It’s August, and as every sports fan knows, that means football is right around the corner. What better way to get ready for our favorite teams to take the field again than play this year’s installment of Madden, which is exactly what I got to do this week. Madden ’09 is more than just a reiteration of a yearly staple: it’s arguably a return to the glory days of Madden past.

When you first start Madden, you take part in one of its newest features: the Madden virtual trainer which tests your "Madden IQ" through a series of challenges. These challenges will test your skills in various aspects of the game, like passing, running, rush defense, pass defense, and receiving. The challenges start out being quite easy (for example, running single coverage routes against lackadaisical defensive backs) and become progressively harder, like attempting to run against three linebackers. Your performance on these challenges will set the difficulty level of your AI opponents, but don’t worry if you disagree with Madden’s assessment of your skills, or if you just want to take the easy route; the difficulty can be set the traditional way.

This personalized difficulty setting is not the only new adaptive feature in Madden ’09. Opposing teams will actually react to your play style -- blitz too much and you will get burned on a hot route, or try and grind it on the ground and you will see eight stacked in the box. This "Adaptive Difficulty Engine," as coined by Electronic Arts, is more than just the AI knowing your play calls or making miraculous interceptions. The game will actually be tailored to your ability level which adds to the replay value of this year’s Madden. Players who in past titles have refrained from playing on All-Madden mode because they could not handle the high powered offenses, but run up 500+ yard games against All-Pro defenses, will definitely enjoy this feature. For those players the game will be tailored in a way that they can have a competitive game by raising the AI’s defensive skill to match their prowess while not increasing the offenses to unbeatable levels.

The artificial intelligence is just the beginning of this year’s improvements. The highlight stick adds so much to running the ball that this year you will find yourself relearning the entire run game. Short cuts, juke moves, and shaking tackles can all be handled with the new improved highlight stick. You will need the upgraded highlight stick along with shifting blocking assignments and picking your holes to successfully run in Madden ’09.