My opinion on Madden, CFB, and NBA2k, and what should be improved in the future:
A lot of people online seem to really hate these games, and yet they still sell incredibly well. Personally, I love all three of the main sports games. CFB 25, Madden 25, and NBA2k25 are all really good in my opinion, and definitely the best of those respective series that I’ve ever played. Now, it should be noted that I’m a teenager, so the oldest sports game I’ve ever played is Madden 10 on the Wii, which is apparently after the golden age of sports games. I have seen videos of people drooling about games from the early 2000s and how their gameplay was amazing. Call me crazy, but hear me out. I think their opinions might, just might, be shrouded in nostalgia.
The graphics in those games were garbage, and the players don’t move realistically at all. I don’t know what these nutzos online think human’s look like when they run, but they don’t look like Gamecube 3D models. The graphics and movement don’t look good, and the textures look like crap. These people talk about how the crowd enviornment and presentation were better and more immersive, but I have a tough time being immersed when I’m looking at dog crap. The gameplay is more realistic that it has ever been, and I think it is a dumb arguement to argue otherwise.
However, there are legitimate problems that are cited elsewhere. Franchise and career modes lacking depth, or not working right is something that people really want. I personally hate playing career mode because I prefer playing as the whole team, and not just being limited to one player. To me, playing as just one player becomes extremely repetitive and I get bored just a quarter in. Franchise/Dynasty/MyNBA is what I almost exclusivly spend my time on in these games. Many people want podcasts like they used to have in older Maddens, better scouting reports and better a better draft process in general, position coaches, and more. I can see merit in wanting that, especially features that were already in the game, but those aren’t the most important things to me.
I will explain what I most want to change with all three of these games, and then what I would want from an ideal College Basketball game. I will talk about seoects of these games in three different categories. Gameplay, Presentation, and Franchise mode. I won’t talk about career modes because I think they’re lame, and I don’t think any amount of extra features or tuning would make me like them.
Madden
Gameplay
I’ll start with what’s good. I think the graphics are good, and the player movement is good. I like how they added the QB cadences coming out of the controller mic, and they have a good thing going with the signature running styles, and they need to keep adding to that. The tackling is pretty decent, but the momentum could always be better. I really enjoy X-factors even though they aren’t very realistic. I also think the play selection is pretty good. That about raps up what I think is good.
There are some bad things here. Sometimes lineman just completely blow blocking assignments, and there is nothing I can do about it. It is insane, and they their logic needs an upgrade. Ball trajectory isn’t always the best, but I usually don’t have that much of a problem with it. What I really don’t like about the passing, is that there doesn’t seem to be much of difference between good and bad QBs. This can be said about most positions, but it is most blatant with QBs. Daniel Jones shouldn’t be as good as Jared Goff, and Goff shouldn’t be as good as Patrick Mahomes. Their ratings are all vastly different, but they play pretty much the same outside of their mobility. If you time up the pass right, all of thema re basically the same. Bad QBs should be bad, and good QBs should be good. That especially hurts Franchise mode. I personally play all games, and don’t simulate (more on that later) and I have almost no incentive to get a good QB. I could win a Super Bowl with Zach Wilson as long as I have a couple decent players around them, because almost all of the game comes down to player skill. I get that this game has a huge online playerbase, but that doesn’t mean that every team should be balanced. Not every team is created equal in the NFL (definitely more so than in other leagues, but I digress), and bad teams should feel bad. Good teams should feel good. Obviously good teams are slightly easier to use (the Chiefs are my personal favorite, but the Ravens are really good too), but I’m almost as good with the Tennessee Titans as I am with Philaldelphia Eagles, which just isn’t realistic.
My problem with team/player balancing isn’t my biggest issue with the gameplay though, it’s the AI. The AI is garbage. As someone who plays almost exclusively against the CPU, it feels like I’m going against somebody who has never even seen a football game before. No matter what team I play against, they pass almost every single play, even if they are a run heavy team like the Ravens or Eagles. Most teams almost never try to get the ball to their best player. I’ll be playing against the Jets, and they’ll be passing the ball to Tyler Conklin and Allen Lazard when they should be passing to Garrett Wilson or Davante Adams (another example of bad player balancing when your scrubs are just as open as your studs). The playcalling and time management is really bad too. They’ll hold on to their timeouts till the last possible second, a lot of the time they’ll just let the time run out on drives late in the game, and sometimes they’ll still be running the ball when there is 6 minutes left and they’re down by 17. Also, it seems like either every single QB is either as smart as a super computer or as dumb as a sack of rocks. On one play they’ll be able to see into the future and make the right read in like 2 seconds, while on the next they’ll roll out and throw the ball away when they have 20 yards of space where they could pick up a 1st down. The QBs are dumb, and their decision making should be more consistent, and custom for every QB.
The core of Madden gameplay is good, its mostly just their terrible AI that makes it seem bad outside of some blocking and ball trajectory problems. EA doesn’t need to add any more features or gimics to their gameplay, they just need to rebuild the AI to the point where it can at least somewhat resemble and NFL Team with real strategies.
*Also, I forgot to mention, the AI QBs almost exclusively throw checkdowns, and rarely try to push the ball downfield. It makes for an extremely repetitive and tedious experience.
Presentation
Presentation is probably what I care about the least, as I either skip through it all, or just listen to music while I play instead of actually paying attention to the presentation. That being said, there are things that could be improved. All of the commetary is pretty lame, especially the two teams they added. The original team of Charles Davis and Brandon Gaudin is by far the best out of three. The presentation of Madden 25 definitely took a step in the right direction, but there are a few more things EA could do to improve.
EA has access to NFL Films, so they should use it. It would be awesome if they used real game footage for highlights when doing player spotlights. They could use real crowd footage. They should find a broadcast partner like ESPN or NBC and then use their music and broadcast crews that already have chemistry. Using actiul TV presentation would help immersion so much, and I love the music these networks use as well. I also think it would be cool if they used NBC style player intros. I liked when they used Next-Gen stats a few years ago, and they should use it again, just execute a little better this time.
There are a million things EA could do to improve their average presentation, but ultimately I don’t care all that much because I usually just skip through it all.
Franchise
Franchise mode has taken a few strides as of late. They added restructuring contracts, made trading a little better, and the scouting process is pretty good. There are plenty of issues though.
The sim engine is awful. Good teams are bad way to often. Is it just me, or do the Bills always fall right around .500 every single season despite being one of the highest rated teams? The stats are never realistic, especially for WRs and RBs. Not every team has a 1000 yard rusher, it is very rare in today’s NFL, and most teams go by committee. Apparently EA hasn’t gotten the memo. The sim engine is too reliant on playbooks. That shouldn’t matter. Things should be almost purely ratings based.
I will also say that AI roster construction is awful and uninspired. They need to get rid of DE and OLB distinctions and just add the EDGE position already. Way too often I see off-ball linebackers on the edge, and edge rushers like Von Miller playing 3-4 DE, when they should be a linebacker in that context.
Not only is the lack of an EDGE distinction a problem, but also teams are just really stupid about the players the pick up. Too many teams either ignore needs, or stockpile on positions that are already filled, especially through the Draft. Each team should have its own GM that has different strategies and tendencies. Some GMs may be more inclined to pay big money for skill players and try to win with a so-so QB. Some GMs should prioritize the line while maybe going cheap on skills. Some should like building through the draft, while others might prefer adding veterans through Free Agency. This would make the team and roster variety really fun to explore with every Franchise that you start. Head Coaches should be tweaked as well so that teams with better Head Coaches get extra boosts, especially in simulation. I personally don’t care for the skill tree system, and I think coaches should get EXP like players, and the upgrades should mostly affect simulation. Maybe there is a player progression rating, an offense rating, or something along those lines. I haven’t really worked out the kinks yet, but something like that would really help make HCs feel more impactful.
There are some customization options I would like as well. Turn trade difficulty into a slider and give a trade override option. Put sliders on everything to do with sim stats and tendencies like in 2k. 2k’s rule change system would be cool as well.
Similar to the gameplay, the core is pretty good, but the AI is where the game really lacks. In a day and age where AI has been better than ever, Madden’s AI shouldn’t be this bad, and they probably need to rebuild it from the ground up.
Wrap Up
The core of the game is good and really fun, but the AI is infuriatingly stupid, and it either makes the game too easy or too repetitive.
EA College Football
Gameplay
This game fixes most of the problems I had with Madden. The AI has a legtimate life-like strategy most of the time, gets the ball to their best players, every team feels unique, and the QBs actually try to push the ball downfield and scramble for extra yards. The ball trajectory is really good, but the blocking is only slightly better. The players are very fast and responsive which I really like as well.
I do have one problem though, and it is actually one that it shares with Madden. The team balancing is not very good from a team rating persepective. Good and mediocre P4 teams are only seperated by a few points, and that should be changed. College Football doesn’t have nearly as much parody as the NFL and that should be reflected. There should be a clear seperation between the Elite-Great-Good-Mediocre-Bad. There isn’t anything wrong with having a 60 overall team as long as everything is scaled properly.
Scaling is really my only problem, pretty much everything else is really good and really fun outside of some abilities being too overpowered.
Presentation
Unlike most critics of this game, I actually think this might be one of the worst aspects of the game, albeit it still is pretty good. I’m not too sure about other teams, but I definitely notice that there are quite a lot of songs missing from what teh Million Dollar Band normally plays for Alabama. There should be more licensed music like Dixieland Delight, Jump Around, and Enter Sandman (all of which are related to big traditiond at some schools). The mascots all do basically the same stuff, and that is not realistic. Big Al and Auby are completely different. It would be cool to see Cosmo do his awesome stunts at BYU games as well.
More commentary dialogue will be added as more and more games are released, so I’m not too worried about that. I think it would be a nice touch if there were actual player pictures in stat overlays. I’d imagine that it wouldn’t be too difficult to get the schools to send those pictures to EA. It would be cool if they added a CBS broadcast package to use their iconic music, but it probably won’t happen.
What they have is mostly good, but they need more.
Dynasty
I really enjoy Dynasty, but there are some things that really need to be fixed.
First and foremost, I think the recruiting system is really good. It is just deep enough to not be boring, but also simple enough that it doesn’t take forever. However, it is not balanced enough. It is way too easy. Too often I am able to get pretty much every single 5 star in the class while other teams are just rummaging for scraps. It should be harder to get every player you want. They should also incorporate more decommitments, and ways to sweeten the deal so you can steal commits from other teams by making promises. Then, if those promises aren’t met, they will enter the transfer portal.
Speaking of the transfer portal, I almost have no players transfer away from my team. While that is very convienient, it is also very unrealistic. Even if I am winning championships every other year, players transfer all the time for all sorts of reasons. With the right logic and tuning, more players should be entering the transfer portal from teams oof all levels, though a higher proportion of players should be leaving teams who’s coach left, or are in the G5.
There should be more conference realignment options. I’d like to be able to create new conference, delete existing ones, and rename/rebrand them. There should be offline Team Builder as well.
They should implement a new HC system like I proposed for Madden. They should have more of an effect on sim results including stats, they should all have their own AI strategies instead of each team having their own, and they should all have their own recruiting/transfer portal strategies.
Finally, the most important thing, we need a better rankings system. It seems like there is an 8-4 threshold. Whenever a team gets to 8-4, they are automatically thrown out of the rankings even if they have really good wins. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to any movement in the rankings, and it can lead to some questionable playoff snubs. Sometimes it feels like the value SOS, but sometimes it doesn’t. There really isn’t reasoning behind anything.
Dynasty is already pretty good, but there are steps EA can take to go above and beyond.
Wrap Up
College Football is really good in a lot of areas, but there are just a few things EA could do to turn it from good to great.
NBA2K
Gameplay
The Gameplay is basically perfect in my opinion. I don’t play online that much, but pretty much everything works well, and is both fun and intuitive. The only thing I don’t like is that the AI teammate defenders can be very dumb, and my center is almost never in the pain to defend the rim. Maybe I’m doing something wrong, but help defense should be better.
Presentation
I think the presentation is great, especially in the MyNBA Eras mode. Kevin Harland is amazing in everything he does, and his crew is by far the best in the game, and I wish I could turn on a setting so that it is him everytime. The stat overlays and highlights are all good too, but I wish they would just stick to real pictures of the players instead of using their in game models.
MyNBA
MyNBA is a much more complete mode with way more customization than any of EA’s games. My problems are more of the same from the last two though. AI teambuilding should be better. A lot of teams just stack up on one position, and then they don’t have the IQ to change their player’s positions in order to have an ideal, realistic lineup. There is also a big Free Agency problem. Too many players ask for too much money, and there are a lot of good players that end up going unsigned.
In the eras mode, there are too many generic players. They need to work harder to get the rights to more players. Chalres Barkley, Reggie Miller, Andre Iguadola, Blake Griffin, and John Wall are just some of the stars that aren’t in the game, and the game suffers because of it. I would also like to start from whatever year I want, instead of just picking between a few different starting points.
Wrap Up
I don’t think there are very many problems with NBA2k at all other than AI roster management. When you don’t play the career mode, it is a very good game.
College Basketball
I think this would be very cool. I have been getting more into college basketball lately, and I almost like it more than the NBA now, especially since Alabama has been so good. I really wish this would have come out this year because I feel like Mark Sears would be right up my wheelhouse. I don’t care whether EA makes it, 2k, or both, but I just hope that it works well and captures the chaos and different styles of play that come with college basketball.
Conclusion
I reall like all these games, and I hope that a college basketball game will come out at some point in the near future, but a lack of competent AI can make all of these games feel very repetitive. I hope people online will take notice at what actually makes the game feel bad, instead of stupid filler that would bloat the game, and make it take up more space than it should.
JacobErwin.com 