Madden 09 has gone gold
by 
In a surprising announcement today EA Sports has stated that Madden 09 has gone gold. That means the game is complete and can be sent out to be mass produced. Knowing this the game must have been submitted for certification weeks ago. In most cases “gone gold” announcements are made 7-14 days prior to the release date, so this news was not expected a month and a half in advance.
The ongoing producer discussions have made it seem as though adjustments were still being made, though at this point it would’ve been getting close to time to lock things in regardless. We do know that the icons disappearing when a QB drops back to far made it in and the Wildcat formation has been removed. Yet I get the feeling that the toning down of the camera flashes will not have happened to the satisfaction of the community.
With the game complete it appears they’ve shifted some attention to work on the demo which I had news on yesterday. It is quite possible that the demo will actually be based off the release version and not an early build.
June 25, 2008 at 11:45 am
this is great. cant the game release earlyer?
June 25, 2008 at 11:45 am
I just hope they test the game out extensively now that it is complete, and try to make a patch for all the glitches before it reaches the public.
June 25, 2008 at 11:50 am
I think games now go gold early because they can just patch any issue that arise. Maybe they can fix the camera flashes via patch.
June 25, 2008 at 11:52 am
I’d be nice to just have an early release date
June 25, 2008 at 11:54 am
Its not going to release early. They have a date they’ve been promoting and will continue to promote, which includes a release midnight extravaganza as always. Plus they aren’t going to cut into NCAA’s sales like that.
June 25, 2008 at 11:55 am
so they didnt tone down the camera flashes at all?
June 25, 2008 at 11:59 am
Do you guys really care that much about the camera flashes.
June 25, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Strange it went gold 7 weeks prior to release. Maybe a demo will be out earlier than expected.
June 25, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Question: So if the icons disappear, and I see my TE in the flat I can’t press the A button to pass it to him? Or is it just that it disappears and people can still exploit the “20yd dropback” passes if they know the corresponding button. Just curious how that would work. I wish there was a way to encourage people to stay in the pocket w/some sort of incentive…
June 25, 2008 at 12:07 pm
They only disappear when a QB drops back too far, they have the icons set to disappear after 12-15 yards. No one should be falling back to that distance naturally.
June 25, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Great news.
June 25, 2008 at 12:10 pm
yeah, that I understand….what I wanted to know was if that meant that throwing the football was disabled b/c of the missing icons. Thx for the news Pasta, hopefully I’ll be jammin the demo in a few short weeks!!!!
June 25, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Lets hope we get a demo and an early patch after its released. Maybe we can get a demo a month away from release like NCAA….Early to mid July?
June 25, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Sigh…..it seems to me that EA should have spent an extra 3-4 weeks actually testing and finishing some things in the game, rather than going gold 7 weeks early. How does that benefit anyone??
Those that say they can patch stuff now, should realize that EA is SUPER slow about making and releasing patches and the patch process itself is probably about 2 months, due to having to get it certified by Sony and MS. If there was still stuff to fix, and I’m sure there is, it would have made much more sense to spend another month fixing it before going gold.
This just gives me another reason to complain when I play Madden and can see it was tested one time by one monkey that knows nothing about football, much like Madden 08 was.
It is impossible to argue that the game wouldn’t have benefitted from another month of development/testing. No wonder EA always says “We didn’t have time” when we wonder why something wasn’t included in the game. They cut their own development cycle short by a month.
June 25, 2008 at 12:20 pm
[quote comment="26617"]Lets hope we get a demo and an early patch after its released. Maybe we can get a demo a month away from release like NCAA….Early to mid July?[/quote]
Why do people want patches so bad???? Wouldn’t you rather just have a game that worked right the first time?
I think, the fact that games can be patched now has led to developers getting lazy and more games, not just Madden, being rushed out. Developers just plan to fix it later, which sometimes doesn’t even happen. It makes for lazy and buggy games that I pay 60 bucks for and have to wait 3 months or more for a finished product.
June 25, 2008 at 12:33 pm
instead of it going gold so soon, it would have been nice if they fixed the damn celebration the spider craw was horrible.
June 25, 2008 at 12:39 pm
I dont understand the whole month early thing. Why not keep working to make things better rather than have a game sitting in boxes with a month to go to release. To me it makes no sense in making the game final now. All this time could be spent fixing bugs, or searching for them.
I know they are not gonna release early so again what is the point?
June 25, 2008 at 12:40 pm
You people who buy games and complain on boards really need to find something to do with your life. I haven’t liked Madden since Ray Lewis was on the cover, but I realize that complaining incessantly on boards (that aren’t EA boards) isn’t going to change anything.
Either buy the game and enjoy it or sell it back and shut up.
June 25, 2008 at 1:01 pm
[quote comment="26624"]You people who buy games and complain on boards really need to find something to do with your life. I haven’t liked Madden since Ray Lewis was on the cover, but I realize that complaining incessantly on boards (that aren’t EA boards) isn’t going to change anything.
Either buy the game and enjoy it or sell it back and shut up.[/quote]
People that complain about people that complain about games on message boards should find something better to do with their time.
Also, EA reads these boards as well as their own. Plus, these boards aren’t totally covered in fanboy goo.
June 25, 2008 at 1:12 pm
will pacman be on the game then.
June 25, 2008 at 1:18 pm
Wow, already?!
June 25, 2008 at 1:37 pm
Can’t wait for the demo then I just hope it’s the same length as the NCAA demo was.
June 25, 2008 at 2:01 pm
Well definitely I hate that patches coming out for games…But its not going to change. And if something can be fixed or added in a patch, then I’m all for it. I would be a fool not to. Any of you would be too.
June 25, 2008 at 2:11 pm
[quote comment="26625"][quote comment="26624"]You people who buy games and complain on boards really need to find something to do with your life. I haven’t liked Madden since Ray Lewis was on the cover, but I realize that complaining incessantly on boards (that aren’t EA boards) isn’t going to change anything.
Either buy the game and enjoy it or sell it back and shut up.[/quote]
People that complain about people that complain about games on message boards should find something better to do with their time.
Also, EA reads these boards as well as their own. Plus, these boards aren’t totally covered in fanboy goo.[/quote]
Oh, I’m sorry people continue to complain, no need to have any rational thought brought to the board.
Anyway, the camera flashes, the lack of refs, etc aren’t going to do a thing for gameplay. I play the games for the gameplay, which is why I’ve never gone for non-EA football games. The other pretenders brought all kinds of bells and whistles to their games, but the gameplay sucked. I’m including the ESPN NFL 2K series in this. EA has been the best in the business at football gameplay. There’s not even a close second.
June 25, 2008 at 2:15 pm
Madden lacks some very basic and fundamental aspects of football gameplay that NFL 2K5 did have.
June 25, 2008 at 2:23 pm
does this mean NCAA 09 is done or still in the works?
June 25, 2008 at 3:20 pm
So what else do you guys think needs to be fixed via patch already besides the camera flashes? I agree that the camera flashes are a bit excessive, the only time we see that is during the super bowl.
June 25, 2008 at 5:39 pm
[quote comment="26652"]So what else do you guys think needs to be fixed via patch already besides the camera flashes? I agree that the camera flashes are a bit excessive, the only time we see that is during the super bowl.[/quote]
It’s almost a fore-gone conclusion that the franchise mode will still have bugs…
June 25, 2008 at 7:03 pm
If they don’t seriously tone down (preferably remove) those stupid camera flashes then that will put a serious damper on the game experience. Who ever was the genious who decided to put those stupid flashes in should be fired!
June 25, 2008 at 9:17 pm
so i take it no one really cares about the wildcat formation, im surprised due to the debates between the lovers and haters of it.
Personally id like a way to know if my team has special formations. Special team formations should standout somehow. It would be cool in head coach 10 if players asked you during training to add you into a play like jared allen on offense etc.
June 26, 2008 at 1:28 am
is it just me or does anyone notice that we didnt get ANY news on the franchise mode or owner mode?????
June 26, 2008 at 6:13 am
Pasta,
If you have time, can you show who have what weapons. Thanks bro
June 26, 2008 at 3:01 pm
[quote comment="26624"]You people who buy games and complain on boards really need to find something to do with your life. I haven’t liked Madden since Ray Lewis was on the cover, but I realize that complaining incessantly on boards (that aren’t EA boards) isn’t going to change anything.
Either buy the game and enjoy it or sell it back and shut up.[/quote]
That’s what forums are for tough guy. You need to find something better to do with your time instead of coming on the site complaining about people who complain about the game. If you don’t care then what are you on this site for?