Madden 2005 Sells Over 1.3 Million in 1st Week

[MarleyMon81]

1.3 MILLION (AND COUNTING) COPIES SOLD

MADDEN NFL 2005 Sets A New Personal Record for First-Week Sales

The first-week sales figures are in, and even the folks at EA SPORTS can hardly believe it. But the latest version of the best-selling pro football video game franchise, Madden NFL 2005 sold more than 1.3 million copies in its first week of release. That's 1,300,000 in just 7 days, or for you stat-junkies at home, an average of 185,714 games sold per day since August 10th.


Sure, there was no doubt that sales would be strong, since pre-orders for Madden NFL 2005 were running much higher than in 2003 -- when, incidentally Madden NFL 2004 was the best-selling video game of the year. But national retailer GameStop says Madden NFL 2005 is already one of its best-selling games ever.
Apparently one of the big draws, in addition to the incredible gameplay and new features, is the online competition. With more than 315,000 consumers signing up for online accounts to play both Madden and NCAA Football 2005 on the PlayStation®2 and Xbox Live™ players know that they will not be lacking for competition anytime or anyplace.

The Madden NFL Football franchise has been the dominant player in the pro football video game field for years, often being compared to an 800-pound gorilla, but it was expected to see its stiffest competition yet this year.

ESPN NFL 2K5 -- the game that dropped its price to an unprecedented $19.99 -- sold just under 800,000 units in the month of July. Sure, that number is a lot higher than in year's past, but it's no 1.3 million in a week! It just goes to show, you really do get what you pay for.

[Buczilla]

That's pretty cool.


But I disagree with the statement about ESPN. It is still a great game....the number of copies sold don't determine how good the game is. Most people don't bother researching games, so they just buy the one that has a more dominant reputation.

[bucsfan9740]

i knew madden would easily beat ESPN in sales. ESPN is good, but madden is great

[Bucfather]

i knew madden would easily beat ESPN in sales. ESPN is good, but madden is great

Madden is not great. It's the same gameplay and has the worse graphics ever. IMO the game took a step back. EA heard the complaints about too much offense last year so they beefed up the defense this year. I played the game for a week and took it back. The only thing that changed on the defense is the audibles. The players still react the same, the only difference is that the coverage is tighter so you cant complete a pass with 3 defenders on a receiver. Good job EA, it took you all these years to address that.

As far as sales numbers go. Lets compare apples to apples. Madden is sold on 3 consoles: xbox, ps2, and gc. It is also sold for the PC. Espn is only sold on ps2 and xbox. Espn only sold 400K units last year. This year it doubled its sales by selling over 800K. Thats a 50% increase and its a major achievement. Has Madden ever seen that kind of a yearly increase. I think not.

You EA loyalists/Madden fanboys are funny. "Madden sold 1.3 million copies so that means its the greatest ever." Get a clue.

[Dwight Smith]

Madden is not great. It's the same gameplay and has the worse graphics ever. IMO the game took a step back. EA heard the complaints about too much offense last year so they beefed up the defense this year. I played the game for a week and took it back. The only thing that changed on the defense is the audibles. The players still react the same, the only difference is that the coverage is tighter so you cant complete a pass with 3 defenders on a receiver. Good job EA, it took you all these years to address that.

As far as sales numbers go. Lets compare apples to apples. Madden is sold on 3 consoles: xbox, ps2, and gc. It is also sold for the PC. Espn is only sold on ps2 and xbox. Espn only sold 400K units last year. This year it doubled its sales by selling over 800K. Thats a 50% increase and its a major achievement. Has Madden ever seen that kind of a yearly increase. I think not.

You EA loyalists/Madden fanboys are funny. "Madden sold 1.3 million copies so that means its the greatest ever." Get a clue.


Are you actually getting mad that someone likes Madden more than ESPN? I am one of the people who doesn't give a crap about the graphics as long as the gameplay and the controls are good. I care about the core game and not all the bells and whistles. In my humble opinion, Madden is far ahead of ESPN in that area. I have played both games (I actually planned on getting just ESPN, but after playing it for a few weeks I quickly realized it wasn't the game for me). I got sick of having only a few offensive and defensive vanilla plays in ESPN, and I thought the gameplay lacked, especially in the passing game.
I like Madden better, if that makes me a "fanboy" so be it.
But I understand other people might not feel that way. I sure as heck won't tell people to "get a clue" if they don't agree with me, that's just idiotic.

[bucsfan9740]

Are you actually getting mad that someone likes Madden more than ESPN? I am one of the people who doesn't give a crap about the graphics as long as the gameplay and the controls are good. I care about the core game and not all the bells and whistles. In my humble opinion, Madden is far ahead of ESPN in that area. I have played both games (I actually planned on getting just ESPN, but after playing it for a few weeks I quickly realized it wasn't the game for me). I got sick of having only a few offensive and defensive vanilla plays in ESPN, and I thought the gameplay lacked, especially in the passing game.
I like Madden better, if that makes me a "fanboy" so be it.
But I understand other people might not feel that way. I sure as heck won't tell people to "get a clue" if they don't agree with me, that's just idiotic.
way to tell it like it is... I agree ;)

[SN4]

Madden is not great. It's the same gameplay and has the worse graphics ever. IMO the game took a step back. EA heard the complaints about too much offense last year so they beefed up the defense this year. I played the game for a week and took it back. The only thing that changed on the defense is the audibles. The players still react the same, the only difference is that the coverage is tighter so you cant complete a pass with 3 defenders on a receiver. Good job EA, it took you all these years to address that.

As far as sales numbers go. Lets compare apples to apples. Madden is sold on 3 consoles: xbox, ps2, and gc. It is also sold for the PC. Espn is only sold on ps2 and xbox. Espn only sold 400K units last year. This year it doubled its sales by selling over 800K. Thats a 50% increase and its a major achievement. Has Madden ever seen that kind of a yearly increase. I think not.

You EA loyalists/Madden fanboys are funny. "Madden sold 1.3 million copies so that means its the greatest ever." Get a clue.
LOL....a ESPN "fanboy" calling other people "fanboy's". Aahhh...the irony.


Oh yeah..and before I forget. What did ESPN sell for last year? 50 bucks? So this year, they are selling it for 20 bucks (or 40% of last years price).

Guess what...Sega's plan is KINDA working.... the 50% increase this year is due to the drop in price (god knows that is the ONLY reason I purchased that worthless game). But if you compare this years sales (in dollars, not in volume), they are still at a loss...and I expect that they will have an insanely difficult time covering what sales they need to cover to make a significant profit off of this years edition.

Now that is what I call a BRILLIANT buisness move. If I were a stock holder with Sega, I would be ****ed at this....but that is me.

(ps, with bombs in the past like Sega Saturn and DreamCast as well as other crap produced, I wouldn't buy stock in them anyway...but that is me).

[PersistentBuc07]

madden unsurprisingly whooped ESPN. i gatta give ESPN props, its replays, halftime shows, and summaries better tehn madden. event he graphics are slightly better. but the gameplay lacks so much. sure madden may not be as pretty but its teh game to get for TRUE football fans taht want a REAL game.

wen is teh updated roster coming out? (w/ tim borwn)

[HookemBucs]

i knew madden would easily beat ESPN in sales. ESPN is good, but madden is great

I don't disagree that Madden is a little better. What I disagree with is how you guys are measuring it. Madden is proven to be better because it sells more? That's a weak argument. Madden would outsell ESPN even if it put out the worst game in its history because it has the name Madden. It's just like in music... the best albums usually aren't the ones with the best sales. The ones with the best sales are the ones with a name, but that doesn't necessarily translate into good music.

I like both games. The deciding factor for me with Madden is more flexibility, such as the ability to change the direction of plays on offense. That said, ESPN is far superior in graphics and is really close as an overall package. The gap is closing quickly, and the amount of sales for each game does little to prove or disprove each game's value. As I said earlier, EA Sports could release the worst game ever and it would still immediately sell a million copies if it had the name Madden on it.

[DUTCH IS BACK]

I just ordered Madden 2005 and I hope I'll get it Sept. 16th, the day before my birthday :biggrinre . What a great gift that would be.

[bucsfan9740]

I just ordered Madden 2005 and I hope I'll get it Sept. 16th, the day before my birthday :biggrinre . What a great gift that would be.
you will be satisfied ;)

[jls-bucs]

I've pre-ordered my PC copy for it's September release :) ....and I admit that living in Australia, I actually got most of my knowledge of football from the Madden series.

[wtmcgee]

LOL....a ESPN "fanboy" calling other people "fanboy's". Aahhh...the irony.


Oh yeah..and before I forget. What did ESPN sell for last year? 50 bucks? So this year, they are selling it for 20 bucks (or 40% of last years price).

Guess what...Sega's plan is KINDA working.... the 50% increase this year is due to the drop in price (god knows that is the ONLY reason I purchased that worthless game). But if you compare this years sales (in dollars, not in volume), they are still at a loss...and I expect that they will have an insanely difficult time covering what sales they need to cover to make a significant profit off of this years edition.

Now that is what I call a BRILLIANT buisness move. If I were a stock holder with Sega, I would be ****ed at this....but that is me.

(ps, with bombs in the past like Sega Saturn and DreamCast as well as other crap produced, I wouldn't buy stock in them anyway...but that is me).

well the problem with dropping the price to 20 bucks is this:

what happens if (when) they try to raise the price back closer to $50? people will go nuts. i bought this game, because madden wasn't out yet, and ESPN was there for 20 bucks. i thought i'd give it a whril. if it were 50 bucks, no way i'd ever do that.