After years of video game football retirement, I decided to get back in the game. I hadn’t played video game football in 15 years after hanging up my joystick when it was announced via a faxed press release that Sega was no longer making games for my beloved Dreamcast console. I announced my retirement to nobody, and commiserated with a six pack of Red Dog and a bag of Lay’s WOW Chips.
I quit video gaming cold turkey. I hadn’t purchased or touched a game console since Dreamcast. Then, about a year ago, I was swept up in Star Wars Nostalgia by a Battlefront commercial and purchased myself an XBox One. Talk about setting fire to a stack of cash. Since making the savvy investment, my kids’ college fund is $500 lighter and I have a constant reminder why I should not impulse purchase expensive items from GameStop. However, now that I have a game system, I have felt the urge to pick up the digital pigskin and start chucking again. You see, I used to see myself as an elite video game quarterback. As a video gamer, I fancied myself as a digital version of Jeff George…with a heart. I would talk your ear off about my exploits with my re-tooled Patriots team that featured Randy Moss (traded from Vikings) and a pudgy French Canadian QB that I created in the game.
So, last week I finally broke down and decided to give Madden NFL 17 a whirl. After a week, I am sad to announce that the game has passed me by. I feel like how Jeff George might feel today if he went out onto a field and started throwing. I feel old.
Let’s start with the positive of Maddy NFL 17. There are a ton – no complaints about the game at all. The graphics are insane and a touch away from real life. The actual game-play is clean and perfectly timed, though I have never been a huge fan of the behind the QB POV (feeling nostalgic for the Tecmo view). The game also is also pretty easy to use for young players. My eight year old was able to start and play a semi-competitive game until he was unable to comprehend off-sides rule on defense.
In terms of strategy, it is easy to get lost in the playbook, but I learned to lean heavily on the Coaches Suggestion feature. If you don’t like the options presented under Coach Suggestion, it is easy enough to switch out to a different package. A quick example of this: I find myself switching to a jumbo package in short yardage situations (somewhere up above John Madden is smiling and wiping wing grease on his Raiders sweater). Defensively, the coaches suggestion is great because it seems to adjust in real-time to what your opponent is doing. For instance, I was playing someone named ScabLicker69 and he kept going to Antonio Brown in the slot. The computer recognized this and went to a nickel and double-teamed Brown. Another cool feature that I am terrified of is Franchise Mode – which would have caused me to fail three MORE classes in college.
So what is the negative? The negative has nothing to do with Madden NFL 17. The negative is the state of video games in general. TOO MANY BUTTONS. In my day, a the Nintendo controller had too many buttons. Now? There are toggles, buttons, joy stick nobs and direction arrows. I know I am probably the 10,000th person to complain about this, but I feel like I am trying to land a helicopter not punt a football on my TV. Actually, landing a helicopter might be easier.
If you have a family, you might want to avoid Madden NFL 17 completely. You will find reasons not to go to soccer games, Cub Scout Meetings, and you will completely blow off the ‘Honey Do’ list on weekends. If you don’t have a family. Go for it. Just don’t fail any classes over it.