• by Les Luchter , Yesterday

“Madden NFL 26”: “the premier American football simulation game.” (source: Electronic Arts)

Modding: “a modification made to a software application (such as a video game) by a user in order to change the way the application looks or functions.” (source: Merriam-Webster Dictionary)

Then there’s “Modden 26”: what happens when a nonprofit puts out a modification of the Madden game to remind football fans that yes, players do get concussions. 

Apparently, modding is a big thing -- and legal. Klick Health, which worked on the "Modden 26 project" with the Derek Sheely Foundation, tells Marketing Daily there are some 72 million registered modding community members, per Nexus Hubs, and that the Madden modding community has about 80,000 members.

But let’s get back to "Madden NFL 26" and its marketer Electronic Arts, which took the first name of John Madden off the game line in 1993 after five years.

Madden, a Hall of Fame coach and broadcaster, had told The New York Times in 2011, when he was still involved in the game’s development, that “Concussions are such a big thing, it has to be a big thing in the video game...Kids used to learn football in the playground, but now they learn the game more by the video game.”

Also in 2011, a college football player named Derek Sheely died after he suffered a traumatic brain injury during practice, leading the Sheely family to form the foundation to advance awareness and research of concussions and traumatic brain injuries.

Indeed, concussions were added to the Madden game, only to be removed at some point later. Madden himself died in 2021.

Klick and the Foundation are reaching out to Madden players largely through social media, including this video, and earned editorial. “Modden 2026,” which is completely free, is dubbed “the mod that puts concussions back in the game.” The video explains how "Modden 26" shows the debilitating symptoms of concussions -- including blurred vision, dizziness, headaches, nausea, light sensitivity, and tinnitus -- during game play.

“We want to help prevent other children and families from enduring the devastating effects of concussions,” said Kristen Thomson Sheely, Derek’s mother and executive director of the Foundation.