Madden 27: The Game Creating a New Reality with AI

As the new football season looms, there is a nice distraction for fans counting down the days until the NFL kick-off game in September – Madden NFL 27. EA’s annually released football franchise has just dropped (early access subscribers at the time of writing), and players are really just talking about one thing – the redesigned franchise mode.

The Madden series has had a few ups and downs over recent years. Sales have been strong – they always are for these big beast franchise sports games – but most will agree that it feels like the golden era is well and truly over. A new release of a series that has been out every year for decades feels like something that a lot of gamers buy out of habit, rather than true excitement. Of course, it can still pull a rabbit out of the hat now and again.

Franchise Mode Shines with the Persona Engine

Is that the case with the new franchise mode? One of the big talking points is the use of AI in the game’s franchise mode. For those not fully au fait with football and football games, a franchise mode is a kind of campaign mode where you take control of a team, build a roster, manage finances, and attempt to manage a successful NFL franchise over multiple seasons.

The AI element is a “Persona Engine,” which will effectively work to create a sports media that players must react to. It is designed to feel real – warts and all – generating a world of news around the league, making you react based on how it will impact your team. It seems to recognize that realism depends on variety, looking beyond the linear news feeds. In the real world, NFL teams react to social media engagement, NFL betting odds, player disputes, and a myriad of other factors to make decisions. The Persona Engine seems designed to be reflective of that. What we love, too, is that the stories will evolve, seemingly based on your decisions.

The Persona Engine is also there to drive players’ actions, not just on the field. The idea, again, is that realism comes with variety. Some NFL players in the real world are controversial, some have huge egos, some believe they deserve more than they are worth. Others are humble, not driven by money. Some are loyal, and some aren’t. In short, it’s like the people you meet in every other job.

A Behavioral Foundation Powers Player Decisions

The Persona Engine is going to give the NFL athletes 65 different types of “DNA,” according to EA. This will determine their mindset, focus, motivation, and so on. That’s interesting, but it doesn’t feel particularly groundbreaking. What is innovative, however, is the “Persona DNA,” which allows players to evolve. As EA puts it: “The Persona Engine is a behavioral foundation that powers player decisions organically based on context and each player’s Persona DNA. It is what finally makes it possible to deliver the features the community has been asking about for years. All driven by players who actually think about their own careers.”

In a sense, this is a good example of the AI use case in video gaming that many had hoped for. We heard a lot about how AI would be the driver to make games more personalized and make NPCs more interesting and adaptable to the game. We have to see how Madden 27 stands against the test of time, and how players react to the full rollout. But it looks like EA is doing something beyond the norm.