Maddenness (or, You Aren't Ready For Some Football)

[Jess Ragan]

The GSN television special Video Game Invasion may have shed some light on why the 2600 game Maddenness was never actually released. Back in the mid 80's, when Electronic Arts began work on John Madden Football, hardware limitations prevented them from putting complete teams of players on the screen. When Madden first saw this, he complained, "Where are the other guys?", and the designers weakly replied, "It was hard enough just putting seven on each team." Madden wasn't having any of it, and told Electronic Arts that if they wanted his name on the box, they'd have to make the football simulation more complete.

 

This could explain why Maddenness, the 2600 game in development at CBS Games, was never released. It's tough to imagine the 2600 handling 22 onscreen characters at once.

 

JR

[ATARIPITBULL]

That was a nice bit of information on that game. I wonder why they never tried to make this game for the 7800 system?

 

[AtariDude]

I wonder if anyone at CBS games still has a copy of the development cartridge. Would be interesting to know how far along it got before it was shelved for good.

[NovaXpress]

That first 2600 game was being developed by CBS, not EA. Perhaps that special got their facts twisted. CBS was employing Madden at the time and wanted to use his name as a tie-in to sell their games. EA didn't have an opportunity to acquire the services of madden until after CBS left the business.

 

Why was it not developed for the 7800? Because CBS was out of business by then and EA never made games for the 7800.

[Cootster]

One on One, a game originally produced by EA, ended up on the 7800. . .

 

They had it and some other titles for the NES as well, so it is surprising there was never an 8-bit Madden.

 

When did the first PC one come out? '87? I know I had it and loved it.