Madden NFL 23 review: FieldSense, Ultimate Team make for replayable fun

Madden is one of the best-known sports games. Every year it works under the disguise of a feature list. Is this year’s version more approachable? Has it evolved the franchise at all, or merely refined the previous year’s pain points? These are the questions looming over every new entry in sports video games’ long-running staple.

GameFlow (2010). The Ignite Engine (2013). This year’s calling card is “FieldSense,” another way of saying that everyone on the field pays attention and gets involved in the play — no small task in a video game re-creating a full-contact sport with 22 players. They could call this new technology anything, but it still wouldn’t capture the feeling that comes from a stumble extending a running play, between the tackles, that you just KnowA year ago, he would have been dead in the line of scrimmage. And “FieldSense” hardly describes the Why was that so? You will regret subverting yourself and trying to bounce outside the play.

Madden NFL 23The running game is where he, just like his forefathers, shines most. Yes, there’s a new passing system allowing for more pinpoint control, whether it’s a five-yard tight-end drag or an all-out flanker streak. It’s what happens when the receiver turns into a ball carrier that really counts, though. The game is back to the finesse running moves that are keyed on the left trigger. Instead of producing an animated juke, spin or spin animation on the left thumbstick, the runner executes a hard cut that leaves a linebacker or defensive back grabbing for the air.

Hard-cut rewards are given to well-chosen plays and those who make deliberate changes at the line. The benefit isn’t just for dedicated runners, or receivers after the catch; mobile quarterbacks like Patrick Mahomes or Lamar Jackson can create more luck if a passing play breaks down and they have to get out of the pocket.

Image by EA Tiburon/Electronic Arts

Enjoy the sophisticated gameplay Madden NFL 23 This is especially evident in the Face of the Franchise single-player career mode. It gets an urgent narrative overhaul. The player is no longer musing about ideal college matchups or hackneyed locker room drama. Instead, they’re dropped into a football player’s prime — an underused, underestimated free agent who can pick any club for a one-year contract, and write his own ticket if he performs well enough. Your position and team will affect your playing time. If you’re a running back, it might not be such a good idea to choose the lowly New York Giants, who start the 86-rated Saquon Barkley. But he’s an unrestricted free agent in 2023, and after a breakout season with the 49ers, the Giants happily let him go and signed me instead.

Face of the Franchise still isn’t on par with NBA 2K’s MyCareer, or MLB The Show’s Road to the Show, but it at least gives me those modes’ baseline promise: a star I can be proud of and want to see on my TV. The game’s bread-and-butter Connected Franchise mode, the finer points of which usually come to light in menus or the NFL’s offseason, is less compelling. Playing Connected franchise with your friends can be more fun. You will have three to five or more buddies supporting you as you create your story through chat or trash-talking emails. The mode is not worth the effort if you are on your own. It focuses too much attention to details such as player scouting or the NFL draft.

It is partially because Madden NFL 23’s presentation is still strictly limited to the game in hand. This bogus social media account serves the remainder of the season. It was fun and entertaining in 2012, but it is well past its expiration date. In real life, the NFL is a year-round sport — it leads practically every ESPN SportsCenter broadcast, even in March — but you still get none of that sense from Madden. The commentary of booth partners Brandon Gaudin, Charles Davis and Charles Davis is as genuine as they can be. However, it becomes increasingly redundant when your season deviates from reality. Madden NFL 23 again does a great job of remembering who did what in the real-life season before — but it struggles to recall anything Please enter your email address Did in the last week.

Image: EA Tiburon/Electronic Arts

Madden NFL 23’s context-free commentary, then, is best served up in the anything-goes grind of the Ultimate Team mode. Yes, there are microtransactions galore here, but there are also a lot of cards and other content — not just in-game currency — that players can unlock after just an hour in Ultimate Team’s challenges. These usually last for one quarter and are primarily focused on offensive play and razzle dazzle. I had to spend about an hour collecting skill-position players (quarterback and receiver) who were all at least 80. For all of Ultimate Team’s bothersome calls to action (whoever thought up these loading screens, with a button prompt to dismiss them, see me in my office), Madden NFL 23’s Ultimate Team still does a better job than NBA 2K, FIFA, or MLB The Show at keeping additional spending an option rather than a necessity.

It’s still Madden, for better or for worse. An excellent stretch of gameplay could still be interrupted by an error in something extraneous and optional, such as the photographs that the career mode captures automatically. That gameplay is truly amazing. It is nothing short of remarkable to go into Madden’s practice mode (or Face of the Franchise minigames) and not only see correct blocking that actually picks up and cleans out an opposing linebacker during a outside power run, but also to see the same play fail and understand that it did so because I ran it to the wrong side.

Many big plays from past Maddens felt almost like a fortunate (or unlucky!) dice roll. You can focus your attention on the 10 feet in front of yourself. Madden NFL 23It works almost perfectly. It’s, again, the bigger picture where the game most often stumbles.

Madden NFL 23 launched Aug. 19 on PlayStation 5 Xbox Series XVersions on PlayStation 4Windows PC and. Xbox OneThere are fewer features. The game was tested on Xbox Series X with a prerelease code from Electronic Arts. Vox Media also has affiliate relationships. Although these partnerships do not impact editorial content, Vox Media could earn commissions on products sold via affiliate links. Find out more. additional information about Polygon’s ethics policy here.