madden 12 online info

[stevsta]

http://www.gameinformer.com/games/m...11/07/25/madden-nfl-12-39-s-online-blitz.aspx

Madden's online feature set the past few years has been filled with controversy, from ranked invites to the lackluster Online Franchise mode. While EA has already said that it isn't improving Online Franchise mode apart from some behind-the-scenes tweaks, it certainly hasn't given up on trying to improve the head-to-head and Online Team Play (OTP) experiences. We talked to Madden designer Anthony DiMento about Madden NFL 12's online features.

COMMUNITIES

Communities is EA Tiburon's way of addressing users' frequent complaints that there aren't enough "good" players to play online because of chronic quitters and griefers spoiling the fun for others. Players can create and join Communities based on whatever custom game sliders and options that the Community wants – whether that's six minute quarters or the honor system promise to stick to "sim-football" conventions like punting on fourth down or not running the same play every time. "Play who you want, and play them the way you want to play," says DiMento. Gamers who band together in Communities will play each other in head-to-head (H2H) games as well as against other Communities in three-on-three co-op squad OTP matches (complete with leaderboards for both).

Some Community features include:

*Communities can consist of two to two thousand members, and you can be a part of up to five different Communities

*They can be open to the public so anyone who reads the text description of your Community and is interested can join, or they can be invite only. Unfortunately, there is no way to solicit invite-only Communities to let you join unless they invite you in the first place

*Community creators or managers deputized by the creator can kick people out at any time

*Rules or gameplay sliders can be tweaked whenever you want

*Communities will have private lobbies, a message board, individual stat tracking, and other info and communication methods

*When you create a Community, you can choose from over 50 current and historical NFL team logos. No custom logos, unfortunately.

ONLINE TEAM PLAY

The main change to OTP this year beyond being able to do it between your Community and others (outlined above) is that boosts are gone and the camera has been moved to the traditional Madden camera. OTP has also been amended to fix the OTP griefing practice of constant encroachments (only three encroachments in a row or five in a game are allow) and delay of games. Any OTP squad stats you accrue will follow you regardless of which Community you earn them in.


INDIVIDUAL HEAD-TO-HEAD PLAY

Ranked invites remain for traditional H2H play, but developer EA Tiburon has made some modifications to try and keep the integrity of the feature. Last year people were exploiting ranked invites to friends who'd let them win in order to cheat up the leaderboards, but Madden 12 features a degenerative point system whereby if you play the same person repeatedly you'll gain less and less skill points with each win over a 10-game span until after three or four games you're not earning any even if you win.

Quitters are also being punished more harshly via more stringent rules. Any quits during a game will be not counted (and no skill points awarded to the quitter), and the remaining player will be awarded the win/skill points. DiMento also told us that there were many instances where players thought they should have been awarded a win last year because they thought the other person quit the game, when it fact it was their connection that dropped the match. In order to help alleviate confusion about who really quits in Madden 12, there is a post-game info box that explains the exact reasoning behind who is the winner/loser when someone quits.

 

[killgod]

Nice additions but nowhere near as a big of a deal as EA was making it out to be.

Essentially will be our tracker and VSD approved system for us.

 

[killgod]

Also, sliders for online play is sweet. Wonder if OF gets use of that...

Team Play Evolved

While it seems like I have said a lot about Communities already, I’ve really only talked about half of the experience. Last year, Madden NFL 11 introduced Online Team Play (OTP), a feature that was generally very well received but in the end, really suffered from not having any leaderboards or stat tracking. The people we talked to said it was fun to play, but lacked any real incentive to play it. In Madden NFL 12, you’ll be able to play Ranked Team Play from within your Community for the very first time. Instead of playing against members of your Community, you will be able to team up with members of your Community to play three vs. three games against other Communities. Since Communities can potentially have up to 2000 members, we gave each Community its own private lobby room where you can chat with your fellow members and of course gather your favorite Community teammates to take on other Communities. If you get into the lobby a little late and your friends already started their game, you can view a box score of their game in progress that shows you which of your fellow members are playing, what the current score is, and how much time is left in the game so you can decide whether to wait for them to finish or if you want to start a game of your own. Every Community will be ranked against the rest of the world on the Community Team Play Leaderboard. Squads are back, boosts are gone, and all of your stats for all six squads will be recorded and ranked in the Squad Stats Leaderboard. Your individual Team Play squad stats in one Community will carry over into all your other Communities as well, meaning if you win 25 games in Community A as the QB Squad and you win 15 games as the QB Squad in Community B, you will appear on the Squad Stats Leaderboard with 40 wins as the QB Squad. We have also added grieving rules to ensure individuals who cause excessive delay of game or encroachment penalties get kicked out of the game and don’t ruin your experience. Finally, in the most requested Team Play feature of them all, we did away with the behind the back camera on defense so that you have your classic Madden NFL camera on both sides of the ball.

And this ^^. We'll need an official VSD team to beat up on OS nerds.

 

[Scikotic]

Also, sliders for online play is sweet. Wonder if OF gets use of that...





And this ^^. We'll need an official VSD team to beat up on OS nerds.

Im going so say probably not. Its not uncommon for OF to get the shaft when it comes to upgrades. OF players need to make up for EA's shortcomings....which at this moment appears to be alot.

 

[killgod]

Im going so say probably not. Its not uncommon for OF to get the shaft when it comes to upgrades. OF players need to make up for EA's shortcomings....which at this moment appears to be alot.

It was blogged that DPP is included in OF.

While the mode itself will not be changing, the core changes to how the game works should still alter OF in a way. This could be one of them, but you're probably right.

 

[Scikotic]

It was blogged that DPP is included in OF.

While the mode itself will not be changing, the core changes to how the game works should still alter OF in a way. This could be one of them, but you're probably right.

I'll believe it when I see it. But that is somewhat encouraging...

 

[Point Blank]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hqnF2AIn_w[/ame]

 

[dave]

I think that the "Communities" thing sounds awesome ... and I may need to get Madden on the ps3 this year, so I can get in on one of these.

 

[I OU a Beatn]

Awesome addition to the game. It's good to see EA focusing so much on head to head games.

 

[StealthShot]

Swear they had this back in I believe Madden 06/07 PS2.

 

[BigBucs]

The communities feature sounds great. To bad you faggots wont be around longer than a few weeks for us to take advantage.

 

[Raidersabc123]

Ever since online franchise has come out its been the biggest the to playing madden online I dont understand why EA wouldn't fix there half ass online franchise when its the biggest for the fans instead they throw in new features

 

[BigBucs]

Ever since online franchise has come out its been the biggest the to playing madden online I dont understand why EA wouldn't fix there half ass online franchise when its the biggest for the fans instead they throw in new features

:lolwut:

 

[PP]

Their reasoning that nobody plays online franchise is stupid. No shit nobody plays it, its a half assed broken feature.

 

[Boss AZ]

Fuck your "Communities". You're not tricking me again.

 

[krulmichael]

VSN community FTW. Still woulda preferred OF improvements like everyone else though.

 

[I OU a Beatn]

I kind of see Communities being like the "clubs" for NCAA and I think Madden back on PS2, which was similar to clans. It kind of sucks that you can't make an invite only community.

 

[killgod]

I kind of see Communities being like the "clubs" for NCAA and I think Madden back on PS2, which was similar to clans. It kind of sucks that you can't make an invite only community.

Yes you can.

 

[I OU a Beatn]

My bad, I read this:

*They can be open to the public so anyone who reads the text description of your Community and is interested can join, or they can be invite only. Unfortunately, there is no way to solicit invite-only Communities to let you join unless they invite you in the first place.

I was skimming and read "unfortunately, there is no way to select invite-only communities." That's what I get for skimming.oops:

 

[dave]

I can't imagine how much fun that communities feature would have been from 2002-2005 when Madden was still fun to play.