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Madden 09 Demo Impressions
Most of you know I hate EA with a passion. In 2005 they bought the rights to the NFL and took away my precious NFL 2k football games. Madden has been nothing but a pile of crap ever since. Now that I’ve got that out of the way prepare to be shocked by my thoughts of the Madden 09 demo.
I got off work early today so I decided to go pick up the DVD with the Madden 09 Demo. I will say up front I've always felt the 2k football games are far better then Madden so I was not expecting much from this demo. I just played for about an hour and a half. For those of you who don't know this demo consists of the Madden Test mode, and you also get to play the final drive of the Super bowl to bring the Giants to victory.
I tried several running plays as well as passing plays and all felt real good to me, very realistic.
Running - this game gives the feeling of impact when running the ball, something I've not felt from any other madden game. I only fumbled one time out of about 20 running plays and it happened as I was using the right stick when hit by 2 defenders. I lunged forward and one of them hit the ball and out it came. (Nice)
For the most part I used my blockers when running the ball it was fairly effective. 3 yards here, 6 yards there, I also broke a tackle for a 27 yard TD run. The animation was sweet when the tackle was broken. I could feel the HB being held up by the defender then I shook free for the score, again nicely done.
Passing - I purposely tried to cheese it up. I ran way right to pass to the WR on a crossing pattern , result, SACK! Then I went way left -result, pass was way off target -INT! Excellent
Deep drop backs seemed ineffective as well , again Excellent Drop back 15 + yards and you will either be on your back or your pass will look like a one winged duck that just downed a few shots of Crown Royal.
I was able to scramble around a bit in the pocket area and my passes were fairly accurate as long as my feet were planted before throwing. I also complete a few passes on the run but in order to make the catch I had to take control of the WR and move him to the ball since it was off target a bit. The more set you are with the QB the more accurate your pass will be. Throw on the run and you are taking a risk of an int.
I felt like the time I had in the pocket was good. I had time to look to at least 2 or 3 options before the Defenders were about to kill me. I know who I want to go to before the snap anyway, but if he was covered I did have time to check out other options.
Quick slants were pretty effective. I was also able to complete a few long balls which looked sweet, I wish I could watch replays.
The game play feels real good to me, it does not feel rushed like past Madden games. It has a nice speed and flow.
The game looks fantastic, it looks so good I'm going to enjoy having several cold beers and watching CPU vs. CPU games. I used to do that with NFL 2k5 when I was missing football season.
All in all I'm very impressed, from what I've seen so far this game is going to be excellent. I can't wait to get my Chiefs on the field at Arrowhead.
A few more things, I sucked at the training part of the game, but had not problems with the actual game play. My Madden IQ was 288 DOH!
My one complaint, and this may not even exist in the final build, as others have mentioned the WR sometimes does the tip-toe catch one or more yards from the sideline when they could just make the catch and continue running.
I forgot to add, I threw into coverage on purpose so the D would pick the ball off. This allowed me to get the feel of what tackling was like. On my first attempt I was stiff armed and knocked to the ground, I got him the second time, nice tackle animation using the X button.
Another thing I did was instead of scoring a TD I kicked a Field Goal so I could kick off to the Pats. If you've played NCAA 09 you know the kick off coverage is horrible. Not so in Madden 09. I stopped the Pats on the 19 yard line.
The thing I love the most about this game is if you're a cheeser you will pay the price. Drop back 20+ yards and your pass will flutter like a wounded duck. Scramble way right or left and you will also pay the price.
Play like they do in the NFL and you will have success in this game.
I can't say for sure until I play the final build on August 12th, but this could be the best football game I've ever played.
Coming for a long time EA / Madden basher, this game is awesome.
Last edited by NPYYZ : 07-25-2008 at 10:54 AM.
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