Madden, Madden, Madden. Oh, and that’s not a chant — just the top three selling games in the month of August. Madden NFL 09 blew up on Xbox 360, PS3, PS2 and Wii, respectively in order of sales, in the latest NPD report.

Software Sales:

1. Madden NFL 09 (Xbox 360) - 1,000,000
2. Madden NFL 09 (PS3) - 643,000
3. Madden NFL 09 (PS2) - 424,500
4. Wii Fit (Wii) - 394,900
5. Mario Kart Wii (Wii) - 328,700
6. Wii Play (Wii) - 200,200
7. Soulcalibur IV (Xbox 360) - 174,000
8. Too Human (Xbox 360) - 168,200
9. Madden NFL 09 (Wii) - 115,800
10. Guitar Hero: On Tour (DS) - 111,200

Surprisingly, Soulcalibur IV put in a respectable performance edging, slightly, over Too Human. Hmm…upwards of 900,000 demos were downloaded of the latter game on Xbox Live. We don’t know too much about these things, but a 9:1ish conversation rate doesn’t spell out “success” for us.

Hardware Sales:

1. Nintendo DS - 518,300
2. Wii - 453,000
3. PSP - 253,000
4. Xbox 360 - 195,200
5. PlayStation 3 - 185,400
6. PlayStation 2 - 144,100

Nintendo rules all yet again. We know, we know. More interestingly, the Xbox 360 got itself out of the PS3’s shadow in August after being behind for the last three months. Wonder what the recent price cut will do to next month’s numbers…

written by Carlos Macias \\ tags: 09, August, Bestsellers, Madden, monthly numbers, NFL, NPD

Too cheap to buy the full retail version of SoulCalibur IV?  Well, this week’s FREE demo is a nice appetizer to the main dish.  Also, The Last Guy looks pretty cool, but stay here for review.  Other than that the two Warkhawk Add-on’s are the other updates worth noting.  Enjoy your last update in August!

Downloadable Games

• The Last Guy ($9.99)

Add-on Content:

• Rock Band DLC
  • “She Does” - Locksley ($0.99)
  • “Don’t Make Me Wait” - Locksley ($0.99)
  • “Don’t Make Me Wait” - Locksley ($0.99)
  • “All Over Again” - Locksley ($0.99)
  • Locksley Pack 1 ($2.99) - includes: “All Over Again,” “Don’t Make Me Wait,” and “She Does” by Locksley.
• Warhawk Fallen Star Pack ($7.99)
• Warhawk Booster Combo ($15.99)

Game Demos

• NHL 09
• Soulcalibur IV

Game Videos:

• SOCOM Confrontation Extraction trailer
• LittleBigPlanet Leipzig “Sackzilla” Trailer
• Motorstorm Pacific Rift Leipzig Trailer
• PAIN Trauma Mode Trailer
• GT5 Prologue Play the Pros with Tanner Foust!
• Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway Machine Gun & Bazooka Video
• Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway Squad Gameplay Video
• Facebreaker Audition Video #1
• Facebreaker Audition Video #2
• Facebreaker Audition Video #3
• Madden NFL 09 Gameplay Trailer
• Madden NFL 09 Madden Moments Trailer
• Madden NFL 09 Play Call Trailer
• Top Spin 3 Player Creator Trailer

Movie and Blu-ray Trailers:

• Quantum Of Solace
• Prom Night

PS3 Wallpaper:

• (2) The Last Guy
  

Via Blog.PlayStation

written by Juan Perez \\ tags: All, are, Ares, August, band, Blu-ray, Brother, buy, call, combo, Combos, Content, cool, Creator, Demo, DLC, download, Downloads, Edition, Enjoy, Facebreaker, Facebreakers, Fallen, free, game, game games, gaming, GUI, gun, guy, Hell, Highway, Include, Leipzig, LittleBigPlanet, look, Looks, machine, Machines, Madden, make, Makes, making, mode, MotorStorm, movie, Movies, NFL, NHL, night, Pacific, Pack, PAIN, play, Player, Playstation, PlayStations, Pretty, Prologue, Retail, retailer, Rift, Rock, Soulcalibur, Spin, Star, Stars, Stay, store, Than, Top, Tops, Trailer, update, Updated, Updates, version, Via, video, Videos, wait, Waiting, Wallpaper, Warhawk, Week, Weeks, WIth, worth

Games On Fire

Love it or hate it, Madden NFL 09 has been another crushing success for the EA franchise. Perhaps that’s because there’s no competition whatsoever, but we could sit here and speculate all day.  According to VG Chartz, the current #1, #2 and #3  American top-selling game is Madden 09.

Does this surprise anyone?  I’d hope not.  The Madden franchise will continue to dominate the market each year until they have some kind of competition.  With the current deal they have with the NFL, I wonder if the day of competition will ever come…

written by Will Snizek \\ tags: anyone, Chartz, competition, day, Fire, franchise, game, kind, love, Madden, market, NFL, success, surprise, year

I never thought I’d see the day where I thought a multi-platform game was better on the Wii than the Xbox 360 or Sony PS3, but that day has come. Although the game has a different title and has different features, I feel like it’s still something I needed to compare to the 360/PS3 version. I recently reviewed Madden NFL 09 for the Xbox 360 and felt it wasn’t the great game everyone was giving it credit for. My primary issues with the game was lag, the game freezing, game glitches and numerous problems with the AI.

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written by Will Snizek \\ tags: Better, day, experience, football, fun, game, Madden, NFL, Nintendo Wii, play, something, Sony, title, version, Xbox

The average score from 1Up editors and users for Madden NFL 09 is a shocking A+. Even G4’s X-Play gave it a perfect review score. The only negative aspects mentioned by X-Play was “minor glitches” and “minor online lag”. I’m not sure if the word minor is right, but I’ll cover that later. After reading dozens of reviews from around the net, I realized that the people giving the scores were probably not looking at the game in depth. Perhaps they were caught up with the “20th anniversary” hype or something. I’m just not sure how anyone could consider this to be a perfect or even close to perfect title.

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written by Will Snizek \\ tags: Chris Collinsworth, commentary, end, freezing, game, Hammond, K Sports, lag, Madden, NFL, Online, Review, right, score, something, stuff, X-Play, year

If you’re looking for some old school flavor with some new packaging, then Bionic Commando: Rearmed is your present.  This week the PlayStation Network is “choc full of goodies.”  There’s also Street Fighter Alpha, which should keep you tamed until Street Fighter IV.

My 60gb PS3 is running a little low on disk space, but I NEED those playable demo’s!  Tiger Woods ‘09 and BC: Rearmed are in my cart as we speak.

Downloadable Games

Bionic Commando: Rearmed ($9.99)
PS1 Classics for PS3/PSP

Street Fighter Alpha ($5.99)
Add-on Game Content

Rock Band

* “Constant Motion” - Dream Theater ($0.99)
* “Aesthetics of Hate” - Machine Head ($0.99)
* “My Curse” - Killswitch Engage ($0.99)
* “Clouds Over California” - DevilDriver ($0.99)
* “Runnin’ Wild” - Airbourne ($0.99)
* “Sleepwalker” - Megadeth ($0.99)
* Roadrunner Records Pack 1 ($5.99) - includes “Runnin’ Wild” - Airbourne, “Clouds Over California” - DevilDriver, “Constant Motion” - Dream Theater, “My Curse” -Killswitch Engage, “Aesthetics of Hate” - Machine Head , and “Sleepwalker” - Megadeth.

File sizes: 22.5 MB - 48.8 MB (singles), 221 MB (track pack)

Price Promotion: these tracks will become to $1.99 on 8/21. The track pack will become $9.99 on 8/21.

Game Demos (free)

Bionic Commando: Rearmed Demo
1942: Joint Strike Demo
NHL 2K9 Demo
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2009 Demo

Game Videos (free)

The Last Guy Gameplay Trailer 2
Bionic Commando: Rearmed: The Making Of - Part 3
Bionic Commando: Rearmed Launch Trailer
Saints Row 2 – Gangs Trailer
Vampire Rain Gameplay Trailer 1
Vampire Rain Running Alley Trailer
Legendary Behind the Scenes Teaser Trailer
Madden NFL 09 Buzz Video
Madden NFL 09 Announcers Video
Madden NFL 09 Presentation Video
Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 : Fusion
Mirror’s Edge Story Trailer 1
AST Dew Tour - Cleveland FMX Jam Session
AST Dew Tour - Cleveland Skate Thrills
AST Dew Tour - Cleveland BMX Highlights
AST Dew Tour - Hear it from Nyquist

PS3 Themes (free)

BioShock Theme
Bionic Commando: Rearmed Theme (x2)

PS3 Wallpaper (free)

Bionic Commando: Rearmed Wallpaper (x2)
PLAYSTATION Store for PC

Here is this week’s content release for the PLAYSTATION Store for PC. To download these games to your PSP, navigate to http://store.playstation.com. There, you’ll find descriptions of the content and directions on how to get started. For more on the PLAYSTATION Store for PC, please click here.

PS1 Classics for PS3/PSP
Street Fighter Alpha ($5.99)

PSP Themes (free)
Bionic Commando: Rearmed Theme (also downloadable via PS3)

PSP Wallpaper (free)
Hot Shots Golf Open Tee 2 Wallpaper (x2)
Madden NFL 09 Wallpaper (x2)

written by Juan Perez \\ tags: Alpha, AST, Bionic, California, Commando, Demo, Dew Tour - Cleveland, Dew Tour - Hear, Fighter, Guy Gameplay, Madden, NFL, Pack, PC. To, Playstation, Rain Gameplay, Rain Running, Rearmed, Saints Row, Sony PSP, store, Street, Tiger Woods, Trailer, Wallpaper

It looks like the only games brave enough to come out and play with reviewers pre-release this week are Bangai-O Spirits (DS) and Baseball Mogul 2009 (PC). That shouldn’t be taken as a knock, though, on the new Madden or Capcom’s 8-bit remake of Bionic Commando which saw Hitler’s head blowing up at the game’s end. Madden NFL 09 looks like its been shaping up nicely (the collector’s edition includes Madden ‘93 with updated rosters!) and the latter even has some people saying the pricing for it might be “too cheap.”

Gamers should take note on one game in particular this week: Fable II Pub Games. The game will be released on XBLA on Wednesday for 800 pts. ($10), but know that for a $5 pre-order on Fable II at your local games retailer lands you the game for FREE. Kezins just saved you five bucks! We give you permission to spend those extra points on new songs for Rock Band…

(The following scores were “aggregated-tive-ized” as of August 10, 2008 via Metacritic)

The Good…

• Bangai-O Spirits (DS) - Metascore: 84

The Bad…

• Baseball Mogul 2009 (PC) - Metascore: 65

The Unrated…

Xbox 360

• Madden NFL 09
• Bionic Commando Rearmed
• Fable II Pub Games

PS3

• Madden NFL 09
• Bionic Commando Rearmed

Wii

• Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People Episode 1: Homestar Ruiner
• Madden NFL 09 All-Play
• Line Rider 2: Unbound

PC

• Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People Episode 1: Homestar Ruiner
• Line Rider 2: Unbound
• Dracula 3: Path of the Dragon
• Space Siege
• Bionic Commando Rearmed
• Ford Racing: Off Road
• Sinking Island

DS

• Madden NFL 09
• Line Rider 2: Unbound
• Imagine Teacher

PSP

• Madden NFL 09
• N+

PS2

• Madden NFL 09

written by Carlos Macias \\ tags: August, baseball, Bionic, Commando, DS., Fable, game, line, Metascore, Mogul, NFL, O Spirits, Pub, Rearmed, Rider, Rock Band, Unbound, Unrated

Hot Dogs, 4th of July and ice cold lemonades… Summer is the best time of year to enjoy the great weather and live it up with your close friends and family. In America, the Olympics are our olde past time. We now have MLB, NFL, and the NBA as our main sport attractions. I feel the Summer Olympics bring us, the world, closer since we all send our best athletes for 3 weeks and compete as to who is the best from each country.

Above: The five mascots for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games include cartoon renditions of, from left, swallow, a panda, the Olympic flame, a Tibetan antelope and a fish, with each one the color of one of the Olympic rings.

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written by Juan Perez \\ tags: America, August, Beijing, Beijing 2008, China, close, Family, Home, hot, ice, July, MLB, NBA, NFL, Olympic, place, Ray, summer, Summer Olympics, time, weather, year

This isn’t breaking news, considering the information was leaked several days ago, but it’s now official that Brett Favre will be on the cover of Madden 09.  Considering he’s retired, there’s no chance of him getting injured due to making the cover.  It’s always possible Favre may come back, but unlikely. Brett certainly represents old school football and was a dying breed of QB.  It will be a long time before we see another player like him.

written by Will Snizek \\ tags: Brett, EA, Favre, football, game, Madden, NFL