The first few years of NHL and Madden titles for the Sega Genesis were revolutionary. They were the first games in their genres to somewhat accurately simulate their sports in a fast and fluid way.
Madden in particular was something like a tour-de-force of software engineering: a full 22 independent dudes characters on the field, actually playing their positions, following a realistic and deep playbook, nearly all of American football's arcane rules represented, and a nifty pseudo-3D playfield.
All written in assembly, on a 7mhz CPU. Mindblowing.
The first 3-4 years of annual updates were incredible. They were iterative, in the best possible software engineering sense of the word. Core ideas refined and polished, a few new key ideas added onto a strong base design.
Madden '93 (the third installment) is where it peaked for me; some say Madden '94.
The first few years of NHL and Madden titles for the Sega Genesis were revolutionary. They were the first games in their genres to somewhat accurately simulate their sports in a fast and fluid way.
Madden in particular was something like a tour-de-force of software engineering: a full 22 independent dudes characters on the field, actually playing their positions, following a realistic and deep playbook, nearly all of American football's arcane rules represented, and a nifty pseudo-3D playfield.
All written in assembly, on a 7mhz CPU. Mindblowing.
The first 3-4 years of annual updates were incredible. They were iterative, in the best possible software engineering sense of the word. Core ideas refined and polished, a few new key ideas added onto a strong base design.
Madden '93 (the third installment) is where it peaked for me; some say Madden '94.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wm9fXnBF67g