Are you playing the most recent year?
The year with Marshall Faulk on cover, HB look was the play. You couldn’t beat it. There were a few other really good plays, but with a Marshall Faulk or any fast running back, you couldn’t stop it.
Playing online is nothing like playing against the computer. Humans do every single dirty trick to defeat you. A few years ago, when Vick was on the cover, you couldn’t stop him. He had a cannon for an arm and ran faster than virtually anyone you had on defense. They’d roll him out in a pseudo-option play every play, wait for the linebackers to cheat inside, and you couldn’t stop him.
After that, it was putting the fastest players on the field. Matchups were really emphasized and still are, to this day. The big team online was the Raiders. Yes, the Raiders. They had a solid defense and really fast 3rd and 4th receivers and a really fast second string running back (Justin Fargas, 95 speed, if memory serves me right). Move where the matchups are. Exploit, exploit, exploit. This is where the matchup-exploiting becomes really big.
After that, it was jumping the snap count and nano blitzing that got huge. Nano blitzing is overwhelming the offensive line’s AI. It’s still around now. You’ll notice that it takes some time to spring, and if you run play action or delay anything, you’re going to get smoked. You can spring the nano blitzing from various formations, so it’s not always easy to pick up on.
Now, you’ve got the Wildcat to worry about. There are a few teams that can run it very well, and if you don’t know how to defend against it, it’ll hurt you every damned time.
Online is a completely different animal. You can dominate single player on every difficulty and get your lunch handed to you online. How do you limit that from happening? Know all the hot routes, set your audibles, and know them. Know how to flip a formation and how to run a different play (run versus a pass) from the same formation. Know how to move a star receiver all over the field, how to identify man versus zone and what receivers you can hot route after you identify all that, too. Now know to run a no-huddle offense and keep a bad base formation out there on the field and run them ragged. If you play on 360 and have Madden 10, I’m game to play with you a little bit. Note: I used to be a lot better. I haven’t played in a while, but if you want, I’ll play from time to time. My buddies and I used to play online against the same person. The three of us would rotate between quarters, and whoever played the best got the 4th quarter (whoever got into a rut in a quarter had the option to give the quarter up to someone else). We all had a different playstyle, too.
You’ll play a little bit online, romp over some people, have some close games, and think you’re hot shit, but you will run into one of those freaks, and unless you know how to play online, you’ll get annihilated.
Now, the single player computer AI? It’s cheated for years. There’s a MASSIVE difference between All-Pro and All-Madden. Has been for a few years, where All-Pro wasn’t hard enough, and in All-Madden, the computer blatantly cheats (cornerbacks turning and breaking on balls to receivers that they’re not even covering and in whose direction they’re not even looking). This most recent year, it’s a lot better in that regard, and the My Difficulty setting finds a pretty decent level.
I call bad patterns, I have to look at the buttons to see who I’m throwing to. I can run off-tackles or sweeps for better than minus 6 yards, and When I do manage to get to open field running I hit buttons randomly and spasticaly doing no good, and half the time manage to pitch the ball to the line judge. And the new fumble game sucks. I am not a fast twitch guy, and I lose them all badly. I had to resort to cheesy tactics to finally win my first game, pick the best QB-receiver combo(Brady-Moss) keep calling deep isos and start chucking.(all against AI, no way I am going to show my face online, or my friends sucking this badly)