EA And NFL Reach Deal To Extend 'Madden' to 2030

Video Games

Oct 24

Madden poster — Image Source: Nintendo Insider

For over twenty years, the Electronic Arts video game studio and the NFL have partnered to create the Madden football game. Named after the famed coach and color commentator John Madden, the game is the most well-known football simulator game out there, allowing you to be coach, owner, and player all in one. At its best, it’s really fun; at its worst, it’s really bad. EA has had an exclusivity deal with the NFL for the license, so anyone hoping for someone other than EA to take a crack at it will be sorely disappointed. With the monopoly on football video games, they can just copy/paste from the previous year’s game with a roster update and a few tweaks here and there. And that’s what they do. Ooh, it’s the same game, but the menu screens are a bit different, and Dre Greenlaw is on the Broncos now, and you can juke a bit better!

As any economist will tell you, competition tends to breed innovation. You’re competing with the other company for business, so it’s in your best interest to make your product better than theirs. Since EA has no such competition, they don’t have that motivation. This makes it all the more frustrating that now its exclusivity deal will continue until at least 2030. The deal was set to expire this year, but in more negotiations, EA will retain full rights to make NFL games. Will they eventually deliver a huge knockout? That remains to be seen. They have at least five more tries at it, though.

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