Madden 09 is a pretty decent entry to the Madden franchise. It has a few updates on previous games, most of them positive. For a start, they removed the stupid vision cone. Additionally there are new animations and an excellent new mode called madden moments where you can play in famous NFL moments from history. This mode is great, but as it's included in future games, it isn't that special. What I would say makes Madden 09 stand out is how beginner friendly it is. You start of with a Madden IQ test to see how good you are at the game. Then you have the training modes to help you improve. The final new addition is the rewind button. Mess up a play and press x to go back and try again. Yes, this is basically cheating and I found myself accidently using it more than meaning to use it, but it's a nice feature to have for new players. Aside from these new features it's a fairly standard early madden affair. The gameplay is decent, if a bit arcadey and simple. It has a nice franchise mode and more game modes than the later online focused Maddens. Now, for these reasons, 09 doesn't really stand out from the next few games in the series. I can recommend it however if you want a nice entry point to the series.