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Several months after the August 14, 2007, release of the latest installment of popular football game Madden NFL 2008, EA Sports has revealed some of the features planned for next year's version.
In a press conference held on October 12, EA announced that Madden 2009 would include better graphics, more depth, and a revolutionary dog-fighting mini-game.
"We want Madden '09 to be the most realistic game possible. This is what people do in the off-season. Dog fighting is football," said an EA spokesperson.
He went on to add, "We've focus grouped this. People love it. They love the depth that this mini-game offers. You might think it's just two dogs fighting each other, sometimes to death, but there's really a lot of strategy involved. What dog are you going to choose? How often are you going to feed it? How often are you going to breed the dog? How can you make it a killing machine? There are thousands of possibilities. That's even before you choose which moves to use during the fight. We envision that a large online community will revolve around competing against other 'breeders' across the world."
Some groups are very vocal in their response to the inclusion of this feature.
"This game is absolutely horrible," commented a PETA spokesperson. "You can barely see the look on the defeated dogs' faces. You call these next-gen graphics? Show me a dog-fighting game when it can deliver high-def immersion and then I might play it."
Before the close of EA's press conference, they provided a small glimpse of the future. They showed a small clip of a man injecting a teammate with a syringe. The words "Juice Mode: Coming Soon" appeared over the image. The crowd went wild with excitement. We then got our hands on a trial copy of the game.
After getting a chance to play, it's definitely the best Madden yet. When it releases in August 2008, people across the world will truly get to enjoy the dog days of summer.
