Impressions On Five Additions To Madden 16

Fans are always wondering what's really new with Madden. Well, for this year's game there are a few standouts we noticed in our time with the game at E3. Some are attempts to fix lingering problems while others are brand new to the series.

Draft Champions

This is a 15-round fantasy football-esque challenge where you build a team by yourself to play against the A.I. or other players online in three or four-game runs. You start out with a pre-selected skeleton team centered around a coach and their play style. Then you build the team through the rounds. The interesting part of the mode is that each round you have to select one player from three generated players. Sometimes you might be tempted to choose a high-ranked TE, for instance, over a lower-rated QB even though you need a QB more. You don't know what the mix of players is going to be, so it's always interesting how you build your team out. Which side of the ball do you focus on? How's your depth? The mode also includes legend players – another interesting wrinkle.

EA says it hasn't completely decided what the rewards are going to be for winning all your games (of escalating difficulty) in a row, although one developer at EA Tiburon told me an Ultimate Team-related reward is one of the possibilities.

The quarters will be shorter than your average Madden game, and the overall goal is to keep the whole thing relatively quick from beginning to end. I drafted a team and played a game, and it was fun to build my team and immediately take it out on the field. And if you lose, you can just as quickly build another team and take another crack at it.

WR Catches & DB Interactions

New this year is the ability to press one of the face buttons while the ball is in the air and initiate a specific kind of catch by a receiver – aggressive, run after the catch, or possession. Aggressive catches tell the receiver to come back to the ball or try and catch the ball at its highest point. This can be useful for curls where the DB is closing fast or deep jump balls where you need to outmuscle a DB for the ball in the air. Run After the Catch (RAC) is designed to have the receiver catch the ball in stride and turn up field quickly. Finally, possession is about securing the ball at the expense of yards after the catch. Maybe this is for a sideline catch or when you know you're going to get popped.

Playing with these catches, the correct type of catch didn't always trigger, but I did have times where it was noticeably useful, like aggressive catches downfield or RACs on slants. Importantly, you don't have to press any button at all, and the A.I. will still try and determine what your receiver should do. This isn't a perfect system (at least at this moment in the game's development), but it does lead to more catchable balls and overall interesting interplay between receivers and DBs. In my time with the game I didn't feel like one side or the other had an inherent advantage in the passing game. I'm interested to see whether pass interference calls are increased this year – especially since defensive backs have a new attribute rating based on whether they get flagged a lot.

QB Pass Targeting

Along with the new catches and interactions with defensive backs, EA also says it has implemented new QB target throws so you can throw it low, high, or out in front of a running receiver, for example. In my experience with the game, I couldn't tell the difference in this aspect compared to last year which had the same feature. Hopefully more time with the game can reveal its usefulness.

Gang Tackles

Madden fans have wanted these for a long time, especially since the series implemented its new collision system a few years back. The physics around tackles has improved year upon year, and this year is the best its been. You can see multiple tacklers influence the momentum of the ball carrier and even each other. Ball carriers have multiple body points at which a would-be tackler might try to grab onto or hit. Sometimes the effect is small but realistic such as when a defensive back comes a little late to the play and goes low on an ball carrier who is already being tackled. He doesn't blow up the play, but he nonetheless becomes part of the tackle.

The Running Game

I've been unhappy with the running game the last couple of years – I didn't feel like I could control my way through the line without sticking and bouncing off my blockers, but I also didn't trust the A.I. enough to take total control of my back. This year's game tries to walk the tightrope between helping the runner too much and not enough. On the whole, I think it's easier to get through the traffic, although it doesn't feel automatic or like you're clipping through your linemen, which is good.

Runners can "get skinny" by pressing the right bumper before the line to turn their shoulders slightly in an effort to wedge into a tight space as they hit the hole. In my experience this sometimes worked and sometimes didn't initiate at all. On the other hand, I didn't feel an overwhelming need to use it. I played on all-pro with the Vikings – not a team with the best o-line – and I could swear the holes were bigger.

For more on the game's career mode, take a look at this previous feature.