Madden 23 players mourn lost teams as bug breaks 60% of affected saves
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Grim news for Madden 23 fans: a recent server error has resulted in players losing access to their online saves in the extremely popular Franchise mode.
Between December 28 and December 29, players logging into franchise leagues discovered that their data was corrupted due to a storage issue on EA’s Madden 23 servers. Online Franchise Mode, Connected Franchise Mode, and Face of the Franchise saves were all corrupted during this time.
“We’re sorry this happened,” EA wrote an update (opens in new tab). “We know how important your franchises are to you and we are actively working on a solution to restore some files from backup as soon as possible. However, not all affected leagues can be restored. The team currently estimates about 40% of leagues in.” to be restored. We will communicate an updated timeline next week on the potential recovery of saved files from backup.”
EA says if you’re logged in between 2:45pm EST, December 28th and 12:45pm EST, December 29th, you’ll have to “start a new franchise”.
Franchise is an extremely popular mode where you manage teams over several seasons in a long campaign. It captures the long-lasting NFL experience and offers great appeal to the Madden games beyond just providing a decent game of football. Over the course of multiple seasons, players form meaningful bonds with their teams. It’s one thing to be a Chicago Bears fan, but it’s quite another to spend dozens of hours lovingly assembling your own version of the team in the context of Madden 23’s newfound realism.
In the trenches
As you might expect, fans have reacted strongly to the loss of their beloved saves.
“Between graduation and work, I don’t have much time to play,” Hank1581 wrote Reddit (opens in new tab). “I spent months on this franchise. Madden corrupted the files. I’m furious.”
“There have been a lot of problems with Madden over the years, but for more than 60% of franchise leads – and that is probably the majority of active leads – to be completely corrupt is unthinkable,” Timequake-Droid wrote (opens in new tab)while asking if EA would offer refunds.
Others have taken the loss in more creative directions. Redditor Lazytowwwwwn posted a tribute (opens in new tab) to Terry Torrence, a fictional player generated by the game who sometimes boasts of absurdly good statistics. “I wanted to take the time to honor HIS sacrifice. You will never be forgotten.”
For all the conveniences of online multiplayer, it’s sad to see a bug with EA’s server configuration negatively impact the gaming experiences of so many football fans. Games like Madden are great because they allow players to chart their own personal course through the world of the NFL, stick with their chosen team through thick and thin, and make those all-important draft picks each year.
The fact that EA only has viable backups available for a predicted 40% of saves shows a serious mistake on their part. If players have to entrust their saves to company-owned servers when they play online, the least they can expect is that their data is safe. While the server infrastructure can’t reasonably be expected to be foolproof, a 60% failure rate on affected saves, not to mention the much-touted lack of crossplay, leaves a lot to be desired on EA’s part.