Madden has a bug problem, and despite a patch that addressed several stability issues in late August and another that released on September 1st, there’s still a lot wrong with EA’s football sim – and some of it stems from last year’s release.
The biggest problems seem to be found in Franchise mode, which has been something of a sore spot among the Madden faithful. Franchise has long lagged behind similar modes in other sports sims.
At the moment, Madden fans are most vocal about Franchise’s draft class bug. This bug only seems to affect players importing or downloading draft classes. Generic draft classes don’t have this problem, but it seems to affect every imported or downloaded draft class after a certain point.
Franchise in #madden24 is once again at the stage where we have to wait until the first title update to play the game, or risk that you get a draft bug or changing players bug, Both bugs are franchise posion pills.
This shouldn’t be acceptable. But it happens every year.
— Pleated Pants (@PleatedPants_) August 26, 2023
What happens? Well, it’s perhaps best explained by user ChuckysRatHole, who reported that the physique slider doesn’t seem to affect the draft class or any created players on the EA support page, and that if you progress far enough in Franchise mode, the bug affects the entire team.
“If you go far enough in Franchise mode, ALL THE PLAYERS LOOK EXACTLY ALIKE. A 314 lb lineman looks like a 240lb linebacker or 200lbs [sic] Running Back. There is no difference besides the height of each player,” they write.
ChuckysRatHole made their post on the EA support page two weeks ago, but users on both the EA support page and Reddit are reporting that the bug persists after the patch EA Tiburon released on the 24th, and the most recent title update, which was released on September 1st.
Reddit user tomahawksport expressed his displeasure in a thread titled “Importing/Downloading Draft Class Bug” shortly after the patch released on August 24th.
“It’s incredibly deflating that I’ve spent the last week starting on draft classes (I’m planning on/hoping to make 2024-2029) and all the work done on everything in the “Edit Appearance” section gets erased (except maybe heights and weights) and all the players look like stick figures,” he wrote.
“You basically have to edit this stuff every single time you upload a draft class file locally or even download it into your franchise and let’s be honest nobody is going to want to do that,” he continued. “This is honestly game-breaking for someone such as myself who primarily plays franchise [sic].”
Other players have confirmed that the only fix seems to be editing each player’s appearance manually – a time-consuming experience given how large a single draft class can be.
“I tested this in an online league and was able to get the skinny generic frame back to looking like a 6’4, 300 pound left guard. This is awful that this is the only solution because until its [sic] patched franchise players/admins are going to have a lot of extra hours dedicated to re-editing players if they want them to look accurate, but it is a temporary solution (or one for the next 3 months knowing EA),” another player wrote in a thread titled “potential imported draft class player model bug fix.”
EA Tiburon is aware of the bug, according to the patch notes from the patch released on September 1st, and is “prioritizing fixes. [They] will provide an update via answers HQ when we have a timeline.” So far, however, the developer hasn’t shared specifics.
Superstar mode is also getting hit with game-breaking bugs
Another potentially game-breaking bug seems to have hit Superstar mode, Madden’s create-a-character mode that essentially mimics Franchise while putting you in the cleats of a single player. The problem in Superstar seems to involve trading away their star players. That happens, but in this case, those players are being traded for nothing – no draft picks, no other players, nada, zilch, zippo. A Reddit user first posted about the bug in a thread titled “Massive Superstar mode bug.”
“Just finished my rookie season as a WR on the Falcons. I sim as usual to preseason week 1 and see Franchise players all over the place. All of these trades happened in the free agency window and they were for free. Nothing was traded for these players. They just… moved to the new team. Notice Arod and Mahomes being traded twice and Bijan Robinson being traded. Our STAR rookie, gone. This is 2 SS rookie seasons I’ve completed where this happens,” the user wrote.
Other users quickly chimed in to confirm that this wasn’t an isolated incident.
“Yeah I was drafted by the Giants at QB. After my first season, we traded Saquon for nothing and didn’t even sign a RB to replace him so we’re running with Eric Gray as our RB1 lol,” another added.
“This crap sucks. Finished my first season as a QB with the Raiders and was traded to the Rams in year 2. As a disgruntled QB, I started off the year playing erratic and careless and now in week 12 just pondering if I’ll be once again rewarded with being a Franchise savior will I be traded again if I win the Rams a SB. The agony!!!” another said.
“Been happening for years,” said another, who seemed to sum up just about everyone’s complaints with Madden NFL 24.
These two bugs are hardly the only things plaguing Madden, and they’re not the only ones that have carried over from previous versions. Madden fans seem to have had enough – several users on the Madden subreddit are openly opening this year will finally be the last straw, and EA will lose their exclusive NFL license – and user reviews reflect that.
While Madden 24 is sitting at decent-but-far-from-great a 66 Metascore on Metacritic (IGN scored it a 6 in our review), its user score is a paltry 1.9. If you can believe it, that’s actually a bit better than Madden 23’s 1.3. It seems Madden players who are hoping EA will finally fix what’s ailing one of their flagship sports titles will have to wait until next year – or, hopefully, next patch – once again.
Will Borger is a freelance writer at IGN.
