The response to Madden 08

Something I have been fascinated with over the last week has been the reaction to Madden 08 on various forums. Despite getting high reviews there seems to be more negativity than ever.

Now, negativity is nothing new around release time. Especially for EA Sports games that seem to attract a crowd that just loves to bash them for any given reason (real or not). So that in itself isn't new. However it seems as if more people than ever are demanding drastic changes.

The interesting thing is that like never before EA was open and communicative about the game and they did far more to address what the hardcore community wanted than ever. The gameplay was the main focus, and it clearly paid off in that area. It also offers a deeper experience with more variety than any sports game to date with the offline modes.

There certainly are numerous issues with the game. I know personally I wouldn't have given the game a score as high as most of the media sites have. The online is deficient at best, fumbles and injuries happen too often, the kicking game is ridiculously overpowered, and Superstar mode isn't as good as NCAA Football 08's Campus Legend.

In some sense there are many people who go into release expecting to dislike the game, or specifically look forward to bashing it. Nothing is going to change their minds, even if it were to arguably be the best sports game ever. There will always be that crowd that revels in attacking a particular game. Those are the vocal ones. The millions of people out there enjoying the game don't have the same motivations.

The concern would be that EA follows this response and alters their strategy due to it. When they worked hard to appease the hardcore fans of the game, and they look at the forums where there is such overwhelming whining and complaining, will they believe that represents the true feelings of the community? I sure hope not because that certainly isn't the case.