Bugs, glitches and missing features has the online franchise mode in Madden NFL and NCAA scraping the bottom of the barrel. Here's why they're missing a big opportunity.
About a year ago, my friend Greg Ford asked if I wanted to be in a Madden NFL league. I wasn't exactly a Madden fan at the time, but I figured that I would give it a try. Three hundred hours later, it's the sole reason that I'm still playing Madden NFL 12.
Unfortunately, the online franchise modes in Madden NFL 12 and its sister game NCAA Football 12 are broken. Not so broken as to be unplayable, but broken enough that it's robbed some of the joy from an otherwise entertaining league
Here are a couple examples.
NCAA Football 12: Game? What Game?
Not long after NCAA Football 12 hit the market, I decided to start up an online dynasty with some friends. I'm not a huge college football fan, but I wanted to partake of the nifty interface, which includes randomly-generated headlines with photos from each game. In many ways, Dynasty Mode is light years beyond anything Madden has to offer.
We never finished the dynasty though. It was one very big bug that ended up deep-sixing our league--NCAA sometimes crashed after games were completed, and the result wasn't recorded on the online servers. Thus, we would have to play again. And again.
The final straw came after an intense game between my Golden Gophers and Texas A&M. We fought tooth and nail through four quarters, and the final minute saw me clinging to a one point lead following a successful two-point conversion. My opponent almost made it to field goal range, but ended up throwing a game ending pick. Regardless of the result, we both agreed that it was a tremendously well-played game.
Of course, NCAA had to crash right after the final gun. And, of course, the game wasn't recorded. I never played another game after that.
Source: Daily News from GamePro.com
Thursday, October 13, 2011