Madden NFL 25 Review: Old Problems Loom Large
Madden NFL 25's cavalcade of old bugs and logic issues proves once again this series needs a year off.
This is a silly analogy, but playing Madden NFL 25 reminded me a lot of anyone I dated in high school. Things started exciting. The first kiss. Staying up late talking about nothing. Taking them to Prom. You know how it goes. But the more you spend time with them, you start to realize that things aren't as great under the surface, and the two of you are looking for completely different things in life.
Madden NFL 25's On-Field Improvements Are Marred by Countless Legacy Issues
Christian McCaffery in Madden NFL 25.
- EA Sports)From a macro level, Madden 25 feels better than last year's version on the field. The team has seemingly taken a page from the more wide-open College Football 25 and injected more fluidity into your ball carrier. With high-level studs like Christian McCaffrey or Tyreek Hill, you can make defenders miss much more dramatically than in years past. Remember that iconic scene from Hard Knocks where DeAndre Hopkins snaps DeAngelo Hall's ankles with one of the nastiest cuts you've ever seen? I saw something similar happen a few times during my Franchise Mode save with Justin Jefferson and the Minnesota Vikings.
Beyond the open-field movement improvements, Madden 25 also brings several pre-snap adjustment improvements from College Football. You can half-slide your offensive or use more tricky coverage shells to hide your defensive alignment. It's the kind of control hardcore Madden players are going to love and newcomers can learn to use it with practice. There are also some great new catch types and animations that are more than worthy of the Sportscenter Top 10 list.
That said, my point about looking under the surface couldn't be more apt than it is in gameplay. Yes, some of the new features and mechanics are great additions, but this is still the same broken Madden players have been dealing with for several years. Blocking remains a guessing game of whether your players are going to function like anything resembling a human being or not. Far too often, I've seen blockers get beaten or slide off of a block and then just stand there like they've been frozen in place.
On top of the questionable-at-best blocking, I've also noticed animations overtaking sense far too often, especially with EA touting its physics-based tackling this year. When it works, it looks great, but when it doesn't, you'll quickly be pulled out of the simulation and remember that Madden doesn't replicate the real-world NFL. It replicates Madden.
To give you an example of what I'm talking about when I say you're not really playing a football simulation when you're playing Madden, I was playing with the Vikings and called a slant route for their star wideout Justin Jefferson. Most fans would agree that Jet is one of, if not the best receivers on the planet right now. A slant route is one of the simplest routes in football. You cut at an angle and run straight. There's not much more to it. On this particular play, Jefferson ran the route like normal, but when I threw to him, he just stopped running. The cornerback then ran past him and grabbed an interception. This is supposed to be the best player at his position in the NFL and he just stops in the middle of a route for no reason. It's unacceptable.
And to be fair, if this were a one-off occurrence, I'd give EA the benefit of the doubt. However, there are plays like this in every game. Your cornerback is staring at the opposing QB but just runs away from the ball when he throws it. Your wideout is running a go and you check it down to your running back, so the receiver starts to block even though there's no way they could know the ball is out. It's these little details that make Madden NFL 25 difficult for me to enjoy because I wish another developer could be competing to make something that takes a little more care with the on-field aspect of the game.
Mode Improvements Leave Much to be Desired
Lamar Jackson in Madden NFL 25.
- EA Sports)Though, even saying that, the lack of care extends to the modes as well. I don't think any of them are necessarily bad, but nothing feels impressive or like the developer is taking a step forward. The more you play modes like Franchise, the more you notice weird details that seem like strange oversights. In my news tab, ESPN was talking about a "highly anticipated quarterback showdown" between two 58 overall, free-agent quarterbacks who didn't play a single down. I was asked to talk to my coordinator about my plans to progress my rookie defensive end, but when I went to the conversation, we were talking about my quarterback's development. It's just a frustrating lack of detail that sours the entire product.
It's also worth noting that, for the first few days I was playing Madden NFL 25, if I tried to start a new Franchise, it would soft-lock my PlayStation 5. If I wanted to play Superstar mode, I had to log into the mode, exit it, log into Ultimate Team, log out of that mode, and then go back into Superstar before it would work. Fortunately, most of those issues seem to have been resolved, but I've also heard other players are still having problems.
Look, I could spend the time talking about how much better the menus look or discuss how pointless a lot of the extra storytelling in Franchise and Superstar Mode is. I could tell you that MUT is the worst version of Ultimate Team in any sports game and complain about how annoying it is to navigate the mode. I could talk about how great the new "Cheat" plays are and how fun kick-offs can be once you learn the new rules. But, the long and short of it all is that Madden NFL 25 is the same Madden it's been for the last several years. EA Sports makes some fun changes on the surface, but the more you play, the more you see all the same problems bubbling to the surface. I think this year's version is marginally better than Madden NFL 24, but not in any way that's going to matter to most fans. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to College Football 25.
Rating: 3 out of 5
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