Yeah, you heard me. I yawn at its giant early numbers. I am just not impressed. Let’s look at the facts:

Madden 07: In the first month, this title sold more than a million copies on the dominant console for the title, the PS2. It sold 569K copies on the Xbox 360 in the USA – which was pretty freaking amazing given that there were only 2.4 million Xbox 360s in USA living rooms at the time. For those of you who don’t feel like getting out the calculator, that’s 23.7% of all Xbox 360 players going out and buying Madden 07 in the first month. Furthermore, the 360 Voice division of GamerDNA had just under 11% of its members playing on launch day. That latter figure is a good measure of how anticipated a title is, as opposed to a title that got its love by word of mouth.

Madden 08: The Xbox 360 overtook the PS2 to become the dominant Madden console, though to be fair, the Playstation “vote” (just under a million, total, in the first month of sales) was split between the PS2 and the PS3. The total copies sold in the first month for the Xbox 360 platform was 896,600. There were 6.3 million possible American consoles that could have booted up the title – so 14% of all possible owners went out and bought it. Finally, the 360V number – 4.17% of all Xbox owners were playing on launch day.

Now, to translate that into raw numbers, there was a 2% increase in actual numbers of people playing on day one. (I’ve long held the theory that as console penetration into the basements across the country increases, the number of hard core, wait in line, first day players does not necessarily increase by much. This number would seem to bear that out.)

Madden 09:  Well, it’s only been out for three days. If you think we’re setting up a future column, you’re entirely right. But let me finish the set up – We’re looking at more than 12 million Xbox 360s, now. The percentage of GamerDNA members playing on launch day has dropped a hair from last year – but in terms of actual numbers, the number people people who were psyched enough for the new Madden to play on the first day is not quite double the Madden 08 numbers. Darn close, though. The early sales numbers are on track to take the franchise over a million copies for the Xbox alone in the first month of sales.

Before I get to my point, I’m going to show my age and bring up something that was widely discussed three years ago. (Three years in internet time is an EPOCH.) When the NFL signed the deal with EA, granting exclusive rights to use NFL tags and names, people widely predicted the end of decent American football games. The lack of competition, it was thought, would stifle any innovation. Without incentive to improve, why should EA bother making improvements? When the exclusive nature of the NFL’s approval was extended to 2012, more handwringing ensued.

I always thought the whining was a little silly. The ability for other companies to make American football games distinguished by features and game play as opposed to brand names and recognizable jerseys was not hindered. True, most people prefer brand names. This is why people still buy Cheerios instead of Toasted O’s.  The fact that people will actually download the Brett Favre patch, and print off the cover art update reflecting the fact that this overpaid jock is now wearing a DIFFERENT COLOR is proof of the incredible advantage EA has by being able to control the actual NFL images. But if they had just perched on the high ground, making no effort whatsoever, a competitor would have sprung up by now, similar to what you see in the world of Actual Football (i.e. soccer). All things being equal, people will choose Cheerios over Toasted O’s, and people will even choose Cheerios that cost five bucks a box over two dollars for Toasted O’s, but people will not pay five dollars for a box of monkey crap if two dollar oaty goodness is available. That kind of circle of life would lead the NFL towards changing franchise holders in 2012.

Madden 09 is not monkey crap in a box. In fact, it’s getting great reviews, the best of the three titles I’m looking at today. That excitement is what’s driving the excellent early returns.

So why am I yawning?

Well, because I feel like I’m watching the wealthy offspring of a well-connected family skate through life with a gentleman’s C and a coke habit. When you’ve got all the advantages, how the hell do you NOT show dramatic annual improvement? The Madden franchise has had an exclusive for three years. There’s an entire crop of gamers out there that doesn’t even realize there are other American football console games. Furthermore, the Xbox has finally started to hit its sales stride as the early versions of the console fade from memory. That old saying “born on third base, but people think he hit a triple” applies. Sorry, but initial hot sales are the minimum standard here. Given the tremendous growth of the console market, the great reviews, the widespread brand recognition, and the rest? Anything less than a million copies of the Xbox version is a failure.

Check back with us in a month!  Meanwhile, tell me what you think of Madden 09, and the rest of the Madden franchise.