PetePyro

I have screenshots of bot in the first elite tier. Not sure how to upload. This was over the weekend.    I spoke to Apple about a refund and it is in process. They also said that surprisingly apple(dot)com/feedback is a highly maintained process and if enough people point out that a PvP advertised game is not a pvp game, it can be removed from the app store. I will strongly encourage everyone to walk from this franchise. They just plain do not deserve the loyalty they have had from players like us. It’s a shame, but all of us know it is time after this.

^^^ It almost seems as if what we are being told and what is actually happening are two different things. I’m sure the response is going to be give us you UID for verification. That screenshot seems pretty straightforward. 4000 fans from elite win, mirror users that don’t actually exist in game.

I will not spend another dime on this product or any others from EA. I’ve been jamming out on Madden since Sega Genesis and was competitively ranked since the game started online with PS2. I’ve commished a full league for the past 3 years that stayed in the top 200 until handing it over to a capable admin this year.    Here’s the problem guys, and I going to omit the speculative stuff which is even worse, but can’t be proven:   You intentionally changed the entire premise of the game without disclosing it. You put “non-human” players in the game and again, intentionally concealed  it. The noble reasons don’t matter because just like the things I can speculate, you can’t prove it. When someone has a massive lie by omission, you don’t trust their excuse for doing it anyway. If a game developer is willing to add “non-human” players to game advertised as real time pvp and they do it without disclosing it, they cannot be trusted on any level, period.

Props

Please dial back on the excuses and deflection. Saying that there are videos and program explainers as though it is some form of transparency is a little frustrating. Those videos and program explainers are marketing materIals and should not be spun as transparency. Transparency is defined as being able to see through things and NOT hiding things behind a shroud. Claims of trying to get something together for release do not in any way detract from putting bots in the game and not telling us. There is no way that EA can get around the truth of turning a “real time PvP” game into a bot game environment without communicating it at it’s release. Plain and simple that is an attempt to hide it in and of itself. Be real with us. Saying you failed us today is another spin. These bots have been around longer than one day and I have the video to prove it. The transparency failure happened the day the bots were introduced, which may have been 2 weeks ago or longer. You know the release daye of the bots. Go ahead and tell us. Be honest though because the video footage exists.

I didn’t read the last few pages here as this thread is on fire. I have some input to direct at EA and I want to start by thanking the OP. Nice first post! I don’t consider myself so important that an EA rep needs to respond to me, but these concerns are going to be the same accross the whole community.    To start: Saying something like “we knew the community would find out sooner rather than later” really speaks volumes about knowing that a massive change was made that people wouldn’t be happy about and intentionally NOT informing the community. There is no way to spin this. I DO consider it malicious that every EA advertisement for this game states “real time, PVP...” then change the game mid-stream to include bots, and not inform the community. That is intentional dishonesty.    Next: Claiming that it was to help new or struggling players seems inaccurate and plays like a cop-out. After the initial dishonesty, how can we even believe this to be true. For this to be one of the few comments added to the admission adds insult to injury for me. This isn’t a slam against HSD because I know that the people who sign the checks let you know what statement you are allowed to release. I do want to point out that the community deserved better.

This is our 4th year, consistently top 200 with expectations of top 100 this year. Dropped a couple inactives to make room for highly engaged players to help us make a big push.