''Madden NFL 16'' is an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

sports video game A sports video game is a video game that simulates the practice of sports. Most sports have been recreated with a game, including team sports, track and field, extreme sports, and combat sports. Some games emphasize actually playing the sport (s ...

based on the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

and published by

EA Sports EA Sports is a division of Electronic Arts that develops and publishes sports video games. Formerly a marketing gimmick of Electronic Arts, in which they tried to imitate real-life sports networks by calling themselves the "EA Sports Network ...

for the

PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed by Sony Computer Entertainment. The successor to the PlayStation 2, it is part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. It was first released on November 11, 2006, in Japan, November ...

, PlayStation 4,

Xbox 360 The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox series. It competed with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generati ...

, and

Xbox One The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third base console in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was first released in North America, parts of ...

. ''Madden 16'' introduced the new game mode "Draft Champions" to Madden. The game was released on August 25, 2015. The PS3 and Xbox 360 versions are based on ''

Madden NFL 25 ''Madden NFL 25'' is an American football sports video game based on the National Football League and published by EA Sports. It was released for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in August 2013. Instead of numbering it ''Madden NFL 14'' with the year l ...

''.

Development

The game was announced in late July 2015 on the EA Sports website. On May 13, 2015, EA announced that like '' Madden NFL 15'', Madden Ultimate Team fans would be able to purchase the ''Madden NFL 16 Deluxe Edition'', which would include the game along with $50 worth of Ultimate Team packs, for an extra $40. It was also announced that EA was working extensively on aesthetics, with new player spotlights, dynamic goals and achievements, and innovative on and off-the-field cameras.

Cover athlete

EA decided not to have players vote for the cover athlete through a traditional bracket, but rather through collectible cards in Madden NFL Mobile, or through Ultimate Team on the console devices. On May 4, 2015, the four finalists were announced for the 2016 game cover: New England Patriots tight end

Rob Gronkowski Robert James Gronkowski (born May 14, 1989) is an American former football tight end who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons. Nicknamed "Gronk", Gronkowski played nine seasons for the New England Patriots, then played h ...

, Arizona Cardinals cornerback

Patrick Peterson Patrick De'mon Peterson Jr. (born July 11, 1990) is an American football cornerback for the Minnesota Vikings of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at LSU, where he won the Chuck Bednarik Award as the best defensiv ...

, New York Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr., and Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver

Antonio Brown Antonio Tavaris Brown Sr. (born July 10, 1988), nicknamed "AB", is an American football wide receiver who is a free agent, and an American rapper. Raised in Liberty City, Miami, Brown attended Miami Norland High School. He played college ...

. The two finalists were announced on May 12 as Gronkowski and Beckham Jr. On May 13, Beckham Jr. beat Gronkowski for the cover of ''Madden 16''. Beckham Jr. also became the cover athlete for ''

Madden NFL Mobile ''Madden NFL Mobile'' is an American football mobile sports game based on the National Football League, developed and published by Electronic Arts. An entry in the ''Madden NFL'' series, the game was released for Android and iOS devices on Au ...

'' following the vote, succeeding Madden 15 cover athlete Richard Sherman.

Soundtrack

In June 2015, EA revealed that EA Trax would be re-integrated into the game, having been absent in the previous three installments. The soundtrack was also available for streaming on

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a proprietary Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 456 million monthly active us ...

. The original score of '' Madden NFL 15'' composed by Mark Petrie could also be played in-game via the EA Trax option.

Reception

''Madden NFL 16'' received positive reviews from critics, with many noting its improvements to the passing game, as well as the addition of the new Draft Champions mode.http://www.gaming-age.com/2015/08/madden-nfl-16-review-for-xbox-one-and-ps4/

Server shutdown

On December 14, 2020, three Madden NFL games were shutdown due to little-to-no profit off of them. One of them, being Madden 16, was the most recent of the ones shut down on that day.

References

{{Portal bar, American football, Video games, border=no 2015 video games EA Sports games Madden NFL PlayStation 3 games PlayStation 4 games Video games developed in the United States Video games scored by Junkie XL Video games set in the United States Xbox 360 games Xbox One games Video games set in 2015