John Riccitiello, CEO of EA, spoke very directly about how EA feels of Take-Two trying to take on Madden with their own football title, All-Pro Football 2K8. EA considers to be a Take-Two a competitor, and takes it pretty seriously that Madden is being challenged by All-Pro Football 2K8.

“When you’ve got a competitor like Take-Two on the sports side, and they launch a football title using some of the industry legends, you want to make sure that ends up being a blip and is not repeatable, because we like to defend our franchises aggressively.”

Riccitiello was pretty to the point concerning Take-Two, but declined to explain what EA planned on doing to defend Madden’s position as the top football franchise. It will be interesting to see whether if EA simply means that they will advertise aggressively, or if Madden ‘08 itself has been improved in order to be a more appealing game for consumers.

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