menus.

[I OU a Beatn]

The fact that I can easily find tons of discussions on IP flooding for NCAA or Madden is enough to make me never play Random Online ever again. Really? DDoS to win a [censored] video game? Get over yourselves.

I know. It's so pathetic. Not to mention, isn't it illegal? How stupid and pathetic can these guys be?

I remember people doing it ALL the time in Gears of War and Halo. You couldn't even get through a full game without it happening and now it's starting to make it's ugly head known in NCAA and Madden. It's the first time it's happened to me on a football game, but I've read the horror stories.

It is illegal, right, or am I thinking of something else?

[JeffHCross]

The legality is a gray area right now in the US. Absolutely illegal in the UK.

For me it's more about ... really? You'll go to that level? Really?

Makes me more convinced than ever that a great % of the things people will do on the Internet is just for LOLZ.

[I OU a Beatn]

The legality is a gray area right now in the US. Absolutely illegal in the UK.

For me it's more about ... really? You'll go to that level? Really?

Makes me more convinced than ever that a great % of the things people will do on the Internet is just for LOLZ.

Oh yeah, I know what you mean. I'm kind of used to it because I've dealt with online random players for so long, but this severity of something really baffles me. I mean, this isn't even something EA can really stop. The fact that it's growing pretty rapidly in it's popularity is what scares me. For long I wont even be able to finish a game without it happening.

It's right up there with the keyboard glitch on the PS2 games. Press start, wait until your opponent resumes, rapidly press the space bar on your USB keyboard until the clock ticked down to 0, and then the game would freeze until the person with the keyboard was ready to resume(in effect hoping you left and you get called for delay of game 3 times and get booted). It got to the point it was happening every few games, too. I just hope this doesn't become widespread.

Do you know of any ways to minimize the chances of them getting your IP, Jeff?

[JeffHCross]

Honestly, I'm not even sure how they're getting your IP to begin with. They're doing something unique with their setup that I can't figure. 'Cause when I hook up with somebody on my PS3, I can't immediately think of a way for me to know what IP I'm hooking up with, anywhere. Maybe through my wireless router, it would tell me where I'm getting packets from. But I don't even think it will tell me that.

And I'm finding guys talking about Zone Alarm and other firewalls ... a firewall isn't going to anything unless it's between the PS3/360 and the internet.

The only thing I can think of maybe ... maybe ... would be to use a proxy server instead of directly connecting to the PSN. But that could cause slowdown, and it's entirely possible they could still flood the proxy with packets to take it down. So it may not do a lick of good.

[I OU a Beatn]

So yeah, some of the tackles are just a bit over the top.

[JeffHCross]

Way to hold onto the ball. That takes talent!

Okay, now I can say I've seen something that wouldn't happen in '12.

[CLW]

So you're saying there is a chance you like it?

LMAO there is = % chance of me voting for Obama in November.

[SmoothPancakes]

So yeah, some of the tackles are just a bit over the top.

Yeah, some of the tackles I've seen are some of the worst god awful tackles I've ever seen.

Honestly, while people were bitching because Madden got Infinity Engine and NCAA didn't, I say THANK GOD! The player movements, the tackles (some of the shittiest tackling I've ever seen, and this is taking into regard the lack of fundamental tackling in the NFL), just awful. I have seen players do things and bend certain ways that are anatomically impossible, lest you would end up carried off the field with a broken back or broken neck. And this is all during plays, I'm not even going to comment on the stuff I've seen after the play ends.

I'm gonna say it now, I HOPE TO GOD that Infinity Engine does NOT get put into NCAA next year. I personally would rather have the regular old animations, sucking blocking, route mirroring and whatever else over this crap in Madden.

[Rudy]

I'll disagree about the player movements. I think the player movement in Madden 13 is smoother and players have more weight than NCAA 13. I don't think that has anything to do with the Infinity engine though. You could say the same thing about last year's games.

I do like the IE engine (just from my time with the demo). I think it's fine except for some goofy things. I just don't think it's the greatest thing since sliced bread although some guys love it. It's a very polarizing topic for people on the forums.

[SmoothPancakes]

I'll disagree about the player movements. I think the player movement in Madden 13 is smoother and players have more weight than NCAA 13. I don't think that has anything to do with the Infinity engine though. You could say the same thing about last year's games.

I do like the IE engine (just from my time with the demo). I think it's fine except for some goofy things. I just don't think it's the greatest thing since sliced bread although some guys love it. It's a very polarizing topic for people on the forums.

Wait until you play the full game, especially with instant replay capabilities to go back and look at things in slow motion. Some of the stuff, since the implementation of IE engine, are just atrocious. It almost ruins the game for me seeing what I've seen, especially during running plays.