Madden NFL 09

Madden NFL 09
The NTSC Xbox and Xbox 360 "Madden NFL 09" cover featuring Brett Favre as a Green Bay Packer
Developer(s)	EA Tiburon
Publisher(s)	EA Sports
Series	Madden NFL
Engine	Proprietary
Platform(s)	Xbox, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Portable, Wii, Nintendo DS
Release date(s)	NA August 12, 2008 AUS August 14, 2008 EU August 15, 2008 JP September 25, 2008
Genre(s)	American football simulation
Mode(s)	Single-player multiplayer

Madden NFL 09 is an American football video game based on the NFL that was published by EA Sports and developed by EA Tiburon. It is the 20th annual installment in the Madden NFL video game franchise. The game was released for the Nintendo DS, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Portable, Wii, Xbox and Xbox 360 consoles, as well as mobile devices such as the iPod. It was also the last game ever made for the Xbox. A GameCube version was cancelled due to the system's discontinuation in 2007.^[1][2]

Unlike previous versions, the game was not released for the PC. EA Sports has said that they are "retooling the PC version" after not making 09. Despite these claims of 'retooling', PC users were again ignored the following year as no Windows version of Madden NFL 10 were released. In June 2009, EA Sports announced that for the year 2010, the games Madden NFL, NCAA Football, NASCAR, NHL, NBA Live, and Tiger Woods PGA Tour would not be shipped for Microsoft Windows.^[3][4]

The Wii version of the game is titled Madden NFL 09 All-Play and was launched under EA Sports' new All-Play brand exclusive to the platform, taking a slightly different approach to the game and taking advantage of the motion controls.^[5]

The 20th Anniversary Collector's Edition of Madden NFL 09 includes NFL Head Coach 09, an alternative case, an exclusive version of John Madden Football '93 with updated teams and rosters and bonus video content and clips. A demo of the game was released on Xbox Live Marketplace and PlayStation Network. The standard version and the anniversary package were released on August 12, 2008. As of August 12, 2008, the game was the last title released for the original Xbox. A Spanish-language version of the game was released on September 17, 2008 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 platforms.^[6]

Cover athlete

On April 23, 2008, David Letterman revealed that former Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre would be the cover athlete of Madden NFL 09 on the Late Show with David Letterman. Despite Favre's later unretirement and trade to the New York Jets about five days before Madden NFL 09 was officially released in North America, the game's cover still featured Favre wearing a Packers uniform. Instead of reissuing the packaging, On August 12, 2008, EA made available a free alternative cover of Favre in a Jets uniform from their website that players are able to download and print.^[7] At first the new covers were available for all the consoles except the Xbox, Nintendo DS, and Wii, which use an alternate cover. On September 15, 2008, EA made available a cover shot specifically for the Wii that had Brett Favre as a Jet.^[7]

Favre is a playable character in every version of Madden NFL 09. Although it is still disputed, Favre is available on the Nintendo DS version. On the Wii, PSP, and PS2 editions, he is not on the Jets roster, but is available on a historic team, the 2007 Packers. Players can transfer Favre to the free agent roster pool, and pick him up on any of the 32 NFL teams for the 2008 season. A roster update on August 12, 2008 places Favre on the New York Jets roster as their starting quarterback.^[7]

Like all other games of EA Sports' 09 Season, the "All Play" version of Madden seen on the Wii features a different photograph of Favre with different graphics and artwork than the other versions of the game.

The Anniversary Collector's Edition does not feature a cover athlete - it has a larger version of the Roman numeral XX logo shown in the top-left corner of the game's standard cover. This edition of the game is also not available outside North America.

Roberto Garza, a guard for the Chicago Bears, is the cover athlete for the Spanish version, Madden NFL 09 en Español.^[6]

Presentation

Play-by-play and color commentary is provided by Tom Hammond and Cris Collinsworth, respectively.^[8] Al Michaels and John Madden are still the play-by-play and color commentary for the Wii, PS2, Xbox, and PSP versions. EA designers have confirmed that John Madden does play a part in Madden 09 as the person describing instructions to the Madden IQ. Madden guides the player on advice and other things to help raise his or her Madden IQ. Madden also appears in Mii form in the Wii version of the game, suggesting plays to run in the game's "Madden's Pick" feature, with a specific reason so new players can learn to call their own plays. Lastly, Madden appears at the start of a game where he describes the teams and the matchup.

EA's relationship with ESPN also enables tie-ins with different ESPN shows.^[9]

Roster updates

Roster updates for Xbox 360 and PlayStation Network users were available again in 2009. The first update had Tom Brady on the injured reserve list, making him unplayable. It featured others, notables like David Tyree who was a free agent due to the lack of depth on the New York Giants, with the most notable being Favre of the Jets after coming out of retirement. During the year, the Arizona Cardinals received the greatest ratings boost to a rating of 86. The final roster update of the game saw some ratings drop tremendously; the Detroit Lions with a rating of 57 overall was the worst team in the game and the Pittsburgh Steelers rating was put at a 93 overall for its final rating of the year.

Soundtrack

• Note: In the song 'Hell Yeah' by 'Rev Theory', the words "Hell Yeah" were replaced with "Hey Yeah" due to strong lyrics.

Reception

Madden NFL 09 for the Xbox 360 received a 8 out of 10 rating from Xbox Magazine,^[11] as well as four out of five stars and Game of the Month from PlayStation: The Official Magazine.^[12] The Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions got an 8.8/10 from IGN^[13] and the Wii version got an 8.6 out of 10, receiving only 0.2 points less than its Sony and Microsoft counterparts from IGN.com^[14] X-Play gave Madden 09 a 4 out of 5. GameSpot gave Madden NFL 09 an 8 out of 10, for both the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360. GameSpot gave the Wii version 8.0/10. Official Nintendo Magazine gave the Wii version 87%.

As of September 30, 2008, the game has sold 4.5 million copies, according to Electronic Arts.^[15] According to the NPD Group, GfK Chart-Track, and Enterbrain, the game has sold 2.958 million copies in the United States, 35,000 in the United Kingdom, and 1,000 in Japan, respectively, for a total of 2.994 million copies as of October 1, 2008.^[16] The Xbox 360 version was the 18th best-selling game of December 2008 in the United States.^[17] It was also the ninth best-selling game of 2008, selling in excess of 1.87 million copies.^[18] The PlayStation 2, 3, and Portable versions were the second, seventh, and first best-selling games respectively for their respective consoles of December 2008 in the United States.^[17]

Issues

Shortly after the release of Madden NFL 09, consumers began reporting several freezing errors in the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of the game. EA has since confirmed the issue, and stated that they are working on a patch for the two consoles to locate the source of the freezing and fix the issue. However, this problem has caused many gamers to doubt the advantages of games being able to be patched on consoles, and instead gamers have criticized this 'feature' for allowing companies to rush games and rely on post-release patches to fix the issues that consumers themselves find.^[19] Other minor issues were player photos, roster updates for Madden 09 had KeJuan Jones's photo wrong and several players' photos were larger than normal and not one thing was reviewed on the Xbox 360. A roster error in the game is that the New York Giants former defensive end Michael Strahan appears in the game, although he retired after Super Bowl XLII.

References

External links

• Official website
• Madden NFL 09 at Xbox.com
• Madden NFL 09 at PlayStation.com