Madden 08 full website to launch today; free Vince Young theme available on Xbox 360 Live Marketplace

For approximately the last month, the Madden 08 website has released a wallpaper for a new team each day. Essentially what has been up has been a placeholder for the real site to come. Later this afternoon EA Sports will launch the full official website for Madden NFL 08.

Also, now available on the Xbox 360 Live Marketplace is a theme for the cover athlete of the game Titans QB Vince Young. The theme will be available for free for the next two weeks.

Reggie Bush Madden 08 commercial

Of the trio of Madden NFL 08 commercials expected for this weekend, the one featuring Vince Young is the only one which aired Thursday on ESPN that has not found its way to Youtube yet. Posted earlier was the Devin Hester commercial, and below is the Reggie Bush one.

It has to be tough to be a Texans fan.

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First hands-on impressions from NCAA Football 08

IGN has posted up the first hands-on impressions from NCAA Football 08 as well as a new sizzle trailer. There should be even more in the coming days as there is a big NCAA Football event taking place in New York City as I write this.

Some of the things noted within the impressions:

-Game was described as being in “mid-alpha” stage. So still relatively early in the development cycle

-The “Hit Stick” has been improved. You now flick the stick up to attempt a high tackle, or flick it down to attempt a low tackle. You’ll need to use it strategically as smaller players like a CB would be more successful going low on a RB that is charging him.

-On offense you now have a hurdle button instead of the game deciding when you should hurdle on its own

-Home Field Advantage is in but there is no “stadium pulse”. How the HFA is implemented still hasn’t been discussed.

-Gang tackles are in and seem to be realistically implemented

-Players move and cut more realistically

-Having the game run at 60fps makes a huge difference

Devin Hester Madden 08 commercial

The series of commercials for Madden NFL 08 started airing on ESPN today. Vince Young, Devin Hester, and Reggie Bush are being featured.

Below is the Devin Hester commercial which is the first to make its way online.

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The Madden season kicks off this weekend

The NFL Draft represents the unofficial start to the new “Madden season”. What is there to expect over the coming days?

• The first commercials for Madden 08 were supposedly going to appear first during the draft. They have started airing early on ESPN today. This year there is a series of them featuring cover athlete Vince Young, as well as Reggie Bush and Devin Hester.

• With what has become a tradition on draft day, expect screenshots of the top draftees (probably all the first rounders) in their team’s uniforms. They likely will be added to the official Madden website shortly after each pick is announced.

• At this point the official site for Madden is essentially just a placeholder. With the wallpapers of every team having been released, look for the full website to go live any time now.

• The first looks at the game from media sites will be arriving shortly after the draft, possibly even as early as Monday April 30th or Tuesday May 1st.

NFL Legends in All-Pro Football 2K8 revealed

2K Sports has updated their website for All-Pro Football 2K8. Listed are some of the details of the game as well as NFL Legends that will be appearing in it.

• The game will have over 240 legendary players. The pool of players will be used to draft a team. The legends are considered to be “in their prime” performance wise.

• The game will have a new broadcasting style that combines the a TV style broadcast with on-field commentary.

• Some of the legends who are listed: Joe Montana, Troy Aikman, Dick Butkus, John Elway, Dan Marino, Barry Sanders, Walter Payton, Emmitt Smith, Johnny Unitas, Jerry Rice, Warren Moon, Archie Manning, Joe Theismann, Earl Campbell, Mike Singletary, Derrick Thomas, Marcus Allen, William Perry, Derrick Thomas, OJ Simpson, Brian Bosworth, and Mike Ditka.

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The NFL Draft’s impact on Madden 08

The draft is always a fun time of the year for NFL fans. Obviously it’s a huge piece to the puzzle that will be the next season and beyond. However for fans of Madden it also represents an opportunity to see the additions that will be made to their favorite teams for the coming year. But how much does the draft matter in the next installment of Madden?

Generally, the big name players are going at the top of the draft to teams that were either poor or downright horrible the year before. Those draftees will make for important additions to those who play through multiple years of franchise, but for the contingent that generally sticks with head-to-head, they’re unlikely to be using those teams on a regular basis anyway unless they are a fan of one of those specific teams.

Even with a top 10 addition, ratings wise they aren’t going to offer much more right away than most of the guys they are replacing. Some may not even start right away.

Last year Reggie Bush came in with an 87 rating, the highest ever given to a rookie in Madden. He also was a versatile player that could be shifted around on the offense, and entered into an already above-average Madden offense. The Bush example though is rare though. Previously no rookie had ever been rated higher than 85 in the intial roster that comes with the game’s release.

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2K Sports reveals some features of The Bigs

2K Sports Unveils Features of The Bigs

With The BIGS, we want to take the baseball genre to new heights and redefine what a baseball video game can be,” said Greg Thomas, President of Visual Concepts, a 2K Sports studio. “The BIGS has the fast learning curve of an arcade game coupled with deep play mechanics, amazing visuals, and hero-like presentation of real MLB® players that will keep gamers coming back for more. The BIGS will showcase dramatic highlight reel moments at every at-bat, creating a truly epic baseball title.”

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Downloadable content still coming for NBA Street: Homecourt

Downloadable content was a topic of discussion for NBA Street: Homecourt even before it was released. Some was planned to be available soon after release of the game, while more additions were planned for farther on down the line. Later it was revealed the downloadable content would be exclusive to the Xbox 360 version of the game.

However now after two months the only things that have made their way to the Xbox Live Marketplace are gamerpics and themes. The official website for the game still displays the message “New Xbox 360 Downloadable Content Coming Soon”.

I was able to get in touch with EA Sports to find out the status of the content. There was an external delay that pushed the releases back. While there is no date that is being targeted, the content is still going to make its way out at some point.

Considering the amount of detail that went into the courts in the game, I’m looking forward to trying the new ones out. Still it’s disappointing to have such a long wait for the extra content. Last time that happened EA ended up giving out the NCAA Football 07 and Madden 07 alternate jerseys for free. I wouldn’t expect that to be the case this time however.

Five new MLB 07: The Show (PS3) gameplay videos

SCEA has released five new videos from the upcoming Playstation 3 version of MLB 07: The Show. The release of the game is scheduled for May 15th. (edit: These videos have been removed since the game has been released)