Weâre only a week into the 2025 NFL season, and weâve already had a player ejected for spitting on an opponent. So, the big question for the Switch 2 release of Madden NFL 26 has to be whether players can spit on Dak Prescott. âSpitâs in the game,â right EA Sports?
Itâs notâat least, not that Iâve foundâbut plenty more is. The last Nintendo-compatible version of Madden was â13 for the Wii U, and a lot has changed since then. More than Iâm able and willing to cover here. As such, this review is for people like me; football fans who donât care about Madden â26s latest improvement anymore than they care about how those improvements look and perform on other platforms. Itâs for people who havenât touched a Madden game in so long that they may as well be coming into it newâŠbecause thatâs pretty much what I did.
In fact, letâs start there. Itâs no secret that EA Sports games revel in realism, which is marketing-speak for complexity. Not only do you have numerous controls to learn for different positions, you have to learn football strategies, football business, football playbooks. A new feature this year allows you to shape your team based on your preferred coaching method: offensive, defensive, developmental, etc. So, before youâre even on the field, youâre controlling how the game will be played. Then, factor in weather, player stamina, depth charts, collision typesâŠ
Itâs a lot to take in for those of us who havenât played a new version since 2012. Some of it feels like EA making desperate attempts to justify asking players to buy a whole new version every year. âNo, see, this version is new and betterâŠkicking and stadium lights are more realistic than ever!â But honestly, itâs all pretty fun once you start getting good at it.
Madden is a game to study and learn, and itâs not built for new players. There are no options to just hop right in and have fun if youâve never played the game before. There are no tutorial games to help you along. Play Now allows you to hop right in with AI that adjusts to your skill level, but it doesnât tell you how to do anything. For that, youâll need to practice plays, positions, and situations in the training room. Not a fun way to begin a game when all you want to do is select your favorite team and correct the wrongs of the past week.
Some of these options had odd bugs, too, such as the two-minute drill in which the player in motion would go out for a pass before I hiked the ball. Was the game telling me to snap the ball sooner? Maybe. Or maybe my receiver needs to be cut.
Once you get your training time in, however, things pick up considerably. There are many modes to play through, my favorite of which are Quick Play and Superstar, despite being on opposite ends of the spectrum. Quick Play is great when you want to just hop in and run through a game or two. Itâs an easy way to learn about the strengths of other players and experience different stadiums. Youâre also under no pressure to win since youâre not aiming for a Super Bowl or trying to impress the upper office.
Superstar is meatier. It includes more interesting aspects such as practicing to prove yourself as a player and keeping a healthy relationship with the team, trainers, coaches, etc.
Of course, you can also go online to play othersâŠto an extent. Whereas the PC and other console versions are fully cross-compatible, the Switch 2 version is not. And the online play within the Nintendo universe is spotty. When looking for a matchup, I was mostly just met by a loading screen that questioned whether I wanted to keep trying. Maybe Madden NFL 26 includes a feature that prevents you from embarrassing yourself online?
The Switch 2 may not be able to deliver proper online gameplay, but it does come through where it matters most: graphics and performance. Itâs been so long since Iâve played one of these games that I wasnât aware of how much better they looked.
The player motions are still a bit jerky and the collision physics are off (I have a rather humorous video of a QB throwing a defender five yards downfield with his non-passing arm), but everything from the player models to the turf texture to the weather effects all look great. The dome lighting seemed weird to me, but I canât say Iâve ever been on a field to experience it in real life.
Even better, the Switch 2 provides the power to keep the action flowing nicely. Madden NFL 26 runs quite well in docked mode and well enough in handheld mode. I did occasionally run into framerate issues in the latter, and loading times can be a bit long, but gameplay itself is largely unaffected by processing issues.
On the field, I found defense was awkward to control. DBs, especially, would get caught in a stumbling animation that would allow receivers to get open too easily, and all defenders would occasionally zip right past a runner when the tackle shouldâve been easy. The blocking AI is shoddy, too.
Not as shoddy as the commentary, however. The voices are annoying, and theyâre quite often wrong about what just happened on the field.
My biggest complaint, though, is that the EA marketing is almost as annoying as the gambling app commercials during actual NFL games. You have to create an EA account to save progress or get rewards, and youâre constantly bombarded by pop-ups to try this or buy that for the ultimate team. I guess thatâs true of the NFL marketing machine, too. If you want to just enjoy football, you have to go all the way down to the high school level where the worst thing you have to deal with is that treacly Kenny Chesney song during warmups. (Mojo Nixon offered a more honest and accurate reminiscence.)
But listen; no matter where youâre at with your Madden skills, whatâs important here is that Nintendo players finally have the ability to play it again. The only feature thatâs really missing on Switch 2 is cross compatibility. Itâs probably good that EA is giving us time to get better against our own, but Iâm hoping I can spit on Xbox and PS5 QBs in the opening week of Madden NFL 27.
