Often during Sports News Season (SNS), it’s easy for me to get excited for new game announcements. When NBA 2K23 revealed that this year’s cover stars included Devin Booker, Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi, I found myself popping off. Despite my general disinterest in the Madden franchise, I still get hype whenever they announce which athletes receive what X-Factors. These modern yearly sports games are maligned, often fairly, for being incremental releases, however. FIFA and NBA 2K both suffer from this, but no game gets these allegations more than the Madden series. Turns out, the Madden 23 producers are well aware of this.
Madden 23 Producers: Polish is our Top Priority
In conversation with IGN’s Kat Bailey, Madden 23 producers Clint Oldenburg and Mike Mahar spent some time talking about feedback they’ve received over the years. Chief among these complains is that the Madden franchise relies too heavily on animations when deciding what players will do and when. In the article, Oldenburg and Mahar acknowledge this, though they don’t like to call it that.
“Our players have told us very strongly, their words, not ours, Madden has gotten a little bit too animation-based, meaning that they feel like they lose control at critical moments and are watching quick-time events, for lack of a better word.”
Oldenburg says that releasing a polished product is a “top priority,” for the team this year. To their credit, the team released a long list of changes made to Madden 23 based on feedback from early playtesting. It’s a pretty thorough list, which suggests a level of focus on the smaller aspects of gameplay that was at least not as transparent with previous releases. Which counts for something, considering EA could release yet another incremental entry and still top sales on release, which Madden titles tend to do.
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