~Madden 03\'... my views so far...~

I hope you like reading...

Let me begin by stating that I\'ve been playing Madden since I couldn\'t even spell football. Around the early 90\'s where my knowledge of the sport was very limited, and I just finished first grade, I played my first Madden title, not knowing how Madden was. I simply called it, "Football game". And thats what Madden was, and still is today, a football game. And without question, the only one worth my time and money.

Excluding Madden 03\', my favorite Madden was 99\' for the Nintendo 64. 02\' was too similiar to 01\', and 00\' tried to make too many changes from 99\'. I\'m very picky as you can see when it comes to football games.....

Let me walk you through the game. Unsurprisingly, yet delightfully, the game greets you with EA Sports\' slogan "It\'s in the game". Then, something I really like, a random football player, I\'ve seen 5 different ones so far, will appear on the screen and say EA Sport\'s slogan again. Most seem to be from last year\'s pro bowl game. A nice little extra that the folks at EA through in. The main menu screen then finishes loading with the best player in the NFL, Marshall Faulk, in a still screen. I\'m glad that Faulk was Madden\'s cover guy this year, personally I never was a fan of Culpepper or Eddie George. And then you get a surprise intro song of Andrew HK! Thats right, EA closed the door on the "rap" theme and turned to the dark side, rock and roll. I love the transition considering that the 02\' intro song was HORRIBLE. Throughout menu screens and minicamp you will hear EA\'s wonderful rock soundtrack that they compiled. A really great move by EA to roll the dice and switch the music theme.

So now what? As usual there are tons of places to go from in the main screen. At first I was overwhelmed but after browsing a bit everything seemed smaller. A cool addition is that you can enable "Autosave" so you don\'t get those annoying pop-ups the continually ask you if you want to save. So everything from your settings, franchise, and profile are automatically updated for you.

A new thing is that if you just want to play an exhibition game, you don\'t have to go to "Game Mode", "Exhibition", etc. You just jump straight to Play Now and select your teams. Not a big deal, but nice either way.

So I after setting up my typical settings, (No Fatigue, 7 minute quarters, Difficulty: Pro), I setup a game of me the home team, 49ers vs. the Lions (hey, I wanted to start off with baby steps ). And then, I hear, AL MICHAELS! Yay! No more monotone Mr. Robot, Pat Summerall! Honestly, Pat Summerall was horrid, and hearing Al Michaels was a much needed breath of fresh air. Now to the game\'s intro:

Screens and message boxes are all revamped and have a "sleekish" new look to them. You watch the away teams defense warm up in small sprints which is nice. Then the QB takes a few snaps, has some words with the center. Its all really realistic and excitingly eerie. No more "blank" stares. EA gave the players EMOTION. Much needed emotion actually. Players smile, frown, and just look plain pissed off sometimes. For example I sacked Mike McMahon (pfft) and my LB started to do a little dance and had a monstrous grin and his eyes were wide with insanity. You gotta love that. In fact, all the little things in Madden begin to pile up, and you basically got a great new sequel to this epic saga.

So you got great music,great commentary, and emotionful players. Now lets talk about how the game plays.

When the kickoff started it was nice to run through my roster and looking at the updated players. I know, I talk about the small stuff, but hey, if its nice, I\'m talking about it. The second the ball landed in my hands, it felt like riding a bike. I smashed my X-button, started to get into a sprint, suddenly a find myself face to face with a defender, and do something I rarely did in 02\', JUKE! Yes, thats right, juking actually works. And I layout a beautiful ankle breaker and burn the guy, which is then followed by a nice comment by Michaels "Shaking and baking", uh huh.....

The stiff arm still isn\'t that great a technique. Spining is best for making defenders run by you, rather than breaking tackles.... Oh yes, the tackles... A good majority of the same tackle animation is back from 02\'. New ones all consisted of the gang tackling. And let me tell you, the second a gang tackle begins, don\'t expect to break free from it. Just cross your fingers that your player doesn\'t get injured.

Passing the ball is different. Now after snapping the ball, you don\'t have to hit \'x\' yet again just to bring up the list of recievers. It automatically occurs after the ball is snapped. Took me 3 plays to get used to, heh, I kept throwing directly to the \'x\' reciever before he could get off the line. Also there\'s more of a "pocket". The blockers create a small pocket for you each time, which allows you to buy time for your recievers to get open. Unlike in previous madden\'s where the blockers stayed in a straight line allowing linebackers to come from the sides.

Maybe its too early to say, but running the ball feels a little harder. Plays that got me a guaranteed 5 yards in 02\', get stuffed on certain occasions. So the AI has been revamped as well. Linebackers will spot holes and clog them up as soon as the can. It\'s tedious, but fun and challenging at the same time. Don\'t get me wrong, I did bust out a 20 yard run, its just don\'t expect 5 yard gains every time.

The greatest addition to the offensive game though is... *drum roll please*.... RB\'S CAN CATCH THE BALL! YAY! Wow... Didn\'t you hate how in previous games the ball would just bounce off their helmets? Now your RB can actually recieve! This is something I find myself doing alot, just dumping the ball to the RB when no one else is open. Hey, Kurt Warner does it all the time....

During half time the cheerleaders came out and did a nice little dance which was quite pleasant...

Defensively..... Intercepting the ball is easier. In the 10 games I played, I got about 12 picks total. So now rookie Madden players that just bomb the ball relentlessly will pay for their lack of skill and respect for the game. I actually played against a friend and he just loves to do Hail Maries over and over, and he was shocked at what he saw. Couldn\'t complete a single one. So passing defense is tougher, and no more forcing the ball places and getting lucky, now you have to play a bit more conservatively with your passing game.

Its funny... running the ball is harder, and so is stopping the run.... I dunno, once again, perhaps its still early. But I was getting RAN on. Maybe my play selection was poor but sheesh, even a guy like James Stewart picked up a 100 yard game against me. It seemed that the only play that stopped the run successfully was a goal line defense... I\'m sure through practice, I can overcome this, but at the moment let me tell you that you better be prepared. I also noticed that now the CPU won\'t do all the work for you on defense because they miss tackles alot, so I find myself constantly having to do all the tackling manually. A good addition if you ask me, no more lazy players.

Special teams... no changes really... not even kicking... "If it ain\'t broke, don\'t fix it."

So the game plays differently, depending on personal preference the changes can be good or bad, much more good than bad for me.

Other modes... No more Season mode it seems... now you go straight to Franchise mode... which is techinically the same thing really and makes alot of sense for EA to combine the two. Online, I can\'t really tell you yet. I won\'t be online till\' I have my Network Adapter. Let me tell you you will need: Network Adapter, Memory Card, Internet connection. All speeds work: 56k, Cable, DSL, etc. And if you want to chat you can plug a keyboard into the USB port in the front of your PS2. Thats all I really know in that department for now.

Mini Camp ROCKS. MAN, oh man.... I really wasn\'t too excited about it, but once I got my grubby little mits into it I couldn\'t get out. The DB Swat is TONS of fun. With good music in the background you sprint to different targets trying to pick the ball off or swat it down. Not only is it fun, but you really enhance your skills. QB Precission is tough. You have to throw to specific WR\'s at a certain time so your ball goes through a ring. There\'s many other mini games you do that are good fun, and good practice. You get either a bronze, silver, or gold trophy depending on your score for that event. When you get at least a bronze, a new option opens up allowing you to go to a "Real Game Situation" with the specific technique you practiced. A really nice feature for you to actually put your hard practices to test. You win Madden Cards, yay!

By the way, I personally think Madden Cards are kind of silly. And were only implemented because of the Pokemon Card hype, yes I\'m serious about this too. They put it in the same time Pokemon cards were released. Just my view on it. Madden Cards are nice to just look over (Cheerleader cards are a bonus!), but seriously, who\'s actually trading these things?.....*tumbleweed*

So Mini Camp is an awesome extra. And there is still Football 101...

Football 101 is amazing. You select any formation and any play, and Madden will break it down for you step by step vocally and helps Madden Rookies understand the plays. Its a great feature that I fear will be overlooked despite all the time EA put into it. If your running a play incorrectly, go see what your doing wrong at Football 101. I personally didn\'t hang around Football 101 too long, considering I\'m a hardkore football fan and to me what Madden was saying was obvious to me. But, if your just learning the ropes, definately check it out.

A final neat addition is that EA implemented a "Behind the Scenes" portion where you can see Madden 2003 in the making. It shows last years Madden Bowl, and then Al Micheals doing commentary in a studio along with Melissa Stark.

Yes, I almost forgot, Melissa Stark does the injury reports and such. Nothing too great, but doesn\'t hurt any at all.

I see alot of people comparing this game with NFL 2k3 everywhere and let me say this.... If you want a Football-Simulation game, Madden is for you. If you want a Football-Arcade game, 2k3 is for you.

Overall Madden has taken a HUGE step as they enter the online realm. PS2 sites around the net are gearing up their own Madden Clans and the anticipation has reached great heights. If you are undecided about purchasing this game, let me tell you this, your crazy. Buy it now. How much more convincing can I do?

I see alot of people comparing this game with NFL 2k3 everywhere and let me say this.... If you want a Football-Simulation game, Madden is for you. If you want a Football-Arcade game, 2k3 is for you.

I don\'t think it\'s fair that you spent all this time with madden 2k3 and then completely shrug off NFL2k3 solely because of how NFL2k2 played.  The two games are totaly different beasts, but I think it\'s unfair to judge NFL2K3 in that way until you actually put some serious time into it like you obviously have with madden.

You and I actually disagree a lot concerning your impressions of the game and mine, but I won\'t debate your opinion.  A decent write up overall.

Yea that is unfair.

[videoholic]

Good review.  Although you did mention the new addition of not having to hit X to bring up passing options.  That was in the \'01 version as well, it just wasn\'t the default like it is now.

Mini Camp is awesome!!  I only played it a bit last night, but it was great.

Yes it was unfair, I\'ll rent 2k3 for a good 2 weeks so I can actually make a decent comparison. My fault.

And I never noticed that there was a 2-tap passing game in 02\'.

Originally posted by Vapor Snake
I see alot of people comparing this game with NFL 2k3 everywhere and let me say this.... If you want a Football-Simulation game, Madden is for you. If you want a Football-Arcade game, 2k3 is for you.

I wouldn\'t go too far to call NFL2K3 an arcade game.

Originally posted by Vapor Snake
And then you get a surprise intro song of Andrew HK! Thats right, EA closed the door on the "rap" theme and turned to the dark side, rock and roll.

I kinda liked the rap theme.

Maybe it\'s because I don\'t listen to rock and don\'t know who Andrew HK is.

Good review, IMO. Thanks Vapor, It makes me want it even more.

You don\'t like Eddie George?  Well it was nice knowing you, now you die!!!!!!!

Eddie George SUCKZZ!!111

How much longer till its online playable?

You can go online with it right now.

[Bobs_Hardware]

I just love how ViVi tried to make his title glow red..but failed miserably..