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Stanford STS 145 - Why John Madden Football Has Been Such A Success

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Why John Madden Football Has Been Such A Success Kevin Dious STS 145: The History of Computer Game Design: Technology, Culture, Business Professor: Henry Lowood March 18, 2002Kevin Dious STS 145: The History of Computer Game Design: Technology, Culture, Business Professor: Henry Lowood March 18, 2002 Why John Madden Football Has Been Such A Success Case History Athletic competition has been a part of the human culture since its inception. One of the most popular and successful sports of today’s culture is American football. This sport has grown into a worldwide phenomenon, and like the video game industry, has become a multi-billion entity. It was only a matter of time until game developers teamed up with the National Football League (NFL) to bring magnificent sport to video game players across the globe. There are few, if any, game genres that are as popular as sports games. With the ever-increasing popularity of the NFL, it was inevitable that football games would become one of the most lucrative of the sports game genre. With all of the companies making football games for consoles and PCs during the late 1980s and 1990s, there is one particular company that clearly stood and remains above the rest, Electronic Arts. EA Sports, the sports division of Electronic Arts, revolutionized not only the football sports games but also the entire sports game genre itself. Before Electronic Arts entered the sports realm, league licenses, celebrity endorsements, and re-release of games were all unheard of. EA was one of the first companies to release the same game annually, creating several series of games that are thriving even today. The John Madden Football series has no counterpart that even comes close to rivaling its in-depth detail of the game of football. With its innovation, marketing, and star power, EA Sports used John Madden Football and other sports titles to strong-arm market share in the sports sector of video game industry and become the largest producer of video games in the 1entire world. Electronics Arts sales in 1997 were over $600 million, with John Madden Football contribution approximately $70 million1. The main factors that directly contributed to the success of the John Madden Football over the years were the constant technological innovations of the series, EA’s acquisitions of NFL and NFLPA (National Football League Players Association) licenses, intense branding and marketing of the EA Sports name, and of course John Madden himself. In order for a sports game to be successful, it must offer something that others do not. It must contain some type of innovation and new ideas that will cause players to look past other titles of the same genre, which is exactly what Electronic Arts did with the John Madden Football series. Just about every sequel in the Madden series offered new and better features that its predecessor and every other football game on the market at that time. The first Madden Football was released on the Apple II in 1989. The popularity of Madden took off when John Madden Football ‘91 was released in 1990 on the Sega Genesis, the first 16-bit game console of its time. In this version EA Sports revolutionized video game football with the introduction of offensive and defensive formations, each with a few plays in them. To improve the passing game EA Sports introduced the “passing windows.” These windows allowed the player to see a close view of his receivers and choose the one he wants to throw to by pressing the corresponding button on the controller. Some of the drawback of Madden ’91 include that there were only 16 teams and the lack of NFL and/or NFLPA licenses. Madden ’92 saw addition of all 28 NFL teams, the Electronic Arts Sports Network (EASN), turf and weather settings, and more formations for the defense and 1 Nikhil Hutheesing, “Electronic Arts’s Strategy in Computer Game Publishing.” Forbes. 2offense. In this version EA added some of its classic features, many of which are still used today, such as easily operable kicking meter, end zone celebrations, and detailed game statistics. At this time the Genesis version was by far the better than its Super Nintendo counterpart. There were relatively few changes in Madden ’93 and ’94, except that the real NFL teams were added in and the EASN was discontinued in Madden ’94. During this span the quality of the Super Nintendo versions caught up quite a bit to the Genesis versions. John Madden Football ’95 also saw a few minor changes, except for the fact that the Super Nintendo version lacked the NFLPA license. A graphically and technically superior Madden ’95 was created for the new 32-bit Panasonic 3DO game system. Much revamping was done to the 1996 version (created in 1995 of course) John Madden Football. Fox football hosts Pat Summerall and Leslie Visser were added as commentators and there were several noticeable changes to the Madden playbook. Left- handed quarter backs and jumping receivers were two of the notable innovative additions for this year. The graphics and game play were redone, as well as the “create a player” option. Madden ’97 was a new era graphically for the Madden series. The 32-bit Sega Saturn and Sony Playstation provided new visual technology that blew away the Genesis and Super Nintendo versions of this Madden. The graphics and greatly improved and lots full motion video was added. The rest of the game, however, remained similar to its predecessors. A few improvements were made in all versions of Madden ’98, ’99, and ‘00 such as improved AI, graphics, and the Fantasy Draft. The Nintendo 64 version of Madden lacked an NFL license in Madden ‘98. Better commentary was inserted into the ’00 version. THQ took over the development of the Super Nintendo and Genesis 3versions. Madden ‘01 and ’02 were released on the Playstation 2 as well as the other platforms. The Playstation 2 brought even better graphics, AI, video, etc. to the Madden series. For the most part though there were not many changes. Despite the several innovations in the overall game play and the technology used in the John Madden Series over the years, John Madden Football would not have been as successful as it was without the NFL and NFLPA licenses that the EA acquired for the game. The NFL and NFLPA grant licenses to individuals or companies who wish to incorporate the teams and or


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Stanford STS 145 - Why John Madden Football Has Been Such A Success

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