Madden 2010 News Post

350,000 Played Madden NFL 10 Online Once, Then Never Went Online Again

05:17 PM - April 26, 2010 by Steve_OS

According to Kotaku and Ian Cummings, 350,000 people played Madden NFL 10 online once, to never return to another Madden 10 online game again. That is a crazy number, don't you think?

Quote:


	"An estimated 350,000 people played last year's Madden NFL 10 once online and never played it online again, series creative director Ian Cummings recently told Kotaku. He and publisher EA are mum on online multiplayer details for this summer's Madden NFL 11, but that's a number the creators of one of gaming's biggest franchises clearly wants to reduce. More than a third of a million people dare to go online with a game and never try it a second time? Something or somethings are scaring them away."

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Member Comments

# 21 Valdarez @ 04/26/10 06:07 PM

Are their Trophies / Achievements for playing a game online? If so, that would be another reason. 350k out of 5 million doesn't seem that bad to me.

# 22 Only1LT @ 04/26/10 06:09 PM

To those that are saying that these numbers are due to roster updates, Kotaku seems to be portraying this as news worthy because it is out of the ordinary. We have had roster updates since the very first online Madden. If it is really due to roster updates, shouldn't the numbers have always looked like this? I'll go even further. Considering that sales have been declining since 2005, shouldn't the numbers in 2005 be even higher?

I seriously doubt this is due to roster updates. If it is then Kotaku wasted all of our time with a nonsensical article. Entirely possible, but I am going to have to say that I lean more towards the side that says that this isn't a roster update number and that something that has to do with negative Madden sentiment is at work here.

# 23 Only1LT @ 04/26/10 06:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Valdarez


	Are their Trophies / Achievements for playing a game online? If so, that would be another reason. 350k out of 5 million doesn't seem that bad to me.

Maybe not, but all 5mil definitely do not play online. If it is more than half, I'd be surprised. That goes for most online games.

# 24 Valdarez @ 04/26/10 06:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Only1LT


	Maybe not, but all 5mil definitely do not play online. If it is more than half, I'd be surprised. That goes for most online games.

Yeah, they said only what, 78% of sales had the ability to go online, so that drops it to 4 million (if we are using 5 million as the base).

After a game is released, most games boil down to the hardcore gamers and then the lobby players who are just playing with friends.

# 25 lgxjames @ 04/26/10 06:25 PM

Is it possible that people prefer to play offline..in their franchise??

# 26 bukktown @ 04/26/10 06:41 PM

I went online about 80 times. On ps2 it was around 400 times per year.

# 27 chicubsfan20 @ 04/26/10 06:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jeremym480


	This. Also, I wonder if this counts people who just went online to get roster's and never played any games online (like me).

I'm the same way, I haven't played online in Madden since 2008. I was just sick of how terrible that game was IMO online and I've only went online to get the rosters from '08-'10.

# 28 lolfalconsbeatu @ 04/26/10 07:07 PM

Well I practically only play online, and to me it would be the nano blitzes that cant be stopped as a reason why people stop going Online for the most part. On PS2, it used to be disconnection glitches/freeze glitches, and just many ways to make the online experience just unenjoyable.

Nowadays, there is not much lag or d/c glitches, its just stuff like:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYIHiW4_HPE

..but that can be corrected with just better OLine intelligence. That kind of stuff spreads like wildfire, and can really suck for someone going online for the first time dealing with that kind of nonsense.

In a nutshell -- Its the gameplay that leaves exploits (such as the Nano blitz above) for people to abuse, fix those, and you fix a lot of people's opinion of Online.

# 29 WDOgF0reL1fe @ 04/26/10 07:07 PM

I feel like this number can be pretty skewed though.
People who rented the game for instance.

I was on only once on 360, but thats because my disc broke.
Im sure there was at least ONE other person who had that happen

# 30 ZoneKIller @ 04/26/10 07:10 PM

Roster updates

# 31 stlstudios189 @ 04/26/10 07:17 PM

Online is too hardcore for me to enjoy. I played some online a while back and NEVER won a football game ever. I forget my record but, it's like 0-13 avg score 47-7

Nascar was fun for me. It's frustrating when I do go online and the only guys I can find are 400-34 when the games been out for 5 days man get a life.

. Then when you are losing to a cheeser he is running his mouth talking trash saying things like "all day baby"

# 32 SteelerSpartan @ 04/26/10 07:35 PM

Yeah I played 2-3 games with my bud and that was it

Not hanging around to play Cheesers with the code still so shaky

# 33 splff3000 @ 04/26/10 07:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boregard


	You wanna know why, here; Lag glitchers more lag online franchise sucked more lag more glitchers nano blitz more lag lack of control (applies offline as well) more glitchers and finally how about some lag that makes you badly miss a 20yd game winning FG attempt!!!!

Not to mention the fact that slow speed is mandatory. I think that is the main reason. No one, and I mean no one, that I know plays on slow speed. I know 10 people with Madden and they all play on normal speed. When they go online, they get this slowed down game that they're not used to. It's very frustrating playing a slowed down game when you're used to the normal speed. That's why they stopped and that's why I stopped. I'm pretty sure that's why the majority stopped. This article explains it all.

http://www.mymaddenpad.com/madden/la...-speed-change/

Quote:


	The hot topic last week was the speed change last week and EA asking for feedback from the community. There were multiple polls on Madden fan sites everywhere, from Operation Sports to VSN, and even on the EA forum itself. The polls showed that more people preferred the “Normal” speed mode but that didn’t stop EA from making the following statement: Hey guys, Online game speed has clearly been a hot topic not just here on our board, but across the community in the last week. The dev team has taken a lot of care in evaluating their recent test and have made a decision on how this will be addressed. After running a test with the default game speed set to Slow and reviewing the thousands of messages we’ve received from our fans, we’ve decided to leave the default game speed online at Slow. This setting matches the default setting used in offline games and provides the ideal combination of fun gameplay and the most accurate simulation of NFL football. We know there are different views about this and we encourage everyone to post their thoughts in this thread in a manner that is respectful to others’ opinions. We do reserve the right to remove comments that aren’t forum appropriate, so let’s use some care in replying to each other and we can have a constructive conversation about this. Thanks, raczilla http://forum.ea.com/eaforum/posts/list/291498.page

which caused this:

Quote:


	The EA forum is littered with 9 plus pages of guys spouting off that they want their money back because Ian Cummings and EA said that online play would be set to “normal” game speed and it was. Now that it has changed many consumers are pissed and say that is false advertisement and they want their money back and they are not playing Madden again. I don’t believe those guys for one second but I do believe that they have a valid point of EA saying one thing and then changing is 2 weeks after launch.

Most people that play online know what to expect. They know they're gonna get some cheesers and they know they're going to see some cheaters. This is nothing new. It's been like that since the game went online. So I really doubt 350,000 people went online and was surprised by what they saw. What they may have been surprised, and ultimately turned off by, was a slow game that felt nothing like the game that they had been playing for 2 weeks online and off.

On OS, EA did a poll and it was about a 50/50 split for normal and slow online, but other sites were heavily in favor of normal over slow. In most threads that I saw, The slow supporters thought normal was ok, but thought slow was better. You hardly ever saw someone say thanks to the slow speed, I can play this game again. On the flip side though, the normal supporters hated slow speed. They didn't think it was ok at all. So what do you think is going to happen when EA makes it mandatory to play on slow speed? People are going to stop playing online. I played about 2 or 3 games after the switch to slow, then dropped out of the online franchise I was in and traded the game in. I had no use for the game if the only mode that I played extensively, had a game speed that I found horrible. I've since picked the game back up and play offline franchise on normal or play head to head on normal, but rarely will you ever see me play online. I'm sure I'm not the only one that feels this way. So, if EA is wondering about this, they need only look in the mirror and they will find the reason why so many people left online.

# 34 str8artist @ 04/26/10 07:40 PM

Easy answer- SWISS CHEESE.... Then you add in the WR glitch and the fumble glitch. I completely understand those crazy numbers.

# 35 Jukeman @ 04/26/10 07:43 PM

Maybe cuz they only play franchise mode..

# 36 TombSong @ 04/26/10 07:57 PM

Are they talking about played 1 ranked game or 1 type of any online game ?

# 37 Valdarez @ 04/26/10 08:01 PM

Until the fundamental gameplay is addressed, proper passing mechanism in place, and proper DB coverage, I don't see the desire to play online at all. It was only the lack of a proper franchise experience that allowed me to endure 5 seasons last year offline. That desire won't be there this year, so I hope the game/franchise makes a strong leap.

# 38 lolfalconsbeatu @ 04/26/10 08:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Valdarez


	Until the fundamental gameplay is addressed, proper passing mechanism in place, and proper DB coverage, I don't see the desire to play online at all. It was only the lack of a proper franchise experience that allowed me to endure 5 seasons last year offline. That desire won't be there this year, so I hope the game/franchise makes a strong leap.

I agree with you Val...As I mentioned, I practically only play online because of the competition, but like you said -- until fundamental gameplay is addressed, proper passing mechanism in place, and proper DB coverage...online will always be be frustrating for many.

But for people like me who primarily play online -- we just cope and adapt to the faults of the fundamental gameplay elements that people eventually exploit/abuse...while people who just go Online every now and then, encounter these people abusing the exploits and just never go back on.

# 39 sniperhare @ 04/26/10 08:39 PM

I might have been one of those, I played a few games (2-5) of Madden 2009 but ran into mainly cheaters or people not playing pro, and think that I've only played one game online of Madden 2010. It was against another cheater who just ran one or two plays and was in dime defense the whole game, then he complained when I ran up the gut and started cheating so I quit.

# 40 shadthedad @ 04/26/10 10:24 PM

gamers quitting or dropped games. Listen up EA. There's nothing worse than playing a game and winning, have your connection dropped and receiving a loss. i have literally put my controller down for weeks because of bad connections or gamers quitting.

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