Some say 2k football would never outsell Madden, but that was 5 years ago. Consider if the great 2k Football games were available each year after year, for the past 5 awful years of Madden. Consider if consumers had a choice. It is my belief that the exact same thing that happened with 2K basketball slowly taking over the market from EA Sports NBA Live in those same 5 years, would have happened with football. Maybe someone at EA recognized this, and pushed for the exclusive license.

2007-2008- Two of the worst editions in the series history receive top reviews and awards from various gaming publications, no doubt creating a sense of complacency within EA Sports. These near perfect ratings also may have caused an incentive for the NFL to renew the exclusivity license even further, which they did until 2012.

2008-2009 – After nearly 5 years of Madden only football gaming, the bar becomes greatly lowered, and an enormously flawed Madden 09 gets a positive reception. 9’s and 10’s mysteriously fly around for a game that has little to no concept of weight detection, broken sliders, noticeable player abilities or tendencies, and freezing bugs, among other issues. Where we see the birth of the terms “Robo QB”, “Suction Blocking” and Phonebooth Tackling” to describe soley Next Gen Madden’s issues.

Some say 2k football would never outsell Madden, but that was 5 years ago. Consider if the great 2k Football games were available each year after year, for the past 5 awful years of Madden. Consider if consumers had a choice. It is my belief that the exact same thing that happened with 2K basketball slowly taking over the market from EA Sports NBA Live in those same 5 years, would have happened with football. Maybe someone at EA recognized this, and pushed for the exclusive license.

2007-2008- Two of the worst editions in the series history receive top reviews and awards from various gaming publications, no doubt creating a sense of complacency within EA Sports. These near perfect ratings also may have caused an incentive for the NFL to renew the exclusivity license even further, which they did until 2012.

2008-2009 – After nearly 5 years of Madden only football gaming, the bar becomes greatly lowered, and an enormously flawed Madden 09 gets a positive reception. 9’s and 10’s mysteriously fly around for a game that has little to no concept of weight detection, broken sliders, noticeable player abilities or tendencies, and freezing bugs, among other issues. Where we see the birth of the terms “Robo QB”, “Suction Blocking” and Phonebooth Tackling” to describe soley Next Gen Madden’s issues.

2006- David Ortiz takes charge of Madden franchise for two disastrous years that this gen Madden may never recover from due to EA’s refusal to change engine

2006 – John Madden, original creator and namesake of Madden, is pushed out/steps down as a creative force behind Madden games.

2006 – Popularity of online play causes EA to tweak game in accordance to its online community cheesers rather then real NFL football as had previously been the case for a decade. Despite publicly deriding and criticizing cheap online play, EA goes on to market toward these same players, even producing a TV series around them called “Madden Nation”.

2005 – Madden releases one of its most well received games in history, Madden 2005. It is regarded as the peak of Madden’s life on the Ps2 and XBOX. 2K Sports counters with the release of what will go on to be the most critically acclaimed football game of all time, NFL 2k5, which coincidentally would be 2K’s last NFL game. Times are good.

Late 2005 – EA Sports sign an exclusive licensing deal through 2009 with the NFL and the NFLPA to give them the exclusive rights to use the NFL's teams, stadiums and players in a video game.

2006 – EA misleads the public with a over dramatized movie trailer which was portrayed as being what Madden on the Next Gen gameplay would be like. This would be 100% false.

2005 – Madden releases one of its most well received games in history, Madden 2005. It is regarded as the peak of Madden’s life on the Ps2 and XBOX. 2K Sports counters with the release of what will go on to be the most critically acclaimed football game of all time, NFL 2k5, which coincidentally would be 2K’s last NFL game. Times are good.

Late 2005 – EA Sports sign an exclusive licensing deal through 2009 with the NFL and the NFLPA to give them the exclusive rights to use the NFL's teams, stadiums and players in a video game.

2006 – EA misleads the public with a over dramatized movie trailer which was portrayed as being what Madden on the Next Gen gameplay would be like. This would be 100% false.

2006- David Ortiz takes charge of Madden franchise for two disastrous years that this gen Madden may never recover from due to EA’s refusal to change engine

2006 – John Madden, original creator and namesake of Madden, is pushed out/steps down as a creative force behind Madden games.

2006 – Popularity of online play causes EA to tweak game in accordance to its online community cheesers rather then real NFL football as had previously been the case for a decade. Despite publicly deriding and criticizing cheap online play, EA goes on to market toward these same players, even producing a TV series around them called “Madden Nation”.