Madden NFL 07 Mobile unleashed

Okay, so most of us Brits aren't exactly clued up when it comes to American football. After all, it's just another U.S. stop-start sport played by men too wussy to do without the helmets and padding and play rugby, innit? (Letters to the usual address...)

Actually, there are plenty of gridiron fans in the UK, as shown by the popularity of EA's Madden franchise down the years, and those are the people who'll be getting excited by EA's announcement of the mobile version of Madden NFL 07 at E3 last week.

Due out in August, Madden NFL 07 boasts slinky 3D graphics, proper 11-on-11 player action, and officially licensed players, kits and logos from all 32 NFL teams. You can play a seven or 16 game season or just dive into a single match, and to keep the armchair strategists happy there's more than 50 plays to choose from.

More importantly, at E3 I rushed over to the EA stand, passed the console demo pods, bust through the line of people queuing to play Orcs & Elves and, er, touched down at the demo version of Madden NFL 07 (before being carted off by the metaphor police).

From what I saw, the game plays really smoothly, both in terms of selecting plays, and the action itself. Of course, the latter was just a bundle of waving limbs and shouting as far as I was concerned, but nearby Americans assured me that it plays well too. (Apparently, it's one of the first mobile games to feature proper motion-capture. Cor!)

Madden NFL 07 is out in August in the US to tie in with the console version, so fingers crossed for a similar release date here. Click "Track It!" to ensure you're not left out of the huddle when it arrives.