Madden 11’s Gameflow Will Teach You Football

Gameflow, Madden 11's most impressive new feature, hacks game-time in half, from 60 minutes to less than 30 while retaining all the time on field. How? Gameflow cuts play calling. Gone is the 300-play deep catalogue of passes and runs and defensive packages that the average player narrows to 13 or so clutch plays.

In its place, an AI coach that calls those key plays for you and a coordinator who, over your headset, explains the finer points of what's happening on the field. Now, more than ever before, you are the QB.

Here's an example of an average possession. You field a punt from the end zone and take it to the twenty-yard line. After the defense tackles you, you're team immediately assembles at the line of scrimmage for a deep pass. Before the hike, the offensive coordinator's comes over your headphones, telling you to take five steps back, be patient and look for a receiver on the right. You complete the pass 20 yards down the field, lean into a tackle and the moment after your down the team lines up again.

This is fast football. Some might call it casual or arcade, but having the playbook out of the way nailed the feel of TV football more than any sim.

Playbook-less football evokes the fist time you played an FPS without a gaudy UI. It's clean and real, if not less malleable.
Not that the playbook's concrete. You can modify the playbook to play to your liking. Scenarios like 2^nd and long can be assigned a number of plays. These plays can then be rated on a five-star scale, like iTunes. In a clutch situation on the field, Coach will likely go with a high rated play, while he might choose a low-rated play in the second-quarter to keep the opponents on their toes.

If you don't want to do all this work, the game comes preset with a playbook based on teams real-life play calling.

Madden 11 makes one of the boldest moves in the history of the series: asking players to quit playing Madden and start playing football. It's a Hail Mary that, for me, scores big.