Odds Say NFL Will Not Drop EA Sports for Football Video Games

• EA Sports latest edition of Madden football – Madden 21 – has been met with harsh criticism and bad ratings
• The Metacritic user rating is 0.3 with over 3,000 ratings
• Very basic glitches in the game have frustrated the community of fervent football fans

EA Sports and the NFL briefly ended their 15-year-long exclusive deal in March before renewing in May. For the most part, people were happy with the announcement but given the look and feel of the latest version of the game, fans are asking the NFL to drop EA Sports. Will the NFL go in a different direction for next year or will they stick with EA Sports?

Odds NFL Drops EA Sports for Simulation Football Video Games in 2020 or 2021

Odds as of September 2nd

Fans Upset With Madden 21

Although many people were happy to hear that the NFL and EA Sports extended their relationship (nobody wanted to see an NCAA Football situation happen with Madden), fans are absolutely livid with the latest version of the game. For quite some time, fans have been pissed with the incremental year-to-year changes but Madden 21 has fallen short of even doing just that.

This problem has persisted for years. As great as Madden 08 was, you can pick up Madden 07 and not notice much of difference.

Speaking of not seeing much of a difference, this side-by-side comparison of Superbowl celebrations between Madden 17-20 is very sad. #nfldropea pic.twitter.com/nbP5minXnr

— Nomar Mendoza (@TheNomarMendoza) August 30, 2020

Madden 21 is loaded with bugs that impact even the most basic aspects of the game. Hopefully, they can patch it up, but fans are really turned off at this point. The absolute bare minimum for EA Sports is to mildly update the aesthetics, add one or two features and carry over the same gameplay year-over-year. In this particular case, they’ve taken a huge step back and have broken the game.

Pros Will Be Very Upset

One of the biggest problems with Madden is that it’s no longer just a game you play with your buddies casually. Sure, that’s still what it’s mostly used for but when you consider esports and the millions in tournaments and prizing available for Madden championships, pro players will not put up with software or gameplay glitches.

https://twitter.com/NFLsantaClaus/status/1300143062547603456

It’s hard enough for them to win as it is. The last thing they want or need are glitches that give an opponent a lucky or an illogical benefit. So far in Madden 21, we’ve seen players running off the sidelines to tackle (who weren’t in the game), gameplay freezing and players having issues either with or after interceptions (can’t properly run).

You can see it in the reviews as the often-friendly IGN gives it a 6.0 out of 10.0, which is a brutal score by their standards. Meta Critic, which is a more accurate poll of the masses, gives it 0.3 out of 10 (3,291 ratings). At this point, fans are going to revert back to Madden 20, which was rated 8.1 by IGN and was generally well-liked.

EA Sports Has Rocked the Boat

The big issue here is that for years, EA Sports has done almost nothing year-over-year with Madden and now fans have had enough. There’s always been a mild frustration when you play the new version and see that basically nothing has changed, but those thoughts quickly subside once you’re having fun and playing football again.

Loving Madden 21 and it’s newest feature “midplay substitutions” #NFLDROPSEA pic.twitter.com/NB2APwNNFh

— Sean Bin Dermott (@905_5998) September 1, 2020

EA Sports looks like they’ve become so lazy to the point that they can’t even update celebrations from years ago or prevent players from going invisible. They’ve clearly not even bothered to test the game themselves before putting it out for sale. They have an exclusive deal and they know people will play either way, and that’s led to them becoming stagnant.

What’s the Best Bet?

The reality here is the NFL won’t be dropping Madden. Madden seems to married to esports and NFL in a way that won’t be easy to annul. The best bet here is that the fans – especially the pros – boycott the game or continue to be critical of it to the point where EA Sports actually makes some serious changes to it.

Wow @EAMaddenNFL. This field looks so beautiful and realistic 😐 pic.twitter.com/oK9XyxlLXZ

— Nathan Raleigh (@NathanRaleigh63) September 2, 2020

I wouldn’t bet on the NFL dropping Madden but I would bet on next year’s Madden – Madden 22 – being one of the best editions of the game we’ve seen. This should serve as a swift kick in the butt for EA Sports (I hope).