Madden 24 is a gentle iteration on last year’s NFL video game, and returning to the franchise every year feels like buying into a slightly better iPhone.
If you’re keeping an eye on the latest iPhone release, you’ve become accustomed to a certain cadence every summer: an announcement of a new model that looks kind of like the one you already have, but with some notable quality-of-life fixes that may or may not be splurge-worthy. You may have some complaints about your eventual purchase, as you may encounter a bug or two along the way, but you’ll be content with the minor upgrades. You’d probably prefer those changes to be bigger and industry-changing like they were years ago, but what you have now is a net positive, and that’s good too.
If you were keeping an eye on the latest Madden release this year, chances are, you’ve experienced something similar. This viewpoint may initially come off as cynical, but some of Madden NFL 24’s changes are small yet notable. Did those differences convince you to put down your copy of Madden NFL 23 in favor of 24? That all depends.
Madden NFL 24’s gameplay is solid, filled with a bevy of small changes to its mechanics and play-calling. When you load up the game for the first time, you’re greeted with different passing options to cater to your level of expertise. The presence of NFL-branded Next Gen Stats has been scaled back, but the feature does pop up to help you decide your general offensive and defensive strategies at halftime. There’s also the long-running Coach Suggestions feature, which helps you choose your offensive and defensive strategies between every play. Stacking both can make the play-calling feel like a hat on a hat, but it also encourages you to find the perfect balance between the two.
If you’re new to the series, this may all seem a bit daunting, though I imagine the number of first-time Madden players is minuscule in comparison to the franchise’s hardcore audience, especially since Electronic Arts has had an exclusive licensing deal with the NFL since 2004.
