Jonathan ‘JonBeast’ Marquez didn’t need long to exact some revenge on his biggest rival.
Playing Henry ‘Henry’ Leverette in yet another Madden Championship Series (MCS) tournament final, JonBeast prevailed 31-24 on Wednesday to win the Most Feared Challenge at Full Sail University Orlando Health Fortress in Winter Park, Fla.
The win comes little more than a month after Henry topped JonBeast to win the MCS-opening Kickoff Challenge. As Henry did in September, JonBeast pocketed $50,000 for his win on Wednesday.
The Madden NFL 26 Championship Series is a collection of five events with a total $1.5 million prize pool.
The first three events are known as the EA Majors: the Kickoff Challenge, the Most Feared Challenge and the Zero Chill Challenge. The top 13 point-earners from the EA Majors and the winner of the Last Chance Qualifier will qualify for the season-ending Madden Bowl, expected to take place sometime in February.
All qualifying events will be played in Winter Park.
JonBeast, from Hartford, Conn., nearly won the Madden Bowl last season, losing to Jacob ‘Fancy’ Worthington of Frisco, Texas, in the final. Fancy did not compete in the Most Feared Challenge.
Henry, from Chicago, won the Madden Bowl when it was a team event in 2021, then captured the crown solo in 2022 and 2024. He finished as runner-up in 2023.
But on Wednesday, he could not figure out JonBeast.
‘I feel like it’s a proper rivalry,’ JonBeast said of his recurring battles with Henry, ‘but me personally I don’t care about rivalries. He beat me in the (Kickoff Challenge). From Madden Bowl 23, he came back and won (the) ’24 Kickoff. Now we’re getting settled onto the next tournament.’
JonBeast’s path to his fourth career Madden belt wasn’t easy. He opened play Wednesday with a narrow 31-28 win over Philadelphia’s Jarett ‘SpamminButtons’ Dieppa in the quarterfinals before getting by Matthew ‘GoatGeezy’ Gangl of Racine, Wis., 31-20 in the semis.
Henry beat Christian ‘NoMercyLambo’ Webb of Hagerstown, Md., 27-7 in the quarterfinals before taking care of Jaylen ‘Astro’ Morrow-Reynolds of Waldorf, Md., 55-45 in the semifinals.
Astro beat Abram ‘Abram’ Joseph of Humble, Texas, 38-24 while GoatGeezy topped John ‘Mr Football 88’ Britt of San Diego 14-10 in the other quarterfinal matches.
The Zero Chill Challenge begins Nov. 7 before concluding on Dec. 10. The Last Chance Qualifier kicks off Dec. 12 and ends Jan. 21.
Most Feared Challenge prize money
1. Jonathan ‘JonBeast’ Marquez ($50,000)
2. Henry ‘Henry’ Leverette ($20,000)
3-4. Jaylen ‘Astro’ Morrow-Reynolds, Matthew ‘GoatGeezy’ Gangl ($10,000)
5-8. Abram ‘Abram’ Joseph, Christian ‘NoMercyLambo’ Webb, Jarett ‘SpamminButtons’ Dieppa, John ‘Mr Football 88’ Britt ($5,000)
It’s been over a decade since Electronic Arts last entered the college football arena, and EA Sports College Football 25 is their widely-promoted return to campus. The pageantry and speed of gameplay make for a stellar experience. Unfortunately, hangovers from EA’s other sports titles keep the title from achieving greatness.
EA’s former college football franchise, NCAA Football, quickly became a sporting staple. They were then unceremoniously forced to cease production of the series in 2013. Due to an inability to compensate college athletes for their likeness, the series was shelved – that is, until now.
College Football 25 is not the same game that players fell in love with ten years ago. A decade has passed, and EA – along with the gaming industry – has changed in that time. However, this title flies its college colors proudly, and through its saturated lens, we can experience one of the most enjoyable sports titles in years.
EA Sports College Football 25 simulates the reality of life as a college athlete with boisterousness and camaraderie. Unfortunately, the game is weighed down by EA’s pseudo-patented anti-consumer practices and lack of entry-level mechanics.
Image Source: Twinfinite via Electronic Arts
Graphical improvements and reimagined game mechanics aside, EA College Football 25 just plays faster than its big brother Madden.
This increased speed is not just apparent in the load times and twitch decision-making of a quarterback but in the gameplay itself. It may seem less grounded, and more like an arcade title, but that’s just skimming the surface.
The increased pace is most enjoyed in the frequent – in some instances, somewhat unfair – matchups. With this relationship, you are left with an experience that is unashamedly college football. The Madden NFL series never felt gritty and heavy. However, comparing Madden 24 to EA Sports College Football 25 is like comparing EA FC 24 to Fifa Street.
If the thumping big band performances of ‘Welcome to the Jungle’, spinning cheerleaders, and anthropomorphic mascots didn’t turn you on to EA Sports College Football 25’s commitment to the college experience, then nothing will.
Visuals on the pitch are generally stellar, indicating a dynamic leap from EA’s last football title. The crashing of bodies and dynamic camera angles pull you into the experience.
However, EA Tiburon has seemingly forgotten about updating the crowds from the last college football title in 2013. The crowd, past the incredibly dynamic and colorful front row, are Max Payne-esc stand-ins. This is made worse when multiple doppelgangers are standing row after row behind and beside them.
Image Source: Twinfinite via Electronic Arts
Arguably more important, however, is how the game plays. In that regard, EA Sports College Football 25 takes the ball and pelts it upfield. Gameplay on the gridiron is fluid and dynamic, if a little too sensitive. An overarching complaint of College Football 25 has been its passing mechanic.
This has seen a diversion from a button press to a gauge that fills until you release the button. This altered passing can be switched for a replica of the streamlined previous system. However, the more I played EA Sports College Football 25, the more I got used to it. It got to a point where I was connecting hail-mary passes I could have only dreamed about before.
Call it a learning curve, or call it Stockholm syndrome. At least EA is self-aware enough to give players the ability to toggle it off.
EA College Football 24 is a title with a lot of systems, and that’s not a bad thing. Yet, with so many intricate systems at play – and with some gamers coming into this console generation purely to pick the title up – it needs a much more rounded tutorial system.
There is a vast selection of Minigames to give the illusion of an entry-level experience. However, the true tutorial is hidden in the crevices of the College Ultimate Team mode. This feels like a somewhat shady-looking decision, considering it’s the only mode that funnels players into the microtransaction pipeline.
Image Source: Twinfinite via Electronic Arts
EA College Football 25 isn’t just another football video game, in line with its gargantuan Madden NFL-shaped sibling. With its return to the gaming space, Electronic Arts has broadcast its commitment to the college football experience. The perils of student multitasking are all brought forth in its Road to Glory game mode, from maintaining a decent GPA, and interacting with other students, to actively keeping up with your training.
Unlike previous entries in the series, you immediately start in your college bracket. This is instead of transitioning from a high school position as fans of the series previously enjoyed. This does leave a much-loved mechanic on the cutting-room floor. However, it does allow gamers to get right in on the meat of the mode.
While you can start as a five-star player, jumping straight onto the field, you can alter this to varying degrees. Beginning as a two-star recruit, for example, you have to climb the ranks of your college team. You do this by earning the trust of your coach and teammates while maintaining that aforementioned GPA and social credo.
These elements are gamified through the use of systems similar to a role-playing game scattered between every game. The visual novel-like texting and social media sections don’t have the same depth as something like Persona. Yet, they lend to one of the most engaging systems of the title.
Image Source: Twinfinite via Electronic Arts
Dynasty, on the other hand, is EA College Football’s return to a Football Manager-esc team-building mode. You begin your journey by entering the ranks of one of the 134 FBS schools in the game’s roster.
You are given a similar amount of control as to whether you jump right into its systems, or allow for a more gradual introduction. Gamers can choose to enter campus as a new Head Coach, or one of its offensive/defensive coordinators.
When entering the ring of college football management, you can choose what kind of coach you want to be. The three archetypes for your coach are; Motivator, Tactician, and Recruiter. They all give select improvements in certain areas of your performance, similar to the abilities of your players.
The mode’s return has been met with nigh universal acclaim. However, the days of sidling up to the best-rated student-athletes to create an unstoppable superteam are over.
Time and resource management are integral to the mode. Other colleges are consistently challenging your moves to secure the most sought-after new talent.
Throughout the season, you are not only tasked with scouting for new talent but maintaining and retaining your current squad. Insofar as the games themselves, you can – of course – simulate the entire affair to focus on the big-picture planning. Beyond that, you can play select sections of your team’s game. You can choose to control your team all game, on the offense, on the defense, or even opt to just ‘play the moments’.
Image Source: Twinfinite via Electronic Arts
Here it comes – it wouldn’t be an EA Sports title without it. EA Sports College Football 25 entices players to its Ultimate Team mode with the promise of creative freedom at the core of its most competitive mode.
The mode will most likely receive much of EA’s post-launch support for College Football 25. Ultimate Team has been a staple of Electronic Arts’ sports titles since its inception. Ironically, it is this most modern addition – beyond all of College Football 25’s ways to play – that feels the most redundant.
The creation and promotion of Dynasty and Road to Glory wouldn’t severely impact Ultimate Team’s appeal on the surface. However, EA Tiburon has done such a tremendous job of bolstering their alternative single-player systems. As such, Ultimate Team feels less like a culmination of everything great in College Football 25, and more like the skeezy multiplayer mode they were obliged to force in.
That’s not to say that players won’t find an immense amount of enjoyment from Ultimate Team. From its interlocking systems to its customizable team roster and aesthetic. It’s just that so many of the elements that make Ultimate Team so enjoyable have been peppered into College Football 25’s alternate modes. As such, Ultimate Team’s already weaning appeal to some has decreased all the more.
Image Source: Twinfinite via Electronic Arts
Although Ultimate Team may somewhat hog the spotlight, EA College Football 25’s newest competitive multiplayer mode lies deeper in the menus. Road to the CFP tasks players with online matchups within three-minute bouts. These matches are meant to simulate that of a real-life college football season.
As your team slowly climbs the ranks, through tiered cups, you reach ever and ever closer to a place in the College Football Playoffs. This also brings you ever closer to your chance to pick up the fabled Heisman Trophy!
While Road to the CFP is a concrete mode, it is a section of EA College Football 25 that thrives on a booming online community to butt heads with on your way to get the gold. Even with the immense amount of early adopters, it isn’t a mode that has been stress-tested like it profusely deserves.
Its core is solid, and its goal is evident. However, with the almost excessive amount of content in the title, it is an overwhelmingly enjoyable distraction. Sadly, however, one which many players may sidestep to get to either of the two other single-player modes, or Ultimate Team.
EA College Football 25 is a title many players will most likely enjoy an ecstatic honeymoon period with, after such a long time out of gamers’ hands. However, the title could have been spent a little longer on the bench before joining the starting lineup. This would allow the User Interface and User Experience to be tweaked and amended. Beyond that, NPC college football fans could have been heavily polished in the stands.
Yet, even with the immense weight of its legacy on its shoulders, EA College Football delivers on every single one of its promises – and then some. The college atmosphere – with streamers, mascots, and cheerleaders – is concentrated into a pseudo-arcade style football title which can be enjoyed by football fanatics and casual fans alike.
EA isn’t renowned for presenting gamers with full-priced sports titles that are worth the money. However, their return to college football leaves this title bursting at the seams. While EA couldn’t help but underhand returning fans of the series with Ultimate Team, they provide more than enough alternatives for those who wish to leave the mode on the bench.
EA Sports College Football 25, at its heart, is incredibly unique in a modern sports game setting. As such, it holds its school colors high and proud – although, it’s going to be a big undertaking to keep up with nearly 140 different team rosters post-launch.
However, in comparing it to its NFL counterpart, some seriously impressive changes will hopefully be retrofitted into the ‘big brother’ series when we see it launch later this year.
EA Sports College Football 25
Even with the immense weight of its own legacy on its shoulders, EA Sports College Football 25 delivers on every single one of its promises – and then some. While EA couldn’t help but underhand returning fans of the series with Ultimate Team, they provide more than enough alternatives for those who wish to leave the mode on the bench.
Pros
Accurately captures the college football atmosphere.
Bursting with single and multiplayer content.
Immense graphical upgrade from past football titles
Fast-paced and arcadey gameplay.
Cons
Difficult to navigate User Interface & User Experience
Standee NPCs are heavily duplicated and under-polished.
Overly-sensitive throwing mechanic.
Shoe-horned in Ultimate Team mode.
A copy of this game was provided by the publisher for review. Reviewed on Xbox Series X.
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CEO John Riccitiello has retired from game development software company Unity after possibly its worst month of bad headlines ever. The tech company that’s slowly morphed into an in-game advertising firm announced a confusing and seemingly predatory new set of fees for game makers in September, only to walk the policy back after studios threatened to abandon the Unity engine moving forward.
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James M. Whitehurst, former head of the IBM-acquired open source software company Red Hat, will take over from Riccitiello as interim CEO while Unity’s board of directors search for a new long-term replacement. “It’s been a privilege to lead Unity for nearly a decade and serve our employees, customers, developers and partners, all of whom have been instrumental to the Company’s growth,” Riccitiello said in a press release. “I look forward to supporting Unity through this transition and following the Company’s future success.”
Riccitiello joined Unity back in 2014 shortly after leaving Electoronic Arts. He oversaw the game engine company’s shift from one-time licensing fees to an ongoing subscription model, launched the IPO in 2020, and made a series of acquisitions, including the in-app monetization firm IronSource in 2022. When Unity first went public, its stock price was around $68. Today it’s just over $30.
Once synonymous with the explosion of creativity and experimental design in the indie gaming space, Unity is being left by Riccitiello a month after a bungled new monetization strategy rollout burned bridges with tons of game makers. The initial messaging made it sound like game developers might be charged fees every time their game was installed, including retroactively.
A follow-up apology by president and general manager Marc Whitten later clarified that the new terms would only apply beginning in 2024, and laid out much bigger carve-outs for smaller studios whose games don’t hit a certain threshold of income. But for many developers it was too late. Their trust in the company had already been irrevocably shaken. Re-logic, maker of the Steam hit Terraria, pledged $200,000 toward the creation of a Unity competitor, and Slay the Spire dev, Mega Crit, says it will still move to rival game software platform Godot.
Rethinking monetization more aggressively was also one of Riccitiello’s legacies at EA. His seven years at the FIFA (now EA Sports FC) and Battlefield publisher saw it experiment with day-one DLC, microtransactions, and a focus on post-launch content. While there was no week-long crisis moment on the scale of what happened at Unity last month, it’s clear he helped usher in the company’s current live-service era, which many players now feel nickel-and-dimed by. Madden and FIFA’s lootbox modes were both added while he was head of EA, though they didn’t become the billion-dollar windfalls they are today until the tenure of his successor, current CEO Andrew Wilson.
Perhaps nothing summed up Riccitiello’s time at both EA and Unity better than another controvertial incident last year. In an interview with Pocketgamer.biz in July 2022, he called developers who don’t think about monetization early in the process “fucking idiots.” He immediately walked the comments back the next week, calling articles about it “clickbait” that took his comment out of context, but later apologized, saying he should have chosen his words more carefully.
That unforced error came shortly after the company revealed hundreds of layoffs at the same time it was buying IronSource in a $4.4 billion all-stock deal. Six hundred more were laid off at Unity earlier this year. Meanwhile, Riccitiello, in addition to the millions he has in Unity stock, will be kept on salary until April of 2024.
Update 10/11/2023 4:50 p.m. ET:SFGate reports that Riccitiello is set to earn up to $8.4 million through stock options over the next six months. That’s in addition to the roughly $253 million he already holds in current Unity stock.
“There was a sense that video games were toys. And Sony is not a toy company.” That’s how a new mini-oral history about PlayStation revolutionizing console gaming begins over at IGN. The words belong to former head of Sony Worldwide Studios, Shawn Layden, and they ring true for anyone who grew up with an NES or SNES.…
There’s an obsession with incremental changes and bullet-point features in the sports game scene, one which challenges fan’s ability to take a step back and assess each game as its own standalone title. It’s something I try and address in my own sports reviews on this site, and it’s something I’m taking to its logical conclusion here in this Quixotic attempt to pluck one game out of hundreds and call it the “best”.
Sports games by their nature don’t turn up for each new season as entirely fresh products. The economics of the industry have determined that they re-use the same engine and models for years at a time, which means the difference between them can often be limited to current uniforms, a few new features and some adjustments to ball physics. And those changes are usually influenced as much by fan feedback as they are by the development teams working on them.
So it’s tough looking at say Madden 17 as something entirely separate, since its creation was heavily influenced by the sales and reception of Madden 16, and it will in turn play a big part in how Madden 18 is designed. How do you pick one of those games and say, ok, THIS ONE is the best, when much of what made it great may have been inspired by—or come directly from—an entirely different video game?
Then you have to take into account the way sports games have changed their entire outlook over the last 20 years. In the 90s, series like FIFA and NBA Live were perfectly happy being fast, accessible, almost arcadey. Fast forward to today and advances in technology have turned blockbuster sports games into simulations, each one trying its hardest to replicate the on-field experience as best it can (or, if it can’t, then the broadcast experience instead). This makes direct comparisons between games in long-running series pretty damn hard!
Making matters worse is that each sport is different, with its own set of fans, style of play and culture. What makes the #1 baseball game better than the #1 hockey game? Is football better than basketball?
……Image: FIFA 98
I think I’ve found one way to compare all sports games, though, and as weird as it may sound at first, it’s through the one thing they all have in common. The one thing they’re more fixated upon than anything else, and which in many ways defines sports video games as their own distinct space in video games. And that’s content.
Every sports game is stingy. It’s possibly the most defining thing about the business, and is often the first thing that non-fans will mock. The genre’s business model is built entirely around balancing the need to make gamers happy with the game they just bought, but unhappy enough that they’ll turn around 12 months later and buy an incredibly similar product.
So after lingering over a short list of truly great sports games—Madden 2002, NBA 2K11, Pro Evolution 6, NBA Jam, NFL 2K5—I’ve settled the tie by going with one that wasn’t just a very good sports game in its own right, but one which decided to just say “fuck it” and give fans everything they could have wanted or needed for years to come, all in the one box.
That game is FIFA: Road to World Cup 98, as bizarre but beloved a major sports game as I think we’re ever going to see.
At the time of its release in 1997, it was a damn fine football game. It had very flash polygonal visuals, audio commentary, all the things we’ve long associated as being hallmarks of the FIFA series. But it’s where the game went above and beyond what we expect of a sports game can include, whether at the time or today, that marks it as truly great.
INDOOR FOOTBALL – In addition to regular 11v11 football, FIFA 98 also included an entirely separate 5v5 indoor mode, with its own rules and conditions, like the fact the ball never went out of bounds. It was just as fun as the actual FIFA. Maybe more fun. And while it had actually been introduced in FIFA 97, the fact it stuck around in 98 when there was so much else in the box is one of the things that helped cement this game’s legacy.
AN ACTUAL WORLD CUP – The reason for the game’s longer title was the fact that the development team decided to include, alongside domestic leagues, the 1998 World Cup. Not just the finals in France, but the entire qualifying system as well. That meant over 170 nations and their squads made it into the game, an absolutely ridiculous number that literally represented every football-playing country on Earth at the time (modern FIFA games usually only include a few dozen). You could, if you wanted, play as one of the smallest nations on the planet, take them all the way through qualifying then win the tournament itself, a feat so monumental that after FIFA 98 it would only be seen again in standalone video games specifically made for World Cups.
Image: FIFA 98
CUSTOMISATION: Besides the 170+ national teams, there were almost 200 club sides included in the game as well. And you could customise the lot. Home kits, away kits, even a player’s appearance. I remember spending what must have been weeks tinkering with this, making sure that every major team’s kit matched its actual design, and that player haircuts had been accurately recreated. This wasn’t just useful in 1997, either; people were playing FIFA 98 for years to come because as 1998, then 1999 rolled around, you could just update the kit designs again.
Here’s the most incredible thing about all this: FIFA 98 was so big it made another of EA’s own video games completely pointless. In addition to FIFA 98 (released in 1997), EA Sports had a game in development designed to cash in on the World Cup itself, due for release in early 1998. Simply called World Cup 1998, it had official branding throughout, from the tournament mascot to branded kits (a first for the series). But with only 40 teams, what was the point of buying it it when you could just fire up FIFA 98, edit some kits and enjoy much the same experience?
To get non-FIFA fans up to speed on just how crazy this was, it’s like NBA 2K18 shipping on four blu-rays, or the next MLB game deciding to include the entire Japanese and Korean pro leagues, just for one year, just for the hell of it.
This kind of thing just isn’t supposed to happen with sports games, because it gives fans everything they need to not buy your game the next year. Yet here we have, for one beautiful year, EA sports giving away the keys to the kingdom. Amongst the blur of year-to-year releases, FIFA 98’s largesse looms large like no other sports game’s inclusions ever have.
But it’s not just the excess content that’s helped FIFA 98 endure. Quantity would be nothing without quality, and the game includes several other series favourites, from the humble free kick arrow (still somehow superior to anything EA comes up with these days) to the ability to slide tackle a goalkeeper and get instantly sent off, which despite its punishment ranks as one of the most cathartic moves in all of video games.
Then there’s the matter of the game’s soundtrack, beginning with its intro, perhaps the most iconic in sports game history:
Don’t let Blur’s cameo overshadow the game’s real musical hook, though, which is the fact much of the menu music was provided by The Crystal Method:
Sports games using popular music is nothing new today, but in 1997 it was a coup for FIFA (for reference, check out FIFA 97’s tragic attempts at hip-hop and rock). Indeed, you could trace the series’ current place on the pop culture landscape back to FIFA 98 and its soundtrack, which dared to suggest that, hey, maybe these sports video games can be cool.
In a world where sports games are and always have been seen as disposable, FIFA 98 stands apart. By including so many teams across such a breadth of competition, and allowing for such a degree of customisation, people were able to dig in and play it not just throughout 1997, but well into the next few years as well.
Even today, when the FIFA series is known as much for its licensing as it is its football and has over 20 years of experience under its belt, you’ll find fans still talking about FIFA 98 in reverent tones. Amazing what some decent music, tiny teams and the ability to let try and murder a goalkeeper will do to a fanbase…
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EA Sports and Nike announced yesterday that, at some point in the “future”, games like FIFA and Madden will feature integration with .Swoosh, which Nike describes as its “new digital community experience”.
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Despite this, and a wider public reaction to the concept that landed somewhere between ambivalence and condemnation, there are still some companies willing to stick it out. Partly because they’ve got one eye on the future, and also maybe because they signed a bunch of contracts in 2021 and now have to see them through.
Nike Virtual Studios and EA SPORTS are today announcing a new partnership aimed at enhancing and personalizing the virtual sports experience for fans all over the world. This collaboration brings together two of the biggest names in sport and entertainment and will lead to all new ways for members of .SWOOSH, Nike’s new digital community experience, and EA SPORTS fans to express their personal style through play.
What’s funniest about the announcement, perhaps, is that even Nike and EA are embarrassed by (or intentionally obfuscating, you pick!) the truth, which is why you won’t find mention of the term NFT in the news, or even a reference to Web3. Instead EA simply says the partnership will make “.SWOOSH virtual creations available allowing members and players unique new opportunities for self-expression and creativity through sport and style.”
EA Sports games offer that already, of course, sometimes in the form of free unlocks, others that you have to pay for using in-game (or real-world) currency.
You can hear someone tell you Tom Brady’s age (45!) and it doesn’t really hit you, because the guy still looks pretty fit and healthy. To fully grasp the length of Brady’s tenure on this Earth, then, you need to realise that the man has appeared in a video game for the PlayStation. Like, the original PlayStation.
Brady, born in 1977, was drafted by the New England Patriots in the sixth round of the 2000 NFL draft—as the 199th pick—and spent his first season in the league as a fourth-string QB. He was so far down the NFL pecking order, in fact, that for his first appearance in Madden—Madden 01, which not only released on the PS1 but also the Nintendo 64—he wasn’t even named, he was just listed on the Patriots depth chart as “QB #12″.
A year later, having moved up to the backup spot, he took over from the injured Drew Bledsoe, led the Patriots to a Super Bowl victory and the rest is history. Brady retires as the statistical leader in almost every category that matters for a QB, from passing yards to passing attempts to TD passes, while also leading the league in ball deflation controversies, crypto scam endorsements and weird ways to kiss your kid on the mouth.
To celebrate his career—or, for many more of you, to celebrate his retirement, announced today—I’ve put together this slideshow showing his video game career, from those early days on the PS1 through to the NFL 2K series, Madden and some other stops in between. It won’t be every game from every year, that would be boring—and for recent Madden games incredibly repetitive—but still, it’ll be a nice little walk down memory lane. Unless you remember playing any of these first few games, in which case I’m sorry for reminding you how old you are.
EA’s “most polished” Madden in years continues to walk a rough road. Madden 23 received its massive October title update on Thursday, and with it a lot of welcome tweaks to underlying gameplay. But despite a bevy of bug fixes, many fans still feel like EA isn’t been honest about the current underwhelming state of the game and what they see as the prioritization of microtransaction gambling over making sure regular modes are glitch-free.
“Today may have saved Madden 23,” Madden YouTuber Zirktober tweeted yesterday shortly after the October patch notes were published online. By the end of the day, players had discovered a major bug. Upgrading any of the game’s “Most Feared Monsters” players would automatically lock players out of Madden Ultimate Team, the game’s highly monetized competitive online mode.
“Do not upgrade any Most Feared Monster Maker players as it can lock your account out of Ultimate Team,” EA announced that evening. “We are currently working on fixing this issue and unlocking any players impacted.” A few hours later the bug was fixed and players could use the upgrades again without fear of being locked out, though EA still seemed unclear on the precise source of the issue. “We have disabled chemistry options on Monster Makers for the time being as we are investigating an issue,” it tweeted.
While the interruption ultimately ended up being just momentary, it was still a perfect encapsulation of the rollercoaster ride fans have been on since Madden 23 launched back in August. Initial reviews were mostly positive, followed by a harsher assessment by some players, including a few NFL pros. Content creators rallied around a brief “pack strike” to protest the high price and piss-poor odds of getting great players out of Madden Ultimate Team’s card packs. By the beginning of October, some wondered if Madden 23 could still be saved, or if it might end up being remembered as one of the worst iterations of the annualized money maker in several years.
First, the good news. Madden 23’s October Title update does address some core complaints in recent weeks. A recalibrated slider seems to be addressing the maddening number of super-human interceptions players were previously witnessing. A disconnect issue leading to lots of lost progress in Franchise mode was also seemingly fixed. CPU teams should no longer randomly end negotiations with players. Some players got new face scans. And there were plenty of teaks to blocking, catching, and other core gameplay mechanics.
“While not every issue has been resolved today, more fixes are coming with future updates as we continue to actively work to bring you the best possible experience. We value and appreciate your feedback,” EA wrote. “Our team is consistently taking it into consideration and working on delivering updates all season long.”
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But the story with Madden is never as simple as one of total disaster or complete redemption. The title update also claimed to add the Jets’ new alternate black helmets, but several players have been getting glitched white versions instead. Franchise mode is also still a mixed bag. While some players report finally being able to progress in their seasons after previously hitting a wall of crashes and disconnects, others are still encountering the dreaded draft loop bug that sends them back to the beginning of a season whenever they finish a game.
Another particular sore spot remains Madden 23’s field passes, a battle pass system similar to the one free-to-play game Apex Legends added just this year. Its three tiers—Season, Competitive, and Fear—have given players issues ever since launch. Even now, they don’t always track players’ stats correctly, meaning players don’t get rewarded for completing an objective when they should. As YouTuber This Is Popular Stranger points out, just getting a pass open can be a chore, with some players still getting flooded with error messages when they try to access it. And then there are the missing rewards.
Some players weren’t getting rewards for House Rules matches, while others weren’t getting Trophy Packs for winning season-length Super Bowls. Coins, used to buy packs without spending real money, also went missing. EA acknowledged the issues at the end of last month, but players are still waiting to hear how it will be addressed. Meanwhile, Solo Battles, a main objective for collecting other rewards, were broken for a week, leaving many players to miss out. It’s a big problem for a game in which the only alternative is to shell out money on randomized card packs.
“I wonder if EA just doesn’t realize what a HUGE issue broken rewards is,” Madden streamer Kmac tweeted earlier this week. “It’s been THREE WEEKS now and they’re just dropping new promos like nothing is wrong. There’s no incentive to play Madden. No one can afford the new cards dropping.”
It’s the stinginess of the card packs—the backbone of Madden’s most popular online mode—paired with the lack of acknowledgement of ongoing bugs and lost rewards that’s continuing to foment discontent within the community.
“A lot of people were like, ‘Is the Pack Strike over?’ ‘The content’s really good, it felt like things were better this morning’—it’s absolutely not [over],” Popular Stranger said during his recent title update video. “The bundles do look better but we ain’t buying them. I hope you guys aren’t as well.”
A player who goes by iowaopoly on Twitter has been tracking pack and stat reroll odds since launch, and continues to believe they are some of the worst in years. That’s despite the card packs themselves historically making billions for EA. It was one of the few publishers to continue posting great profits this year while rivals like Ubisoft and Activision struggled, mostly on the back of microtransactions in series like Madden.
“The main theme of Madden 23 is stuff just continues to come out broken and super expensive and it takes days or even weeks to get stuff fixed in some way so players can get rewards to get the items or even play the game so it counts for something on progress,” Twitch content creator Rob Lopez told Kotaku. In the meantime, Madden 23just went on sale. It’s $20 off less than two months after release.
