Saturday, May 31, 2008

Madden 09 Community Day Impressions - Part 2

by VG Sports Kobra

Run Game

Big B will happy with this part of the game or at least I think he will. The few guys I talked with seem to agree with me that the run game is back in the NG. I am not much of a runner, but when you get Marion Barber in your backfield, you can’t help but want to pound the rock. In the games I got to play, I ran him between 15-20 times and was averaging around 4.1 yards a carry. The holes tend to open up more. Now I didn’t get to spend a lot of time running against dime and quarter formations, so I can’t say if those two can defend the run like in years past. As we get closer to Madden launch day, you can bet we will have more time on sticks to give you a better idea of how the run game will work.

Playbooks

Not all the playbooks were done with the build we played today. I believe 75% of books were completed. I can tell you there are new formations and several new plays to choose from. Also the formation names have been change. Shotgun formations are now called Gun. For those of you who have played real football, you will find a lot of same terminology is now used in Madden.

I am big fan of passing concepts and they are all over the Madden playbooks such as Drive, Mesh, and Texas. I know they were in the game last year, but even more plays with the same concepts can now be found in several different formations. What I like about this is I can run the same passing concepts, but from different formations to keep my opponent from knowing what I am running.

Each team has it’s own defensive playbook. I didn’t get a chance to check out all of them or even know which were done. However I did see new plays. One of them that stood out to me is Man Press. What I like about this play is when I lab I don’t have to use two controllers. I can just play with one whenever I want to work on beating bump-n-run man coverage. By calling this defense the CPU defenders are automatically put in bump-n-run man coverage. This makes it really easy to work on plays that beat bump-n-run man coverage.

Some of the New Features Added

Here is quick look at some of the new features added to Madden NFL 09.

Virtual Trainer – In the mode you can test your skills by performing various drills to improve your game.

EA Rewind – Basically lets you roll back by replaying the last play.
New Booth Commentators – Really nice to have a two-man booth calling the game again.

Action Camera (I think that’s the name of it) – At first I didn’t like it, and I switched to Madden classic. After a game or so, I decided I would give it a try again. It’s not too bad once you get use to it. It does allow you see the field better. I wonder how much it will really affect playing defense. I’ll need to spend more time with it before I decide what camera I want to use.

Online Leagues – I am not going to spend a lot of time with this feature in this article, but I will write up a more in-depth article later this week. I will say that this will increase the game play replay value tremendously.

Weather Effects – Brings in another element when playing Madden.

User Celebration – Pretty cool if you mange to get in the end zone. Different players will perform different types of celebrations. It’s a nice way to talk some trash to your buddy playing next to you.

Bluff Art – I really like this feature being added to Madden. When playing next to your opponent, you can use it bluff your opponent or use it to view pass routes or blitz assignments that you may have forgotten.

Slide Protection – Nanos shouldn’t be as effective as they were in Madden 08 thanks to this new game feature for the NG.

Formation Audibles – Another game play feature I am glad was brought over from CG. Real nice to have when you see something in the defense that you can exploit.

Smart Routes – Works like it did before in CG.

That’s it for now. I will be answering your questions on the forums over next few days.

http://www.maddentips.com/forums

Madden 09 Community Day Impressions - Part 1

by VG Sports Kobra

Last year I felt the game improved on the NG, but not as much as I would have hoped. As many of you know there were several features, glitches, and other problems within inside the game. This year EA SPORTS has made a concerted effort to add features that the causal and hard core community will enjoy. They also have made the effort to remove past glitches and problems that have the plagued the game.

Now I am not going to tell you that they corrected everything, but they did get rid some of the more well know problems like the 3 Man Pass Rush and Double Pass. They also toned down the rocket and spectacular catch, and fixed flipping plays to break down the pass coverages.

When I got my hands on the game, I went to straight to play now, turned off the play clock, and starting digging into the game play.

User Catch Offense

The first thing I tried was to rocket catch. When I played NCAA 09 the day before, my nickname around the rest of the community leaders was “Rocket Man”. I figured I’ll try it in Madden and see what happens. I was not able to perform the same rocket animations I was able to get on NCAA, nor was I was able to get the high spectacular catch like 08.

Even when I did get high up in the air, the defensive backs were jumping just as high. I tried Moss, Johnson, Edwards and Buress. Against 2 Man Deep coverage, I didn’t have a lot of success. When I was able to go up to make the catch either the defensive backs were knocking the ball down or they were laying out my receiver. It was down right nasty to watch as the strong safety blasted the receiver over and over.

Now I will admit I did have more success with the mini jet pack against zone coverage. As far as pulling off the rocket catch, I can still get it, but not on short and intermediate pass routes, I was only able to turn the receiver around on deeper routes. As I already mentioned early, even when I was able to be in position to make the catch, the defenders were all over me. When I tried to undercut the defenders in coverage, they would have none of that. They were able to keep position to knock the pass down or pick it off. Remember how defenders would turn away when the receiver was going up for the catch in the past. That’s not the case in the version of the game I played today. The CPU defenders were like vultures circling their prey. Now I am sure as we all play the game, we are going to find creative ways to catch the ball manually, but I will tell you for now if you were one of those who abused user catching in 08, you will find it a lot more difficult in 09.

User Catch Defense

In my opinion playing defense in Madden 09 should be fun because now the defenders can get up in the air with the right animation trigger. Heck even if you don’t want to take control of the defenders, the CPU does a nice job at defending the pass. To me playing defense feels smoother than any version so far on the NG. It should make those switching from CG to NG a a little more comfortable.

Underneath Passing Game

I’ve gone into a lot of detail already about the deep passing game, now I want to give some thoughts on the underneath passing game. One of things I have felt I have always been good at is the dink and dunk offense. In Madden 09, the underneath passing game may be the best way to move the ball through the air. Slants, curls, drags, hitches, flats, and crossing routes are all effective to name a just a few.

Now I am not saying they are money because against the right defense it’s not going to be there. For instance zones tend to defend the crossing routes better than what man coverage provides. One of the reasons I say this is because of the way the receivers tend to get separation as the ball is just about to be caught. For instance I threw a pass to T.O. It looked like he wasn’t going to be able to get it even if I took control of him, but at the last second, he got a little speed burst and separated from the defender and made the catch.

I also make several user catches on what I like to call corner routes with an inside release (also known as backward C routes). I used the sprint button and was able to get the same separation. I believe this game play feature may separate the players who take control of receivers and defenders once the ball is thrown. For instance if I play against a human who doesn’t take control of his receivers, I will be able to take control of the defender in coverage, and use the speed burst button to negate the speed burst that the CPU uses.

I will be able to jump the route for a pick or at the very least use the swat button to knock the pass away. Now if my opponent takes control of the receiver, he can use the speed burst button to get the catch. It should be nice battle for players who like to control their receivers and defenders.