After Electronic Arts (EA) saw that Washington’s football team had decided to drop its politically historic nickname, “Redskins”, they knew that they had to make changes themselves. Due to this massive change coming in mid- July, EA is going to slightly adjust the initial release date of the game. Madden 21 is on track to be released to the public Aug.25.
An Electronic Arts representative/spokesperson said to the Verge that
“We are pleased to see Washington’s decision to change their team name and visual identity. We are quickly working to update Madden NFL 21 to feature a generic Washington team, while we await final word on the updated team name and logo design.”
There will be a patch update, which will remove all “Redskins” references. A requirement for all users who wish to play online must install the update to proceed. The game is already in its home-stretch of preparation before a much anticipated release.
When Madden fans initially pick up their physical copy of the game, it will reference Washington’s former name and logo. The reasoning behind that is that the discs have been in production, well before Washington’s final decision on July 13th.
Washington has yet to announce when the new nickname will come or what it will be. Surely developers at Electronic Arts wished that this change came a few months ago. As opposed to almost a month before the scheduled release date. All EA eyes will be following the situation closely for another potential update in their game on Washington’s ball club.