All Pro Football 2K8 first details

John Elway. Rulon Jones. Karl Mecklenburg. Greg Kragen. Floyd Little.

What else do you need?

2K Sports finally announced some details on this summer's Madden-killer. No, not cardiac arrest brought on by a double turducken burger with extra cheese; I mean All Pro Football 2K8. First: the game is coming out for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. That sort of sucks (why not PlayStation 2 and Xbox?), but I just got a 360, and I recommend it.

Anyway, their website has a list of former players (mouse over the "Football Resurrected" graphic to see more clearly) who, I presume, will appear in the game. Aside from the aforementioned Broncos, you'll see studs like Walter Payton, Barry Sanders, Joe Montana, Johnny Unitas, and more. Check it out. Some members of the list (Kragen) seem pretty random, but considering 2K probably had to hunt down all these guys individually, I think they did an awesome job.

The thing is, they didn't really have any other options. When Electronic Arts snapped up the NFL license, they also made sure to make an exclusivity deal with the NCAA for college football games. EA also makes an Arena League game. Guess what? They have an exclusive deal for that, too. Even Bill Gates thinks these guys are anti-competitive. It was this, or high school football, I guess.

Madden NFL has featured legendary players as unlockables for years. Two problems, though, with its approach: one, you have to jump through hoops or play the game forever to get a specific player you want. I probably spent hours unlocking John Elway on Madden 2003, only to find out he was 6'4" with brown hair. Lazy bastards. And two, half of the legends happen to be Raiders from the late '70s for some reason.

Madden does the same thing with the best historic teams (like the 1985 Bears), which is too bad. Sadly, I imagine EA's exclusivity deal with the NFL would keep any historic teams and logos from appearing in All Pro Football 2K8.

Still, though, this game could be really cool, assuming everything else turns out. ESPN NFL 2K5 was clearly graphically superior to Madden 2005, and I think it surpassed Madden in gameplay. But EA's been developing games for the last few years while 2K's been sitting on the proverbial sidelines. I'm sure they've been working on this for a long time, but they're still at a disadvantage. It'll be interesting to see how well 2K can do on this effort.

(Did that sound unbiased? I hope not.)