Its Madden time again and the second HD version is all of the Madden goodness and frustration that Maddenites everywhere know and love and love to hate. First off, the game is beautiful and very, very true to life. Helmets reflect and shine just like they do on TV, the numbers on the jerseys show mesh and the satin sheen of the numbers, you can see individual blades of grass on the field. The attention to detail is very noticeable, players helmets get scratched, uniforms get dirty, and it seems like grass fields get worn as the game goes on. This game brings you in and wants you to feel all of the hits, wants your adrenaline to rush as you beat the cornerback for an 87 yard touchdown play, and wants to know what it feels like to have to shed three defensive linemen to get to open field. EA changes the game-play and features every year, and most of the improvements made this year are pretty good. Not only have they made the game more visually realistic, the game's speed is faster paced and not as sluggish as it has been in previous versions. The players move more responsive and more realtime which allows for better control of your player on both sides of the ball, better control of your wide receivers, and better control of your defensive players allowing you to lay the un-holiest of smack-downs on anyone that tries to score on you. The change of pace makes for a great football experience, but they have more than just a great football. Some of the features that they have added not only help make you feel more in the game, but help take you deeper into the NFL and they decided to throw in news from the rest of the sporting world as an extra bonus. One of the best features (which does require xbox live) is the "NFL News" and "Other Sports News" tabs that come up at the main game menu. The "NFL News" tab gives you video and text news and highlights from NFL Network and other sources for the each conference as well as the entire league. The "Other Sports News" tab gives you articles on every major worldwide sport including olympics as well as the top 30 videos, radio broadcasts, and text articles from around the world. Franchise mode is pretty much the same as its always been, but now you can have a fantasy draft, just incase you missed out on an online fantasy league. This is a really cool feature that I think should not change at all. I decided to start up a Dallas Cowboys team with fantasy draft on and the team I picked is: Vince Young--QB LaDanian Tomlinson--RB Reggie Bush--RB Lamont Jordan--RB Michael Irvin--WR Chad Johnson--WR Marvin Harrison--WR Steve Smith--WR Willie McGinest--OLB Just to name a few, and my team is not the highest rated in the league. The fantasy draft along with regular franchise mode and the returning superstar mode its pretty easy to have three seasons (at least) going on at once. There are however a few drawbacks. During the game and most importantly during the plays, the character switching is a little off and can make nailing the right guy a little more harder than it should be. The catch-up AI is good, sometimes too good and can make for some close and great games but also for some pretty ridiculous comebacks and collapses on your part. This is a great game so far and I haven't even played online yet. Great visuals, great true to life game-play, and good extra features with the addition of online play EA has once again lived up to the expectations demanded by Maddenites everywhere. Like Madden 04 this one is definitely a keeper. Great Job EA. Buy it, the replay value on this game is great and it will at least get you through until Madden 09. RANKING: 9 out of 10