I've been really dismayed by the focus that EA has placed on its Ultimate Team feature in the past couple years of Madden releases. I've made my distaste known in my reviews of both 16 and 15. With the NCAA football series dead due to the revocation of the license, Madden is all we have. I feel like the best thing for me to do at this point is to just give up, since it seems that EA has no interest in appealing to the small demographic of simulation die-hards to which I belong. Instead, they want to keep their model of annual releases that force people to have to give up their established decks of Ultimate Team cards so that they can spend more money on micro-DLC to buy the credits necessary to rebuild their collection.

But as cynical as my reviews can be, I don't want to give up on football gaming. I love football, and I love gaming, and I want to continue to be able to enjoy the union of the two. And right now, Madden is the only way that I can do that.

So I'm going to take some time to write up a wishlist of the kind of features that I want - no expect - a modern football game to include. Some of them are new features that football games have never attempted. Others are ones that previous games just never got right. And still others might be things that were present in earlier games, worked just fine, but have been inexplicably removed to make room for less worthwhile features.

Table of Contents

• Contextual game prep and scouting
  • Scouting an opponent
  • Film study
  • Drills the improve specific skills
  • Weather forecast
• Making the preseason meaningful and fun
  • "Starter" tag
  • Improved substitution logic, options, and progression
  • Maintaining a "scout team" and practice squad
• In-game features
  • Blocking assignments and "hot blocks"
  • Accelerated clock management
  • Delayed kneel down and "rugby punt"
  • Special teams snafus
  • Onside kicks and loose ball recovery
  • Coach's challenge options
• The little things
  • Play-calling screen suggestions
  • Defensive matchups
  • Allow Franchise user to cause simulated injuries
  • Nagging injuries
  • Add officials to the physics engine
  • Change the coach cam controls
  • More time to read the defense
  • Allow Franchise players to change CPU team uniforms
• The pieces are all here; EA just needs to put them together

Dallas Cowboy quarterback Tony Romo has built quite a reputation over the years of blowing big plays and ruining his team's chance at winning games.

Last night, against the New York Jets, he did it again.

After a standout performance in the first 3 quarters of the game, he gave up two turnovers in the fourth, including a fumble on the Jets 3-yard-line and a game-losing int to Darrelle Revis.