In a story on the unveiling of Brett Favre as the cover athlete for Madden NFL 09, I linked an interview that GameTap did with one of the game’s lead designers, Phil Frazier. In that interview, Frazier boldly proclaimed that Madden 09 features “the biggest graphical improvement we've ever had year-to-year in Madden” (console generation jumps notwithstanding). Sure, it’s easy to be cynical and assume that this is another empty promise, but we’ve happily been proven wrong this time around.
GameTrailers has a three-minute video that directly compares the graphics of Madden 08 and Madden 09 on the Xbox 360 in six ways: lighting (at 4:15 PM), grass effects, weather effects (heavy snow), and three different player models. It doesn’t feature any gameplay footage, but it’s all in-game video of camera pans in a static stadium (the footage looks like it could’ve been taken out of the instant replay tool). Hit the jump for my analysis of the video.
Oh, and if you’re craving some more details on how Madden 09 is shaping up, IGN has just put up a new three-page preview, and it’s subtitled “The most additions we've seen to the franchise in years”. Here’s something from the preview that will hopefully shut up all the people who continually deride sports games as ‘annual roster updates’:
Madden 09 does not redefine videogame football. It doesn't take the classic Madden formula and turn it upside down. What it does do is it takes so many of the little things from last year's game and improves on them exponentially. They aren't details that can be seen by watching a short gameplay clip or looking at screenshots. They're the things that you don't realize about the game until you pick it up and play it for yourself...
That’s what sports games are all about. Not revolutions, but evolutions, so to speak. We sports gamers don’t usually take kindly to any major shake-ups; incremental improvements are what it’s all about. Each year, sports game developers try to create a more accurate simulation of their respective sport, and we notice even the smallest changes. Alright, I’ll get off my soapbox now.
The first three comparisons provide the easiest-to-spot changes. Regarding lighting, Madden 09 has 4:15 PM pegged as more of a dusk time, which makes more sense in the context of the football season (fall/winter). Last year, 4:15 PM still featured a bright sun, as if the game were being played during the summer. Field-wise, instead of a stale, neatly crisscrossing mowed pattern, the grass in Madden 09 is much more realistic (it doesn’t just look like a green background anymore). Blades of steel grass can actually be made out.
As for snow, it’ll actually pile up on the field (along with footprints), and there’s a subtle cool blue hue in snowy games to accentuate the cold weather feel. If you turned snow on in Madden 08 (or most prior Madden games, for that matter), it just appeared as if there were flurries of snow during the game. Finally, the video shows off three player models: Vikings LG Steve Hutchinson, Saints RB Reggie Bush, and Chargers OLB Shawne Merriman. The difference between Madden 08 and 09 isn’t night-and-day, but noticeable improvements have been made to light reflections on players’ helmets.
Overall, I’m highly impressed by what EA Tiburon has pulled off here. They’ve already assured us that the game will be running at 60 fps on both PS3 and 360, so let’s hope that it plays as well as it looks.
Contest:
1:59 PM on 05.23.2008
| 
Bad boy. Know your Rev Rants.
Now get in the corner and stay there.
I can't miss this new Madden then!
It looks no different, I think they just lowered lighting and resolution details on 08 to show 09 as better.
EA = crap. Those programmers are lucky they're working on an auto-buy title.
@Aerox: Well, it’s hard to explain if you’re not a sports gamer, but basically, even the smallest gameplay changes can make all the difference in a win or a loss. Things like the Hit Stick and Playmaker controls in Madden are “big things” — they were game-changing new features when they were introduced.
But, for example, if you’re allowed to “break out” of moves before the animation finishes, that’s huge. Think of hitting the O button to do a spin move, realizing that it’s going to end up in you getting tackled, and quickly tapping R1 to juke right instead. If you have to wait for the spin animation to finish, you’re going to get tackled. But if you can juke out of the spin before completing the move, you could be off to the races toward the end zone.
The biggest change to player models "noticeable improvements have been made to light reflections on players’ helmets.". Destructoid likes to talk big about people going too easy on crappy cash whore video games, (Madden in particular) but then you go and cup EA's balls when they start showing this shit off.
Did you even read the "If you love it change it" Madden article?
it is like they are proud to document and present nothingness.
And if you read BigPopaGamer’s “If you love it, change it” Madden article, you’d know that it was pretty much completely tongue-in-cheek. Or at least, I hope it was, because if you want any of the stuff that BigPopaGamer talked about, then go play an arcade game. Madden is a simulation football game, which means that it tries to replicate the real game of football as much as possible.
Madden 09 is looking like it will be a significant upgrade, and it's got me excited to play it.
Also I would like to point out that I recently got a 360, and I can glady play Tiger Woods 08. I'm a happy man.
I think this stuff is pretty impressive. Its too bad its taken the 4th version of this generation (06, 07, 08, 09) to get there though. For NHL it only took 2 years (07, 08) to get really good and be a legitimate sports game of the year. They did a good job in showing the difference which isn't readily apparent to the people who say "$60 roster update!". I think that some of the Madden 08 stuff looks a little more blurry than it should though (especially in the footplanting comparison).
I'm so sick of the haters. Yes, from a casual view, 90% of the game is going to look the same as last year, 90% of the game is going to play the same as last year; thats true for any sports game. Football never changes, so its always going to look and play like Football! But the tweaks to the League Modes, AI, Animations & Online play can make such a huge difference in a game like this. Its easy to slap together a game that approximately looks and plays like Football and has a career mode (Madden 06), but its much harder to get all the details right and have a balanced AI which is fun to play against, which is what they've been doing the last 3 iterations. Its not just a roster update.
I don't understand why people who don't play sports games hate on them. Do they go around and hate on other genres that they don't like to play? I don't like Turn-Based Combat in RPGs, but I don't go around bashing Final Fantasy 7, because I know its one of the best games out there and it wouldn't be fair for me to judge the whole game based on one aspect that I dislike. Also seems like the Jap RPGs have had relatively the same formula to me since the NES days, but again, I'm not going to hate on it because I haven't actually sat down and played one start-to-finish.
Haters are delusional to think that they aren't throwing resources at this thing. Someone who DOES play sports games can notice a big difference year-to-year. There are people working on this game 11 months every year. If you don't feel the work of a team of people for a year is worth $60, then fine, thats your business. But don't think that they just have one guy come in and work on the game for a few days, and say "HAY GUYZ HERES MADDEN 09!". Some people say that these games should only be $30 since they come out yearly. If they cut the price in half, would people be satisfied with half the amount of work done on the game being cut in half?
OH SNAP! :)
Flamebaiting aside, when you're talking about a sport game, you have the core game, which doesn't change in in reality , aside from rules and rosters, and then you've got features and nuances, which give the player more control over the simulation.
I'll admit, I haven't bought a Madden game in a few years, primarily because I don't need the updates they make every year. But its still a very solid game and can be a whole load of fun.
Step One: Throw out everything involving offense in this game, right down to the last coffee stained sticky note.
Step Two: Implement a decent running system. Likely source; NFL 2K5. Hell its been years now and they aren't allowed to make NFL games anymore so they probably won't mind.
Step Three: Implement a passing system that does not reward the 20yd drop and bomb.
Step Four: ....?
Step Five: Profit
Alternatively I present the two step program to profit, of which I am confident EA is fully aware of.
Step One: ....?
Step Two: Profit!
Wait. I'm pretty sure my Madden 02 on the PS2 had that.
Nice try Tiburon.
Can we actually just get a Madden game that has ALL the features of the previous games and knock off this add/subtract cockamamie bullshit? Gawd.
I bought '08 last year (the last madden game I bought being Madden '02) and it was fun for a while. But it was just not innovative enough for my tastes. There's so much more they could do with the game, and yet they like to focus on "making the tackles look more real." How about we make the gameplay more real, you idiots?
So, what did they do as far as animation is concerned?