Ahead of the release of Madden NFL 22 this August, EA Sports is offering a select few gamers the chance to give its next offering an early run. The closed Madden 22 community playtest will be the first chance for members of the community to get some hands-on experience with the game, and provide some feedback ahead of its release.
Madden is coming off of a year of widespread backlash that had been boiling under the surface for almost a decade. This was evidenced by Madden 21’s infamous 0.2 Metacritic user score. EA is looking to win back some community members with its latest installment. Here’s everything you need to know about the Madden 22 beta via EA Sports.
What is included in the Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest
- Play Now
- Completely new and improved Franchise
- Madden Ultimate Team
- Strategy Cards
- Solo Battles
- Weekend League
- Squads
- Superstar KO*
- The Yard*
*Available only during Week 2 of Playtest
Community Playtest Rules
When participating in the Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest, participation is subject to the Madden NFL 22 Pre-Release Feedback Agreement in-game and participants must refrain from recording, streaming and/or capturing any portion of the Playtest content. Failure to do so can result in penalties from removal from the Playtest up to complete bans on all EA Accounts.
How Participants Can Download the Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest
To Download Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest to your console, players who have received a code must follow the instructions below:
To Download on Playstation:
- Use your existing Sony Entertainment Network account on PSN™.
- Select the PlayStation®Store icon on the system home screen.
- Select Redeem Codes at the bottom of the menu on the PlayStation®Store.
- Enter the code and get ready to play.
To Download on Xbox:
- Go to Games under Store.
- Select Use a Code. Or say with Kinect, “Xbox, use code.”
- Sign in if prompted.
- Select or enter the 25-character code and get ready to play.
Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest Known Issues
Here is a rundown on known issues throughout the Community Playtest. We’re working to improve these issues in the coming months, so participants can have the best gaming experience at Madden NFL 22 worldwide launch.
.Known Issues in Franchise: Weekly Strategy
- There will be no data on some of the focuses (passing) art
- The G/T will be flipped on Inside/Outside run focus art
- The wrong Top Threat players will show up for the Offensive gameplan Focuses (i.e. a running back showing up for “Contain QB Scramble”)
- Bye Weeks will show empty data
- The player order within the Manage Health screens are not the correct depth chart order
- Fatigue bar levels will be flipped on Off/Def Focuses
- After completing weekly Training, you will be able to go back in again and change things (you should only be able to choose free practice)
- After selecting a weekly Goal, the Team profile screen will not refresh and show it
- There are some overarching in-game fatigue issues during gameplay
Known Issues in Franchise: Staff/Enhanced Goals
- There will likely be a crash going into the Manage Staff screen after accessing the Staff Moves Action Item
- The Staff Moves will not load any information if you go in twice
- Changing filters will force you to lose the highlight on the Staff Management screen, making it difficult to navigate
- In Gameday Goals, Head Coach goal of “Shut Out” will display <oppteamlongname> in title text
Known Issues in Franchise: Hub
- The ties will cause visual issues in the Standings panel of the Home tab
- The header will be missing in the Home tab, while the user team logo will be missing in the bottom right corner of the Hub
- There will be a few miscellaneous size/spacing/formatting issues in the UI
- Expect data refresh issues in various screens
- There will be bad data in panels during the Fantasy Draft and when the user Coach is not on a team
Known Issues in Franchise: Season Engine (Scenarios)
- Some scenarios will use incorrect cinematic environments
- Some scenario reward screens will feature an incorrect staff points icon
- Scenario goal titles will appear in all caps in all goal screens and hubs
- The Hot and Cold Opponent scenarios will trigger too often, as well as in the playoffs
Known Issues with Gameplay
- Expect late drops caused by defender contact on Aggressive Catches
- Expect flat defenders to be slow to react to the flats in coverage
- Most ‘End of Game’ highlights will not be functional
- Deep Zones will not effectively cover sidelines/the back corner of the end zone
- Deep Zones will not effectively cover deep crossing routes
- Throw-out-Sack adjustments will be incomplete on Competitive game style
- Jumping sideline catches will not always get the player’s feet down in-bounds
- Expect broken hit-stick tackles; Tuning is ongoing
- Question marks will sometimes randomly hover over various players’ heads during play
- The first down augmented line on the field will not be functional
- There are some issues with the DGD Momentum Meter; it will not work right in Superstar KO and The Yard
- Tendency Gameplay UI will not be final; some text in the build will not be accurate on these menus
Known Issues in Madden Ultimate Team
- Some menu description text will read “There’s Subtext Here”
- Expect no deep-links within Mission Activities
- There will be no offers in the MUT store
- Several Play modes are not meant to be accessible during the Madden 22 Community Playtest, including:
- H2H Salary Cap Ranked
- H2H Play a Friend
- Draft
- Squads Play a Friend
- No Sets are available
Known Issues with Commentary
- Expect some missing commentary during the second part of the pre-game intro (e.g. while showing NextGen Stats)
- There will not be Coachman commentary during halftime (e.g. when showing NextGen Stats tendencies)
- There will not be commentary specific to the three new NextGen Stats replays
- Expect gaps in commentary for rookies and players on new teams
- The onboarding VO is not updated yet (i.e. might hear “Welcome to Madden NFL 21”)
Known Issues around Avatar and Shared Progression
- We are experiencing intermittent access issues with our Global Profile. If you’re unable to access it, try entering a mode and exiting; Functionality should resume.
- The Objectives deep link navigation has been disabled for the Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest. However, you can still achieve most of these objectives through playing. Game On!
- Occasionally the player wallet information becomes invisible after finishing a game. To get this info back, please access the global profile.
Things to Look out for Throughout the Madden NFL 22 Community Beta
As participants get into gameplay over the next few weeks, there are a few things to keep in mind:
- During Week 2 of the Community Playtest, there will be a Title Update – adding more into Madden NFL 22. Please keep in mind that with this Title Update, participants will lose all information and leagues created. Following the update, participants will be able to recreate and reload previous information in The Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest.
- NFL Player and Rookie Ratings throughout the Madden NFL 22 Community Playtest are not final and will shift in the final game build. Currently, Player Ratings are similar to those in Madden NFL 21 and Rookie Ratings are based on averages of each of their positions.
- Starting a league in the improved and revamped Franchise includes:
- Select “Franchise” from the main menu
- Choose the “Active Roster” option
- Select any Team
- Change any League Settings as desired (such as: Quarter Length, Accelerated Clock, or amount of cost per Talent)
Feedback on the Madden NFL 22 Community Beta – Madden Voice
Feedback is extremely important to us. We want to ensure our team gets participant feedback to continue making updates and improvements to Madden NFL 22, so it has what our players want and need.
Below, we have listed insights and questions around various modes available in the Community Playtest. Playtest participants may submit additional feedback on the Madden Voice website.
Insights Around Franchise
- We recently rounded out user interface updates for returning features as well as the build out on new features. If you see any issues with the screens, please let us know.
- The design team has implemented significant tuning updates, with much more to come over the next few months. If you find any issues with either game balance or authenticity, please share!
- For our two most significant areas of change: Weekly Strategy and Franchise Staff, we want to make sure we’re offering fun decisions, with clear choices that lead to genuine impacts in how you play your franchise each week. If a decision is unclear, not powerful, or you feel it might not work, please let us know!
Feedback Around Franchise: Weekly Strategy
- How often are you changing the game plan focus from the recommended option?
- Do the Pros and Cons give you enough information about how these carry over into game?
- Does the choice between choosing the different Practice intensities and reps choices make sense and also, feel different enough?
- Is there enough information about how the progressive fatigue system works?
- Do you have enough information to make an informed choice about what gameplan focus you should choose?
Feedback Around Franchise: Staff/Enhanced Goals
- Does it feel authentic when a coach gets fired?
- What talents do you gravitate toward first? How strong do the talents feel (on a scale of 1-7 with 7 being OP)? Are the talent descriptions clear on what each talent does?
- What additional talents do you feel are missing?
- Are the goals fun to select/play? What are your favorite goals to select in Staff Management?
Feedback Around Franchise: Hub
- Are things refreshing as one would expect when making edits/playing games/making player transactions?
- Where is data not refreshing?
- Where is data refreshing or reloading multiple times?
- Is anything that’s useful to Franchise, that you’re finding difficult to access quickly?
- What options would you prefer to be at the top of the Activities list?
Feedback Around Franchise: Season Engine (Scenarios)
- Do goals feel too easy or too hard?
- How do the rewards feel? (Too powerful, not powerful enough, etc.)
- Do the rewards feel like they match the difficulty of the goals?
- How is the cadence of scenarios? Are they too frequent? Not frequent enough? Are you seeing a particular scenario or scenarios too often?
Feedback Around Dynamic Gameday
- How does the power/balance of Momentum Factors feel?
- How does the power/balance of AI Tendency Gameplans feel?
- Are there any gameplans/Momentum Factors that stick out as favorites? Least favorite? Any you’d want, that we don’t have?
Feedback Around Gameplay
- How do you feel about the Run Game Balance; Pass Game Balance; Catching Responsiveness; Tackling Responsiveness; Pass Rush vs. Pass Block balance?
Feedback Around Madden Ultimate Team
- What are your first impressions of Strategy items? Is it clear what they do? Is it intuitive how to equip and manage them?
Feedback Around Overall Commentary
- Is there any commentary that is contextually inaccurate (e.g. commentator shares the team punted their last possession, but it was really a lost fumble)?