Franchise Community, we did it. We made our voices heard and we at least got a response. Seann Graddy, the executive producer for Madden issued a video that was posted to Madden’s twitter account today.
He addressed the Madden Franchise community and said “We understand your frustration.” He also said that “The franchise community is critically important to us and we appreciate your passion for Madden NFL.” Well, it clearly doesn’t seem like the franchise community is important at all because we got PATCH NOTES for our Updates while you lumped Face of the Franchise in to make the article look 3 times as big as it actually was. Also lumping in X-factors and gameplay updates that are not a part of franchise specifically but rather the game as a whole.
Graddy also went on to say “We’re reading your feedback and we clearly understand that you want more. We’ve seen your requests for details around what the franchise community can expect moving forward. And while I don’t have a lot of details I can share with you right now I can tell you that today our team is actively working on bolstering plans to support franchise in Madden NFL 21 and beyond.” Graddy then went onto say, “The development team is collectively right now working from home to prepare Madden NFL 21 for launch on August 28th. But we’re also committed to providing updates to you on our thoughts and plans around franchise moving forward before the game launches.” Finally concluding his video with, “So again thank you for all the passion and the feedback that you bring. For those of you that are going to participate in the closed beta we look forward to more feedback later this weekend. Thank you.”
What Does This Mean?
It means that we were heard. The higher ups at EA know they screwed up. However, it seems like nothing will change before the game’s launch this August. The team is working on “plans” for franchise, that doesn’t sound like we’re going to get anything substantial in a little under two months. If we got patch notes after almost a year, we aren’t getting anything before the game launches. The only good thing is, they said we’ll get updates on their plans for franchise.
While I’m happy to have gotten a response from Seann, it doesn’t change the fact that Madden 21 is a dud for the franchise community. If they manage to actually add something to the mode before launch, then hats off to EA. But don’t get your hopes up. They disappointed us this year, and I’m not buying the game until they actually add something and finally restore franchise to where it was over a decade ago.
