Madden 12 Online Communities Review

On August 30th, Madden 12 will be offering a new feature called ‘Communities’ that is poised to be an online difference maker just like their constantly evolving football video game is for many happy gamers. Madden 12 promises to allow its players to find games with others in a Community. Each Community can have up to 2,000 players where you can play head-to-head online football against fellow Maddenites.

My experience as an online Community and historical wikis Moderator for the NY Giants, Houston Rockets, Entourage and DWTS, tells me that the EA Sports ‘Communities’ feature will be a significant evolution in sports technology history and therefore becomes the subject matter for our newest Sports Techie blog.

Whether you play against your family, neighborhood or a large network of high skilled gamers from all over the world, you are eligible to participant with anyone in 5 different Communities. Each Community has its own private lobby room that is the place to interface with others much like multiplayer online games like Internet bingo. New bingo sites 2016 will have more features which give the player a better game experience and help to communicate with other bingo players.

I like how the Madden 12 Communities creator will be able to create Community “house rules”. Every game option and slider in Madden NFL 12 will be editable and will apply to all head-to-head games within your Community adding increased customization opportunities.

Your individual stats will all be tracked and ranked. Recent game results will be displayed for your entire Community and all virtual games will be ranked on your Community Leaderboard. Every Community will be ranked against the rest of the world on the Community Team Play Leaderboard. Squads are back, boosts are not, and all of your stats for all six squads will be recorded and ranked in the Squad Stats Leaderboard. Stats are good food and look to be a big part of the Community focus by EA Sports.

Last year, Madden NFL 11 implemented Online Team Play (OTP) and this year in Madden NFL 12, you’ll be able to play Ranked Team Play from within your Community for the very first time. Instead of within your own Community, you will be able to team up with members in your Community to play three vs. three games against other Communities. This sounds tailor made for Super Madden Bowls in order to find out who the best of the best is, no.

Check out the real-time box score of a current game in progress that shows you which of your fellow members are playing, what the current score is, and how much time is left in the game so you can decide whether to wait for them to finish or if you want to start a game of your own. You can use this opportunity to scout your opponent’s tendencies as a play caller and better gauge his gaming skill sets.

Using player feedback from existing players, Madden 12 made other changes to note:

In order to avoid poor sportsmanship effecting game play and rankings, EA Sports has added grieving rules to ensure individuals who cause excessive delay of game or encroachment penalties get kicked out of the game and don’t ruin your online gaming experience. EA Sports also did away with the behind the back camera on defense so that you have your classic Madden NFL camera on both sides of the ball.

The EA Sports goal is to give the gamers the power to create the experience they really want. From the sounds of it, the upcoming ‘Communities’ feature in Madden 12 does all that and will soon be the Platform for online football play and Community.

Read more about the Madden 12 Online Communities here:
http://www.ea.com/madden-nfl/blog/madden-12-online-communities

NFL Pigskin Pro-Am Event
Be sure to watch the Live coverage from the Madden NFL Pigskin Pro-Am Event and win free swag on Tuesday July 26th at 7pm ET when the Madden NFL 12 demo release date will be revealed. The Madden NFL 12 demo details will also be revealed (Teams, settings, etc.) and you can see exclusive LIVE gameplay from the Madden NFL 12 demo. There will be interviews and video walkthroughs with the developers behind the Online Communities feature.

From 7-9 pm ET go to UStream: http://www.ustream.tv/easportslive

Maddenites will have the opportunity to ask questions directly to members of the Madden NFL 12 development team including Football GM Cam Weber, Online Communities Designer Anthony DiMento, Ratings Czar Donny Moore, Online Producer Ryan Ferwerda, and Creative Director Mike Young.

Online Communities such as Sports Techie seem to flourish because of good timing, fun engagement and passionate members. I suspect that EA Sports and Madden 12 have the right kind of formula in place to expect that their new Communities feature will be an International sportsbiz success.

I will see ya when I see ya, Sports Techie.
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