The Blog for the Sports Gamer Three guys who love Sports Gaming rant and rave about various stuff.

More Madden PC

A few more notes about the PC version before I start my bookwork for the day.

It's definitely slower than the Xbox version, which was slower than NCAA 06. Personally, I don't mind the slower pace, although I know for some it's going to be a tad annoying.

The gameplay is very similar, although not exactly the same as on the Xbox. The CPU QBs are infinitely better on the default settings on the PC version. In fact I haven't felt the need to touch the slider settings on All Pro and on the Xbox my slider settings are drastically altered. The PC game seems a tad more sim-like. It's MUCH more difficult to rush the QB and to break blocks on the PC version as well. While I usually get 2-5 sacks a game on the Xbox, my sack total on the PC is much, much lower.

There is a bug in the PC version that doesn't start the next week of the Tony Bruno show unless you save your franchise and reload it. Nice.

You can't enable/disable specific music tracks on the PC version. There is an audio folder in the Madden DIR that has the files but they aren't named...so it's guesswork as to which is which.

I had to update my Catalyst ATI drivers in order to avoid choppy gameplay. If you're having performance issues make sure to do this. The latest 8/17 drivers fixed the problem.

I can't help the fact that I just love having a damn mouse to scroll around the menu screens.

It looks a lot beter than the Xbox.

There is a pass lead slider that I do not think is in the Xbox version so if you think it's too easy to use the precision passing it makes it tougher (or easier) to lead receivers.

Right now the biggest gameplay difference that I notice is the CPU QBs. I see a lot fewer deep balls in the PC edition, which I think is good. And like I said, I haven't seen a CPU QB with a completion% under 45 after about 5 games on the default AP settings and I NEVER saw that on the Xbox. Hell I even have the CPU accuracy at 20 on the consoles.

Speaking ofd that, I just want to reiterate that the slider settings are on a 1-100 scale on the PC version. Why is it not the same on both console and PC? I have no idea.

I have not played online yet, BTW.

Quick anecdote re: Madden. I play basketball about 4 days a week now. I also play with mostly the same group of guys and we tend to talk about a lot of stuff in between games and Madden is the latest headliner. Of the 10 guys who love Madden (as in talked my ear off about the cone prior to release, trying to glean info. Note: Never tell people that you write about games for a living unless you are willing to talk endlessly about them.)

Of those 10 guys -- ONE plays franchise mode, NONE ever touch a gameplay slider (5 had no idea what I was talking about and sounded amazed when I described it to them), and all 10 play it primarily for the online game. I found that fascinating. Not surprising, just very interesting.

6 had never heard of the NFL2K series.