Madden NFL 2004
System: X-Box
Publisher: EA Sports
Developer:
Tiburon
Released: August 2003
Genre: Sports (Football)
Capabilities: Memory Unit, Custom Soundtracks
Review Written: September 8, 2003
Last year, NFL 2K3 barely nudged ahead of Madden NFL 2003 in my
preferences of NFL game of choice last year. All the little things like money
plays, cheap defensive AI, and other control bugs were the things that made the
deciding factor of me choosing 2K3 over last year’s Madden. While
the new additions to this year’s edition like Owner mode and Playmaker control
make Madden 2004 even more in-depth than any other NFL game on the
market, there are still a few flaws that irritate me with this franchise.
One of the biggest additions to Madden NFL 2004 this year is Playmaker
control. What it does is change play routes for particular players before, and
during plays. This is an excellent innovative control technique that helps you
out a ton when used correctly. Things I like it for the most are flipping plays
right at the line of scrimmage, say you’re doing a halfback toss to the right,
but you see extra defenders stacked to the right, so flip it to the left and
you’re chances of getting a good carry are increased. Other things Playmaker
control is handy for is changing the routes your receivers run while you’re
scrambling in the pocket, to calling in your d-backs to help take out a running
back early in his carry. All of the Playmaker control functions are easily done
with a flip of the right thumb-stick in a specific direction. If all this
Playmaker stuff confuses you, then don’t fret, there are several bonus tutorial
videos hosted by Al Michaels and Melissa Stark, where one of them goes through
all the ways you can make the most out of Playmaker control.
The other notable change to the controls this year is how the Play Action works.
The developers over at Tiburon did a genius thing by making the camera and ball
carrier icon focus on the running back for a split second before panning back to
the QB and showing all the eligible receivers. Whenever the comp or a buddy of
mine ran the PA, it almost always fooled me, and I guarantee it’ll catch you off
guard on plenty of occasions to boot. Big kudos to the developers to making the
Play Action the most effective it has ever been in football gaming history.
As with every yearly Madden, there are still a couple of things that
irritate me about the gameplay. For starters, the blitz plays seem to be
over-effective. I don’t know weather or not if it’s the game reflecting teams
actual defensive attributes, but when the stinking Cardinals start getting 8
sacks a game it does raise a few eyebrows. Also, turnovers seem to happen more
frequent than before. Defensive men will seemingly zap over to a receiver who
was wide open two seconds earlier to manage an interception. Even though the
developers already claimed they removed the dreaded “catch-up” AI of the
defense, I can’t help but think that little bits and pieces still linger around.
The acclaimed Franchise mode is still as good as we remembered it, and just when
you think EA Sports can’t make it any more in-depth, they still manage to wow us
one more time. One little addition Tiburon did is adding the Mini-Camp drills in
preseason play, where well performance is awarded with a few extra attributes to
your players. Preseason play is remarkably well in Franchise mode, because the
game automatically subs in most of your backups, and if you perform well with
them you’ll notice their ratings and attributes go up once Season play starts.
This year the Franchise mode gives a nod to the legendary Front Page Sports
Pro Football series on the PC by adding simulation type elements with the
new Owner mode options. Now aside from playing season upon season, and doing all
your other regular Franchise options like retiring players, negotiating
contracts, and going through the draft, there are a slew of elements you get to
control by being the actual “Owner” of a team. This means you get total
management of the stadium by adjusting the prices of tickets, parking,
souvenirs, and concessions, yes you heard me right, if you want to charge $55
for a cup of beer, than go ahead and do so! Other Owner mode options include you
managing your team’s budget, changing the uniform, and even moving the franchise
to a different city. Just imagine the announcer going……..”And now, welcome
your Bismarck 49ers!”
One thing I can count on for each yearly Madden is that it has the most
versatile amount of gameplay modes available, and this year’s version doesn’t
disappoint me one bit. All the modes exclusive to the Madden series are
back, such as the Two-Minute Drill (make as many points in two minutes as
possible), Football 101 (Madden guiding you through the many plays of the NFL),
to the awesome Mini-Camp mode that debuted last year where you tour the country
on the Madden Cruiser doing various drills for scrambling, tackling, and kicking
accuracy to name a few. There are also the other modes we come to expect in all
pigskin games like Practice, Tournament, Playoffs, and Situation. The one mode I
wish they brought back to the series is the standalone Season mode, simply
because there are times where I want to play just one season without all the
micromanagement involved in the Franchise mode.
The in-game graphics of Madden NFL 2004 are a bit of a mixed bag. The
arenas you compete in look mighty nice where you’ll notice that every banner and
sign that is in the arena in real life are featured in the game. There are also
a couple of slick lighting effects where you’ll notice shadows gazing across the
fields in outdoor stadiums. The player models are the thing I’m disappointed
with the most. Sure, they have come a long way since this game engine debuted on
the PS2 back with Madden 2001, but they aren’t up to par when stacked up
against other graphical powerhouses on the Xbox such as ESPN NFL Football
and NFL Fever 2003. The face texturing is accurate for some of the major
players like Michael Vick and Marshall Faulk, and all the body proportioning is
pretty dead on as well. However, it is obvious this graphic engine is showing
its age, I mean the players look downright silly without their helmets. Even
with the outdated player models, the developers still manage to muster out quite
a bit of animations for things like gang tackles, helmets getting popped off of
players after vicious hits, and countless touchdown celebrations (there are even
player specific celebrations such as “The Sharpie” where Terell Owens signs the
football and tosses it to the stands).
Another thing that Madden has always lacked in was presentation. They did
manage to add in a couple of cool effects like integrating instant replays in
the play section screen in single player games. But one thing that is a drawback
to that is while you are gazing at that awesome second look of that killer play,
the play clock is ticking away at you. For the rest of the presentation, the
stat and score overlays look bland and generic when compared to the competition,
and watching those inanimate faces on the cheerleaders during their halftime
dance gets me ecstatic all over (I’m being sarcastic by the way)! Also, other
football games like Fever and ESPN NFL have been adding things
like halftime and post-game shows that show little clips or snapshots of
previous key plays in the game. There is nothing like that at all to be found in
Madden 2004.
John Madden and Al Michaels return as the commentary team for this year’s game.
While Madden will throw in many comments that are either blatantly obvious or
make no sense at all, the developers managed to recycle most of the lines from
the past few games scrambled in with a slew of new ones so he doesn’t sound as
repetitive as he did in previous games. We can at least be thankful that Al
Michaels livens up the mood of the game to a certain extent, and while he may
not have the jive and pizzazz of the hired voice actors that the ESPN NFL
Football commentary team has, he does a decent of enough job with many more
lines of commentary than Madden so you will never get fed up with him. Also keep
a keen ear for the PA announcer, as he likes to slip in a few comedic lines from
time to time.
For the past few years Madden has offered genre-specific soundtracks. In 2002’s
game it was rap, where in 2003 it was mostly rock. This year the developers
decided to give us the best of both worlds by throwing in 22 tracks that come
from a mix of Rock, Rap, and Hip Hop songs from the likes of Soil, AFI, and
Alien Ant Farm, among others. EA Sports finally decided to take advantage of an
Xbox specific feature by supporting custom soundtracks that play while browsing
through menus or playing Mini-Camp drills. The sound effects for all the
tackles, catches, and grunts are the same as the previous games, and the game
still has those sweet arena-only special effects for specific venues like the
cannons going off in Tampa Bay after big plays.
Usually I always find myself saying something along the lines of “there will be
enough content to satisfy you until next year’s game.” In all actuality, there’s
enough stuff to do to last you a good three of four years until you get the next
Madden upgrade. Just look at what all there is to do. From wasting days
of your life away in the Franchise mode, to playing all the extra modes like
Two-minute Drill, Football 101, Mini-Camp, and Situation for hard earned tokens
used to earn Madden cards, the reward system that gives you rating boosts,
cheats, and unlocks hidden players, teams, and stadiums. Also, there is so much
that you can add to the game by creating your own dream plays and adding them in
your own customized playbook. Then you can live out your life in the NFL by
creating your own player, or even create your very own team which also allows
the option of creating the stadium they play in. Another thing that could’ve
extended the life of this year’s game is that if EA would’ve decided to make
this game online, but they skimped out on it the second year in a row. EA should
just get over the fact that they got to run their game on Microsoft’s servers on
the Xbox so they can give the fans what they want!
Another set of extras they added in that I briefly mentioned above is the
tutorial videos. I highly recommend watching all of these as they give you the
complete rundown on what’s new in the game, how to play smart offense and
defense and take advantage of advanced techniques like hot routes and Playmaker
control. And the last extra they added is a second reward system in the form of
the “EA Sports Bio.” This unique feature keeps tabs of all your EA Sports game
saves from the 2004 line of games, and you gain extra Madden cards by compiling
more game playing time, and having other 2004 EA Sports game saves.
RATINGS
Graphics: 7.8
Sound: 8.5
Gameplay: 9.2
Replay Value: 9.8
Overall: 8.8
Madden NFL 2004 is another solid addition to the series. In its 14th
season, the series continues to amaze me by the amount of new bells and whistles
they can add in each game. If it has been a couple years since the last
Madden game you bought, than I recommend you upgrade to 2004 today. But if
you’re like me and place this game and Sega’s football series neck and neck each
year, then I’m going to have to give the nod this year to Sega.