Madden NFL 06

"Next Generation Football

Well, EA didn't exactly do their best work on Madden 06 for the Xbox 360 so we're just going to tell them what we want for 07.

The next generation of gaming is here. Sure, it doesn't quite feel like it yet because you can't access an Xbox 360 console like you want to, and official details haven't dropped yet on the releases of the PlayStation 3 and the Revolution. But it is here, just waking to eke onto the industry and take the world by storm. And who's there with their first football product? EA Sports, the exclusive owners of the NFL license and the arena football license. That means that, unless you take an originality route like Midway did with Blitz: The League, there's only one company to lean towards with the approach of next-generation football.

And so far, so...uh, average. Last year, just in time for the system's launch, EA released Madden NFL 06 for the Xbox 360. And expectations were high on the title, as EA had touted the next generation football experience with blazing screenshots that looked bone-crunchingly real and a catchy commercial showing what the sport could possibly look like on a next-gen machine. Then the game arrived and it was hardly what you might consider next-gen. Did it look good? Sure, it absolutely did. But the detail wasn't THAT sharp. Furthermore, the game was as hollow as a chocolate Easter bunny when it came to features, lacking even the new gimmicks that were introduced with the current generation version of Madden 06. The game turned out to be a disappointment, just like the other EA Sports releases for the system, all rushed in an attempt to get people to buy in to their virtual splendor. (To see more disappointment details on these games, check out the Sports Guide for a recent article on the matter.)" [more]