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Another chance to win
With the sooner than expected announcement of the Madden NFL 08 cover athlete, the contest previously being run to win the faceplate ended without a successful guess of Vince Young. So now we’ll give it another shot.
To qualify simply sign up for the site’s newsletter which can be found in the sidebar. For details on the newsletter read this post. Anyone on the list by Thursday April 26th will be eligible. Once that date is reached, one person from the list will be randomly selected to receive their choice of the Madden 07 faceplate or a copy of NBA Live 07 for the PC. The winner will be contacted via the email address provided to choose which prize and to provide their shipping address. Good luck!
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The ridiculous article of the day goes to…
This guy, Keith Claverie of the Louisiana State University paper. In his article he touches upon the topic of race as it pertains to the Madden cover. He astutely points out that no white player has ever been the cover athlete for the Madden franchise. I wonder how long it took him to find that out on Wikipedia.The article takes an unexpected turn when he starts to infer what that means and goes as far as to use the popular belief in the “cover curse” as a motive behind who EA chooses. Below are some excerpts.
- One would believe this means Electronic Arts, the game’s developer, may have something against the white man, but this issue goes a little bit deeper.
- It is no secret the only player ever not to be affected by the curse is former Titans running back Eddie George. George had career highs in yards and touchdowns the year he made the cover and did not miss one game. And it is also no secret that George is the least dark of all the Madden cover athletes. Hmmm, coincidence? Probably so.
- But what is EA’s real motivation here? Are they purposely setting-up young, black players for sub-par, injury-riddled seasons? Of course I will not go as far to accuse Electronic Arts of being racists. Did I do that yet? Nonetheless, the facts are interesting.
Really I don’t even know how to react to this, it has to be one of the flat out most ignorant opinion pieces I’ve ever read. It would be bad enough to suggest that EA was selecting the cover athlete based on skin color for any reason, but then to imply that they are choosing black players with the hopes of the cover curse afflicting them? Give me a break.
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LaDainian Tomlinson was EA’s first choice for the Madden 08 cover
CNBC’s Darren Rovell reports that Chargers RB LaDainian Tomlinson received the intial offer from EA Sports to appear on the cover of Madden NFL 08.
Multiple industry sources have told me that Tomlinson, in fact, was asked of his interest, was presented with an offer, and told Electronic Arts he was not interested. Tomlinson’s turning down of Electronic Arts, we’re told, doesn’t have much to do with the highly publicized curse, which has been attributed to the recent misfortune of Michael Vick, Donovan McNabb and Shaun Alexander. It has more to do with the fact that the people at Electronic Arts know that, for many, their cover is seen as the “Wheaties box endorsement” — in that athletes are usually so honored they are willing to do it for less than market value. Tomlinson wasn’t.
The deal usually pays the cover athlete $100,000 to $200,000 and requires multiple appearances to pump up the game. Since the Madden game sort of sells itself, the athlete on the cover doesn’t really matter that much, but expect more NFL stars to turn down the cover in the future, not because of the curse, but because the price is just too low. (via Deadspin)
This has also been confirmed by Tomlinson’s business manager LaMar Andrews (via San Diego Union Tribune)Â
It’s interesting to hear about the business side to the cover decision. EA doesn’t need a particular player to sell the game, and in most cases it was assumed that the players were more interested in the honor that came with being selected for the cover than any monetary compensation that came along with it. In the end whatever the cover athletes are paid it is going to pale in comparison to the money they make in their contracts as well as other endorsements.
This is also another clue as to the possible theme or main feature added to Madden 08. In the past several years the cover athlete has directly represented that. Knowing that the first choice for the cover was a runningback but the next option EA turned to was a quarterback, it adds another hint that it may not be the case this year. Once you also consider the commercial campaign that will include Reggie Bush and Devin Hester, it’s looking more and more like it may just be an overall theme that Vince Young fits into rather than a QB specific feature.
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Odds out on the Madden 08 cover curse
Bodog has posted odds on whether Madden NFL 08 cover athlete Vince Young will fall victim to the famed cover curse. Bodog deems that missing two consecutive regular season games due to injury constitutes the curse coming to fruition yet again.
The favorite is ‘Yes’ (that he will miss at least the two straight games). Currently ‘Yes’ is at -140 meaning you would need to bet $14 to win $10. ‘No’ is sitting at even odds.
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Madden NFL 08 cover art
Pastapadre.com has captured the first image of the cover art for Madden NFL 08. It was officially unveiled on the Jimmy Kimmel Live show as he was joined by the cover athlete, Titans QB Vince Young.
Edit: The official release of the cover art has since made its way out. Click the thumbnail for the full version.
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An early look at where NBA Live 08 is headed
IGN has posted up an interview with EA Sports NBA Live 08 Producer Brian Ulrich. The intention of the interview was to present the direction that the franchise is headed, not necessarily reveal new features. The build of the game was at a very early point in development, and a majority of the time was spent simply discussing some of the problems found in Live 07 and what the team was doing to correct them.
Some noteable information to come out of the interview:
- The game will run at 60fps
- The exaggerated shot arc from 07 is fixed
- Rebounding is much improved
- Overall focus is on creating a realistic and fun 5 on 5 gameplay experience
Essentially it appears that the NBA Live 08 team is taking the same route that the MLB 2K7 team took this year. Concentrating first on the most important thing, the gameplay, in order to establish the title for not only this year but beyond. MLB 2K was coming off a very poor release, and the consumer base has shown that they can be patient if they feel that a series is headed in the right direction. MLB 2K7 has sold well and has been received rather favorably. NBA Live 08 has the potential to do the same thing this year.
EA Canada will be hosting a media day in early May which I’ll be attending. More news on a handful of titles including NBA Live 08 should make its way out sometime soon thereafter.
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Too little, too late?
SCEA has finally released a trailer for the PS3 version of MLB 07: The Show which is currently tagged for a May 15th release. Until now only a handful of screens had made their way out. The game has gone through multiple release date delays which has caused it to fall well into the baseball season. Those factors have caused worrysome chatter to become dominant. Was the game even going to be released this year and what major problems were causing the game to be pushed back?
Well we don’t have an idea on the second part of that question, but it seems safe to say that at the very least the game is coming. How good it will be remains to be seen. Click here to view the trailer.
From watching it’s easy to recognize why there may be some hesitation to releasing media. The graphics and player models are sub-par for what you would expect from the PS3 (thats actually being kind). This is even more bothersome coming from a 1st party developer. Some of the animations don’t look quite right as well. Obviously that is just about all you can take from this as it isn’t going to demonstrate on-the-field gamplay. If that is on the money then I think some of the visuals could be overlooked.
Overall though this is certainly concerning because trailers are constructed to make the game look as good as it possibly can. Even bad games can have kick-ass trailers.
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First Madden 08 screenshots
EA Sports has released the first screenshots from Madden NFL 08 featuring newly announced cover man Vince Young. They are from either the Xbox 360 or the PS3 version of the game. Click the thumbnails below to view them full size.
 
 
Upon first glance they may not seem much different from Madden 07. However having spent the last two days working within replay mode capturing screens and videos of Vince Young, these look to be a pretty solid improvement. We’ll have to see more than just these three screens though before reaching any sort of conclusions on the graphics.
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