Regardless of the time of year (and the quality of Madden itself), OS folks are always looking ahead. This year, there is a lot of talk about a lack of news and rumors about Madden 24.

When June hits, that’s when the Madden news really begins. But returning to the point about the lack of rumors, there’s not a lot to talk about as of now. Before official news started to hit last year, there were a lot of rumors about franchise mode, crossplay, how EA would honor John Madden, Madden coming to the Nintendo Switch, and Madden maybe replicating some tech that came to FIFA (HyperSense). We did end up getting franchise updates (albeit not as massive as maybe hoped), John Madden was on the cover of the game he pioneered, and FieldSense was a stand in for HyperMotion. It was a pretty standard year for being about 50 percent on the biggest rumors coming to fruition.

This year we haven’t heard anything about the development of Madden 24 beyond EA’s announcement of the closed beta and how those impacted by the cloud franchise issue in Madden 23 are getting an invite to that beta and half off Madden 24 (if they choose to purchase it).

EA is definitely in another transition period. New tech isn’t on the horizon but EA Sports College Football is a year out. It did get delayed a full year but development is in full swing now and how EA as a company is going to get back to handling two football games a year is going to be interesting. If one or both are bad, it’s going to ask a lot from consumers to support both year after year. The college football game will have that grace period where people buy it simply because they’re just excited to have it back in their lives, but that is fleeting.

While the lack of Madden 24 rumors is curious on some level, quality does seem like it’s going to matter more here because time is running out for Madden in some ways, even if those ways are just internal pressures.

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Despite Madden 23 being the third-best-selling game of 2022 in the United States, it sounds like major changes are coming.

The game doesn’t work on a technical level and has devolved into a poor simulation-style game. The people at EA have admitted there is a problem, now the question is “What changes will Madden make?” Here are a few suggestions.

Solve the awareness issues

What are some solutions to these awareness issues? Limiting pre-snap options would be an obvious start. There should be some motion and audible options, but not to the extent that Madden has allowed. The vast array of options have lead to most of the handful of plays every year that no one cans top.

If my opponent only runs one or two plays out of the pistol, I should get that information before I play them. If I knew what plays were their go-to’s, I could pick a defense to counter. This would incentivize diversifying your offense, and punish running the same plays repeatedly.

Show me what people are actually running in game. When playing someone online, after every play, the game shows you what they just ran, but not really. The game shows you the base play they ran, but doesn’t show you all the adjustments they made at the line. Show people what beat them so they can adjust.

Cosmetics

Give EVERY player a realistic character model. There is no reason the in game models do not have a clear resemblance to the real life players they depict.

Above all else though, make sure the game works. People are tired of seeing highlights where the ball just magically appears at the fifty-yard line for no reason. People are tired of seeing clips where a player gets tackled only for them to get back up and keep running after going through their end-of-play animation.

All players really require is EA address some of the low hanging fruit issues that have plagued the game for years. Do that and the tone towards the franchise will start to shift.

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