One of my main complaints with Madden over the years has been the commentary. If your playing franchise mode then you will probably want your stats to be represented as realistic as possible. Therefore you will most likely be setting the quarter length to 6 or 7 minutes. The basically equates to a game that will run you about 45 minutes to an hour to complete. Multiply this by a 16 game season (not including the post season) and you have about 16 hours or a bit less to complete 1 season. During this time you end up hearing alot of commentary from Collinsworth and the new guy Gus Johnson. Although its nice to have a new voice in the booth, it seems year after year this is the one category that Madden fails in. Last year was the worst. When you here the commentators say the same phrase twice in one game, you know there is a problem. So far that has not happened with 2011, but I have heard the same phrase within a two game span. And after all these years of producing the game and all the various football talking heads there are I don't understand why it is so difficult for EA Sports to get this one right. They did a great job with NHL 10 and 11. Take NHL 10 for instance. I have been playing that game consistently for nearly two years and although I will hear the same phrase here and there, the rate at which they repeat the phrases is very low. Not to mention the fact that after all this time I am still hearing brand new phrases occasionally. EA Sports should take a lesson from EA Canada in how to handle the commentary in their football game.
Probably the biggest addition to the game this year is the new feature called "Gameflow". In an effort to speed up gameplay and make Madden a bit more realistic they added this feature. Essentially what this does is call your plays. It is meant to represent the coach on the sidelines calling in plays. Cool idea. Except for one thing.. personally I don't want the coach (AI) calling my plays. Fortunately in every aspect of this new feature you have the option of switching to calling the play yourself. In the setup options all the way to the snap of the ball. So at least they gave you an out. The one thing that really gets on my nerves is how the commentary interacts with this new feature. Its something that just irks my immensely simply because it is a simple thing to see and its obvious that EA was informed by their testers yet chose to ignore it. When you take possession of the ball and are deciding whether to let the gameflow feature call the play or if you will call you own, Gus Johnson and Chris Collinsworth are doing their little commentary thing. However, as soon as you hit a button to select that you will pick your own play the commentary stops. It just gets cut off in the middle of the sentence. It is just unsettling.
Other improvements have been made that do make a bigger difference on the gameplay. Corners can actually cover slant routes now. Offensive lineman are much improved and will block for your halfback with much more vigor. However there are some things that they could use help on, such as on passing plays. Money plays are still an issue, however it's not nearly as noticeable as in previous years.The real meat of this game has always been the franchise mode. Of course it makes its return. There is not much changed here, if its not broke why try and fix it. Sometimes trades that you try and make with CPU teams get declined are your left wondering why because they make perfect sense to you. But that's the way it goes. Multiplayer is a bit more refined. Hits feel cleaner and the competition feel of the online portion of the game seems to flow at a more realistic pace. Lag is still an issue and in my mind until the lag is completely gone the multiplayer will not be something I will spend much time on. There is just something about football that when that little delay between the button push and the action occurring on the screen is too great the game loses its attraction.
Overall the game is very good. With improved animation, ball/character physics, and gameplay this is a definite buy. Of course the issues that plague the game are still present. Albeit at a lesser level but for how long some of these things have been an issue and not been fixed - you have to wonder if they ever will. There has long been a feeling with Madden that every year they just rehash the same product and release it with a new cover picture. There have been years where the commentary was even mostly the same. This years release is no different. The commentary is all new voice over but the game feels the same. Some new graphics and animations. But all in all the game remains the same. If your a true Madden junkie then you will buy the 2011 (and 2012,2013 and so on). And if you don't already have a previous Madden then you will surely want to pick this one up. But if your like me and you have last years game... then this years version is in no way something I am going to rush out to get unless you have money just burning a hole in your pocket. Personally I would rather spend that $60 on NHL 11 or some other title. Don't get me wrong, the game is solid and for football you really cant go wrong. But to say that this is above and beyond previous versions would be false. Do yourself a favor and maybe rent this one first, just to be sure you want to spend the money on a cleaner, smoother and prettier version of more of the same.
Scores:
Graphics - 8/10
Audio/effects - 6/10
Gameplay - 7/10
Replay Value - 6/10
Online - 7/10
Overall Score: 6.8/10
