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Traditionally releasing the first or second Tuesday of August, Madden NFL 12 this year moved to the end of the month, Aug. 30. EA Sports insisted the schedule change was not because of this year's NFL lockout, but because it provided a more natural alignment of the game's launch to the league's opening week in September. That, plus the most expensive marking campaign in the game's history, helped record-setting sales, the game's top marketer told Industry Gamers. More »
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Bit of a speed bump here in just the second week of what I'd hoped would be a regular feature. Our commentator is AWOL. I'm still uploading the video so you can see what Madden NFL 12 predicts for this week's marquee matchup between New England and San Diego. More »
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When the NFL lockout hovered over the release of EA Sports' Madden series earlier in the year, investors were told to expect lower sales of Madden NFL 12. Analysts pegged the potential losses at up to half of all sales. The label's exclusive pact with the league was renegotiated to terms that would help mitigate any harm. More »
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It's an annual tradition for Madden NFL 12 to simulate the upcoming season and offer its predictions of how the football season will unfold. Last year it correctly picked one of the Super Bowl participants—the eventual champion Green Bay Packers. This year, the game calls for a rematch of their title game with the Pittsburgh Steelers. More »
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As the NFL lockout dragged all of the spring and much of the summer, Madden NFL 12 figured to be the only football coming to your TV this year, until a month before its release. From its conception, the game was meant to be a salve for the hurting hardcore fan, not a song for those who tune in only for Super Bowl commercials. Freed of the need to build features marketed to the indifferent, this was supposed to be the Madden for a lifer, if not a lifetime. More »
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Previewed this spring, the list of Madden NFL 12's improvements to its Franchise campaign read like a letter to Santa written by the hardcore football fan. Wished-for features like draft-pick trades, custom playbooks and training camp cut days join new concepts like a fast-paced free agency period under the hood of Madden's most popular mode. But do they assemble into an engine, or are they a collection of useful parts? More »
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This has been an obsession of mine ever since Cowboys Stadium appeared in Madden NFL 10—hit the Jerrytron, the arena's massive scoreboard, with a punt. Tennessee's A.J. Trapasso did in a pre-season game in 2009, causing a brief foofaraw over its size and how low it was hanging over the field. More »
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Simulation-quality sports video games all now ship with some kind of solo career mode, in which you create or control one player throughout his entire career. By far, this fantasy experience is most underserved by the football games. NCAA Football 12 made a substantial effort to upgrade its career this year, and although Madden NFL 12 does add some new features with "Superstar," it remains inexcusably neglected next to the rest of the product. More »
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The first day of EA Sports' "Season Ticket" premium subscription, offering a three-day (or more) full preview of Madden NFL 12, does not reflect wide acceptance among the hardcore community it was meant to appeal to. More »
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The preview weekend download for Madden NFL 12 is now underway for PlayStation 3 subscribers to the Season Ticket. Because of the way this is handled (through the PlayStation Store, instead of an application) some may be confused about how to start the download. Here is the answer: More »
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The idea behind EA Sports' premium "Season Ticket" was to give people 72 hours with their favorite sports video game before it hit retail shelves. Turns out they will get a few more, with Xbox 360 and west coast users benefitting the most. More »
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John Madden has a low tolerance for cheesy play in the video game bearing his name. "I don't like to see stuff that isn't real, or isn't practical," he says, "like going for it long on fourth down." He would, however, blitz you every single down, if you gave him back one of his old linebackers. More »
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The NFL's official fantasy football service, offered through NFL.com, will be integrated into Madden NFL 12, updating gamers with scores and results from their leagues, standings, schedules and more. More »
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Madden Ultimate Team, the card-collecting/player-management/online multiplayer mishmash that's become an obsession for many, will not be active during the three-day exclusive full preview of Madden NFL 12 offered by EA Sports' "Season Ticket" premium subscription, according to EA Sports. More »
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The 100. A rarity that symbolizes perfection and nearly automatic success in sports video games, the difference between it and a 99 rating in a single attribute is in fact cosmetic. But the difference between a 100 and a 92—or an 88—is rather substantial. Fans of Madden NFL 12 have the chance to make a profound difference in how some of the game's players will perform when the title releases in two weeks. More »
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The score was out of reach. The fans had given up. The result would have no effect on the season. Nothing suggested Greg Jennings and the Green Bay Packers were about to execute the most famous come-from-ahead touchdown miracle in NFL history. More »
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Madden NFL 12 moved its release to the end of August but still will deliver something for fans on the second Tuesday of the month, its traditional release date for much of the decade. The Madden demo hits PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade then, and will feature the Chicago Bears against the Green Bay Packers. More »
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The NFL's four-month player lockout suspended all personnel operations except for the rookie draft—signings, trades, all of it. With labor peace declared today, that process will be condensed down to a hectic few weeks, and can dramatically reshape the rosters in Madden NFL 12. More »
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The National Football League's players approved a deal with the league owners this afternoon, ending a four-month lockout that had threatened the regular season and cast a shadow over development of one of the NFL's signature licensed products, EA Sports' Madden NFL. The game is on shelves Aug. 30. More »
]]> http://kotaku.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5824522&view=rss&microfeed=true With Madden NFL 12 moving its release date to Aug. 30 to be closer to the league's opening day (assuming that happens), the game's demo likewise skips forward a couple of weeks. Tuesday, EA Sports will reveal the demo release date, the teams it will feature, and any other details about the demo. More »
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A man on trial in North Carolina for killing his pregnant fiancée says he could not have been the killer, and is using a screen capture from a game of Madden NFL as his alibi. More »
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In an internal memo obtained by IGN, a senior EA Sports executive says the label will soon open a third studio in Texas, and addresses the departures of key developers from its flagship Madden NFL product. More »
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The lie I faced on the seventh green at Costa Navarino was so steep, it's a wonder I didn't need rappelling gear to address the ball. My caddy, who has recommended twisting shots that skip over bunkers and thread between trees, suddenly had no advice. Without any starting point for my read, I had no hope of making this putt in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 12. More »
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In any discussion of the greatest video game athletes, the Michael Vick of Madden NFL 2004 always makes the cut, and is usually the most recent name on the list. In the eight years since his appearance, sports simulations have fine-tuned their realism, closing the era of logic-defying performances by the likes of Griffey, Roenick, and Tecmo Bo Jackson. More »
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The executive producer of Madden NFL quietly stepped down this week after less than a year on the job. He is the third senior-level Madden developer to leave the title in the past two months. But Phil Frazier and his former bosses say it is an amicable separation, one that won't affect the video game whose annual release is treated as a national celebration. More »
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At E3 this week, the sight I was least prepared for was that of Ray Lewis in full Baltimore Ravens uniform: eye-black, skullcap, gloves, wristbands, everything. This was an appearance for Madden NFL 12 but to him, it didn't look like it was for show. Lewis looked ready to play right there, ready to go in the two seconds it would have taken to strap on his helmet, clenched by the facemask in his left fist. More »
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Beat on a quarterback for 45 minutes of an NFL game and you'll see a different guy in the fourth quarter. Some start forcing every throw. Some will run like hell. Some go catatonic. More »
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When Madden NFL 11 released last year with a virtually unchanged Franchise mode, Josh Looman expected to hear about it. He just expected to hear it on the message boards. More »
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As an avuncular living-room presence for three generations, it's easy to forget John Madden was the head coach of the Oakland Raiders back when they were the Raiders, and he had to lead characters like Ted Hendricks, Phil Villapiano, Jack Tatum and Ken Stabler. So Madden's proficiency with the F-word should not be astonishing. More »
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Madden NFL 12 will present concussions realistically - as realistically as removing a player from the game, forbidding his return, and delivering commentary that highlights the seriousness of the injury. The game will not include suspensions for players who dole them out; nor is there any way to intentionally cause one. More »
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Gus Johnson, who debuted as the play-by-play announcer on the Madden NFL series last year, is out as an NFL commentator at CBS, meaning the enthusiastic boothman will be working NFL games only virtually in the upcoming season. More »
]]> http://kotaku.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5799124&view=rss&microfeed=true Madden executive producer Phil Frazier has confirmed, via Twitter, that Madden NFL 12 on the Wii will support the Classic Controller. Wii football gamers have long requested the feature. (His tweet was in response to this question from a fan.) More »
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He's the first Madden cover star from a losing team. The first with no Pro Bowl appearances at the time of his selection. He led NFL running backs in one statistical category last year - fumbles. More »
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Two videos give the first look at Madden NFL 12's gameplay, calling attention to gameplay (above) and presentation details added for this year's game. They don't cover everything. There are three deeper discussions of the game's defensive and collision upgrades and fully customizable playbooks. More »
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EA Sports recently uploaded - then quickly yanked - a YouTube video teasing Madden NFL 12. Madden junkies love to pick these things apart for clues about this year's new features. In so doing, they also found the Buffalo Bills' new uniforms - a design not yet announced. More »
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Fans selected Peyton Hillis, the Cleveland Browns running back, to grace the cover of Madden NFL 12. Hillis prevailed in a five-week, tournament style vote-off that drew nearly 13 million votes, and was a landslide winner over Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick in the final round, 66 percent to 34, with more than a million votes cast. More »
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In the two and a half months since he traded Canada's weather for Florida's, and titles like FIFA for Madden, Cam Weber has read that he delayed Madden's release for three weeks because of the NFL lockout; that he's adding some kind of social network to the game, like Need for Speed's Autolog; and that he is at the same time doubling the size of the Madden team while presiding over a massive brain drain within it. More »
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Traditionally arriving by the first or second Tuesday of August, Madden NFL 12 will be released three weeks later, Aug. 30, in a move EA Sports says will carry into future releases, too. More »
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For a brief moment Tuesday, I wasn't sure we'd be seeing any basketball video game this year, even though I'd taken for granted that NBA 2K12 would release, a death-and-taxes sure thing in October for more than 10 years. More »
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The guy suing Electronic Arts for, potentially, tens of millions in royalties from the Madden NFL series, has overstated and overrated his importance in developing John Madden Football, according to the series' creator. More »
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