Hello. I'm new to this blog. People in the office call me Jorge. I've been around the EA-Tiburon offices since 2000. Like a lot of folks who work in the gaming industry I started in QA as a tester. A year and a half after starting with QA I moved in with the Marketing department. I took the screenshots and video you saw online, in magazines, and in TV commercials for all of EA-Tiburon's products.

Recently I've moved into more of a support role within EA SPORTS itself. I was asked if I wanted to contribute to the EA SPORTS blog with gaming commentary. It was made clear, my topics aren't to focus on sports or sports gaming, just gaming. This offer makes a lot of people in the office nervous because I tend to say things that would make me a PR nightmare, so I jumped at the chance.

For my first blog I'd thought I'd pull back the curtain and show you some information I provide internally here at EA SPORTS. Every month NPD provides sales figures for console hardware and software. It's kinda my favorite part of the month. So I take the information NPD releases and put in my two cents for folks to digest. Some people find it useful, some don't. Why the discrepancy? Even though NPD and I both look at the numbers by individual sku, folks in the industry really only care about combined sales. So X360 fanboys may want to chest bump over Borderlands selling more on their system, but Gearbox only cares that it sold a combined 531,000 units on both consoles (added to whatever it sold on PC).

Software

Sales are way down year-over-year. The strange thing is that even though the market is hurting, new IPs are breaking out. I think Borderlands is just another example of how shooter happy Xbox 360 owners are. Borderlands was dropped in-between ODST and Modern Warfare 2 and still sold a bunch.

1.       Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (PS3)

How does Naughty Dog lose their way with the Jax series and then make such an incredible game? Good for them.

2.       Wii Fit Plus (Wii)

$20 gets you a bunch of exercises only a soccer mom could love. Taking bets at my desk to how long this stays in the top ten.

3.       Borderlands (X360)

The game 'sent to die' knocks it out of the park. Now, somebody get Randy Pitchford his medication. He's become 2009's Denis Dyack.

4.       Wii Sports Resort (Wii)

Nintendo's plan to seed houses with MotionPlus devices is working. Now, what's the next game from Nintendo that'll actually use it?

5.       NBA 2k10 (X360)

I'm guessing there's about three hundred thousand fans who wish reviewers would have mentioned NBA 2k's online issues.

6.       Halo 3: ODST (X360)

ODST has sold 1.8 million units after two months. Less than half of what Halo 3 sold during the same time period. Not that anybody's counting.

7.       NBA 2k10 (PS3)

Wait, forgot to include PS3 owners. Make that half a million basketball fans who are having online issues.

8.       Forza Motorsport 3 (X360)

Better, cleaner, deeper . . . Turn 10 knocks it out of the park. But it's another example of sales that are lower than the previous version.

9.       Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (DS)

This brings its total to 370,230 copies after two months. Yoichi Wada has to be excited about that number.

10.   FIFA Soccer 10 (X360)

Whoa, there's soccer fans in this country?

11.   Demon's Souls (PS3)

How does the most hardcore game to come out this year sell so well? PlayStation 3 owners are an eclectic bunch. Odds 3D Dot Game Heroes does this well next year?

12.   Brutal Legend (X360)

An eye opener and a half. I'm halfway through this game and it's awesome. What's Tim Schafer got to do to get a winner on his hands?

13.   FIFA Soccer 10 (PS3)

You know what this proves? There are a higher percentage of soccer fans amongst PlayStation 3 owners than Xbox 360 owners. That's all.

14.   Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story (DS)

Almost four hundred thousand units in two months for a Mario RPG? Man, Nintendo must be glowing right now.

15.   WWE Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 (X360)

High review scores, strong marketing push . . . disappointing sales. Not a good time for THQ during their licensing contract negotiations either.

16.   Tekken 6 (PS3)

Yes, Tekken is historically a PlayStation franchise, but it's still always surprising when the PS3 is the lead sku. Sales being lower than WWE, though, is a real bad sign for them.

17.   Borderlands (PS3)

Proving once again that PlayStation 3 owners aren't into shooters like Xbox 360 consumers.

18.   Madden NFL 10 (X360)

Three months in and hanging tough. Can't wait to see fan reaction to playing Ultimate Team.

19.   Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of the Sky (DS)

This underwhelming first month of sales is only a hiccup for the popular brand. My guess is that poor reviews are likely keeping this Pokemon title down.

20.   Mario Kart Wii (Wii)

The lowest rated Mario Kart in history continues to sell even when Wii Play has disappeared off the chart.

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The latest Madden NFL 10 roster update is now available for download on XBL and the PSN. You can view the entire  Madden NFL 10 Roster Update #7 details here on the Madden NFL 10 site.

As a reminder Madden fans, we recently set up team specific threads in the Roster and Ratings section of the Madden NFL Forums where Madden NFL Ratings Czar Donny Moore is interacting and taking into consideration your thoughts on your team's ratings in Madden NFL 10. Is there a guy that you feel is over/under rated in the game? Now's your chance to let the guy making the decisions know.

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Year in and year out, we on the Madden team strive to deliver the most entertaining and authentic football experience a fan could hope for. Thanks to the online connectivity of the current consoles, we can take direct feedback from you all (the fans) and continue to improve the game after we ship it so you don't have to wait until next August.  This first Madden NFL 10 title update focused on improving online experiences as well as general gameplay tuning, additions, and improvements.

Downloading this update will fix a few random stability issues player's encountered in Online Franchise, address the false start grieving issue, and fix the video lag for players with latent network connections.  Players who have been uploading their highlights to share with the community will be happy to hear that the update will improve the quality of those videos.  Fans will be happy to hear that the "broadcast" camera angle was added to the game after a multiple year hiatus. Also of note, the Playoff and Super Bowl field conditions have been brought over into online franchise.  Finally, based on a ton of feedback, ranked games are now set to 7 minute quarters with accelerated clock turned on in order to get both teams a fair amount of possessions and more realistic stats.

We are also very excited about some of the gameplay fixes included in the update.  We did a good bit of tuning to broken tackles so that a big bull dozing back has a much better chance of running over a tiny defensive back, and smaller, weaker back has a much smaller chance of slipping away from 4 or 5 defenders.  The sliders for Break Tackle and Run Blocking are now more responsive, and you should also notice defenders benefiting from improved pursuit angles (especially on outside run plays). Fatigue will play much more of a factor affecting player ratings, adding even more strategy to managing your substitutions.  Special Teams got a little love too.  We fixed the incorrect spotting of punts out of bounds and adjusted the Run Blocking slider so that it doesn't affect your kick returns.  Holding calls on kicks have also been removed so that you don't end up having to kick 30 yard extra points or miss out on that game winning field goal.

We are fortunate to have such an extremely passionate (and vocal) fan base, and will continue to listen to your thoughts and suggestions as we continue to make Madden NFL 10 all it can be.  This first title update will NOT require you to restart your franchises in progress.

A complete list of the fixes for this first update (and current plans for the 2nd update) can be found on our new FAQ.