Madden 20 Beta: A Win for the Future of Madden


Earlier today EA hosted a special developer stream on Twitch to detail the changes coming out of the Beta heading into the game's release later this month. Out of the stream came a laundry list of changes, fixes, and improvements, as well as information on future changes they plan to make based on the feedback from the community. While the changes were substantial and numerous, the biggest takeaway from the stream was a resounding "We hear you" from the development team.

Constantly highlighted throughout the stream were references to feedback coming directly out of the Beta. Fears of pass rush being tuned back, or throwing animations being shortened were quickly put to rest as Clint explained that the feedback from the community didn't support such moves. Mentioned often were comments from twitter about issues and bugs that were seen and how the team wanted to move to correct those that were truly issues.

In a bigger picture sense, the stream sold the idea to the community that they are an integral part of the game development process. This notion has been pitched before, but the concept never seemed to actually land with the consumer. This time seems to be different though. From Gridiron notes to the information streams to the latest Beta feedback update, it just seems like EA has finally found it's stride in the world of year round gaming.

Perhaps the greatest update from the stream came during Clint's closing remarks when speaking to game updates/patches. To paraphrase, they plan to be more cognizant of the issues they are attempting to fix while attempting to intervene less in order to limit splash damage. This thought alone required a great amount of self-awareness by the development team. They realized, much like the community did, that the over updating of Madden 19 left it in shambles at times. Being able to acknowledge ones mistakes is key to self improvement and this statement bodes really well for the future of the game.

Call me a homer, or a fanboy, or whatever you like but after today my outlook on the future of Madden is even brighter. The development team seems set on giving the power back to the community to drive the future of the game. The communication between developer and community is at an all time high. The game coming out of the Beta was the best playing game Madden has had in quite some time. All of these things add up as one giant win for all of us as we head into what should be another great year of Madden.

Comments

  1. hyhkdSeptember 12, 2021 at 1:15 PM

    stream was a resoundinghyhkd We hear you" from the development team.

    ReplyDelete

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