madden '08

Madden's best purpose is to let you know who to avoid in FFL.

 

The Madden commercials are starting to annoy me. I want to see less celebrities playing it and more about how the game is better than '07.

 

the Panthers Madden '08 roster supposedly

http://www.sportsgamer.com/games/madden08/roster/team/panthers/

54 players, all rookies except Rosario and Wilson, no Basanez or Anderson. A couple of the CBs you can create from '06 and '07 (Strait and DeLoatch) and of course bring over the new S from the Bears.

 

Roster doesn'treally matter. Just wait for the final cutdown and download the new rosters.

 

Okay, I broke down and bough it. I had an effing gift card, so it cost me like $14 out of pocket.

Played one game versus TB on whatever the default settings were. Gave up a quick TD while I fucked around with the controls. Won the game 28-10, but I blew at least 4 more chances to score (red zone TOs - see below).

The controls have changed enough where it feels alien to me. Didn't expect a learning curve. Couple of quick items you Madden geeks could help me with:

1. The default offense. They have our shitty Henning playbook in there. What's the quickest & easiest way for me to switch to a standard split back offense oriented at spreading the field, chucking the ball all over the place, and giving the backs space to make people miss? I'm not enough of an NFL guru to know which teams run that style.

2. The controls - GUH do they suck. Biggest pet peeve - cycling through the playbook by formation and always getting tossed into special teams when I go to pick a play from another formation. It's overly sensitive to the sticks. Can I fix the sensitivity?

Do you guys tend to build a frequently used playbook and pick from that (think its called recent plays)? How many can it hold? I ran 28 different plays in my game, plus about 25% flips.

3. Fumbles - where is the fumbles slider? Had 15 TOs on fumbles in my one game, including almost every punt or KO return I had. TB's best offense was to kick the ball to me.

There's more. Damn I'm a n00b. Got a feeling you guys would beat me 70-3. I'm about as confident with the controls as an 11 year old is behind the wheel. When I score, it's in spite of myself.

 

Seems like Madden and NCAA are using the same engine when it used to be that they were completely separate games, because most of the changes sound identical. A review I read said that the turnover problem isn't as bad in Madden as NCAA (where it's absurd), but that it was still too high.

If it is like NCAA, you should be able to change your user settings to a different playbook and have it default to that at the team selection screen before a game. Also, in NCAA you can adjust the sliders by going into Game AI.

I haven't bought this yet. I was thinking about getting it today, but my only real motivation is to play it with friends who come over. I think NCAA sated my thirst for football, and while the reviews I read sounded promising, I'm just not that motivated to get Madden as well.

 

So there's a Fumble slider? I only had about an hour with the game last night, but I couldnt find it.

And I didnt scroll the whole way through the playbook options. Are there some generic playbooks after all the team specific ones?

 

No, I guess there isn't a fumble slider. Now that you mention it I recall being frustrated about the absence of one in NCAA (although the INT slider really didn't seem to affect interceptions anyway). As for playbooks, I'm not sure. You might just have to look for a team playbook that fits what you want.

 

What the fuck?


I played an entire game on 8 minute quarters, all-madden, and there was only one fumble. Interesting. Maybe that will change as I play more games. However, I do think the turnover problem is exaggerated. If you turn the int slider down, it seems to make the game a lot more realistic.

I'll try to fill you in as I play more, but right now I'm really enjoying this game. It's probably my favorite Madden yet.



HH, you might want to try Houston's playbook. I think they have more of a spread offense with zone-stretch running. The playbooks actually look more detailed to me. I've been playing as Tennessee and they have option plays for VY, which I don't recall being in last year's game. And, in case you were wondering, they didn't make Vince unreasonably good, like they have with past cover guys. He's not a very good passer on this game. The player ratings seem about right this year.

 

Thanks for the tip. I'll try it this weekend.