Madden 21: 2K and NFL trade could force EA to resume NFL Blitz / Street
Posted by Yucca195 on March 13th, 2020
In the past few days, there has been a relatively surprising announcement: the NFL has made its first deal with 2K Sports in more than a decade. EA Sports had exclusive rights to the NFL at the time, and some believed it led to some complacency.
The announcement itself is interesting because it states that EA Sports continues to own exclusive rights to "simulated" games. Read between the two lines, which means that Madden 21 and later should be safe. But there is an interesting trend in the sports market, which means it can bring more than just eyeballs.
Since next year's games will also be played on PS5 and Xbox Series X, the attention paid to content to be played in 2020 will be higher than ever. In recent years, the number of various types of arcade-style sports games actually led by EA itself has surged. Madden 20, for example, has been loved by a large number of players, and many people have purchased MUT Coins.
Even in Madden 20, we have a similar new game mode Superstar KO. Other sports games such as NBA Live and NBA 2K also introduce the ability to bring your character into a "street" environment, making the game play slightly different. Another element of FIFA and Madden is the "no rules" or "internal rules" game played online and in FUT / MUT.
EA Sports has actually been making this kind of game for a while. NFL Street and FIFA Street were both issued in the mid-2000s, but did not achieve the best commercial success. They are fun, but not worth buying the full game. NFL Street went through several championships before getting cut off and received good reviews.
Compared to Madden's competitive game, seeing your favorite player shine in the game and bounce off the wall is a good change. Although previous attempts to bring arcade fun to sports simulation games were unsuccessful, there are signs of demand. FUT and MUT prove that people really want certain game modes to be disconnected from reality, and it seems that the entire game is not worth the money.
2K saw this and responded in their top NBA titles. Since entering the EA Sports exclusive deal, they will not enter the main simulation part of the game, so their entry into the NFL arena will be more difficult.
So this is where EA Sports may become more aggressive in the competition. If they can match what 2K is trying to do and put it into an existing Madden 21 game, then 2k will have no chance.
I can fully expect the single-player mode in Madden 21 to combine some sort of "streetball" arcade experience. But since they usually launch in mid-August, they didn't spend much time. Now that players are looking for cheap and reliable Madden Coins, I find GameMS is a very good choice.
