NFL coach and commentator John Madden has passed away. The popular football figure helped start the popular Madden NFL video game series with Electronic Arts. He was 85 years old.
Before his involvement in the Madden series of games, Madden was the head coach for the Oakland Raiders. After taking the team to and winning the Superbowl in 1976, the coach became a prominent broadcaster for various sports channels.
Then, in the late 1980s, Electronic Arts approached Madden to use his name on a new football video game series. That video game became John Madden Football, releasing in 1988 for the MS-DOS. EA later rebranded the series to Madden NFL in 1994. The series has sold millions of copies over its several decade-long run and is the only officially licensed game of the National Football League.
Though Madden hasn’t been part of the game’s development for quite some time, the series has continued to be a mainstay in the sports video game sphere. Back in 2020, Madden 21 became the best-selling game of August. And while the series hasn’t seen much change in the past decade, it still serves as one of EA’s best-selling titles. So much so that EA has renewed its licensing deal with the NFL until 2026.
[Source: VGC]
