Alright, those who had any idea EA Sports's winter titles would offer what it does please raise your hand. Wait, why is everyone raising their hand? You mean you knew that Live would be just average and NHL would be very good? Well would you have guessed that NHL 08 has become an early contender for Sports Game of the year? I'd also like to chalk up Live in the category for most improved; although I'm not quite sure you should give that to a game that went from suck to stink.

EA Sports's two major winter franchise staples, NBA Live and NHL, are both on store shelves and both have had different reactions from the game "experts" across the land. NHL is widely considered one of the best sports games this year (group DSM in that category) and Live is considered the second, if not third best basketball game on the market. Ouch.

While I was covering Live this past weekend I could not wait to get it over with and move on to NHL, which I was eagerly waiting to play. The list of things wrong with Live this year isn't nearly as long as last year, but the list is far from getting to the range where it could be considered as short as NBA 2K8's. So let's just be clear here.

Live isn't a terrible game, it's just not anything special. People who have no idea about basketball will enjoy the game immensely because the game on the court is relatively shallow and easy to pick up and play. It does the basics reasonably well but it's lousy if you are an NBA enthusiast.

The main problem with Live is that the teams don't play their true styles of play. While the court is spaced well enough the off-ball movement is below average, and  in general there are some major issues to work around in the game.

If you are shopping for a basketball title and you pick up Live you have bought into the brand and not the game, because honestly 2K Sports's game is so much better than Live that it really isn't fair to compare the two.

But if the subject is switched to video game hockey, EA's NHL 08 turned the tables by completely destroying 2K Sports's NHL 2K8 this year. I rented 2K's version and played a few games and the games shouldn't even be mentioned in the same breath. The same things that EA did wrong with Live it did right with NHL.

NHL 08 is an absolute blast to play. I can honestly say that 20 games into my franchise I have seen new ways to win and lose and I have not once felt like I could be doing something better with my time. Just how good is NHL? Well let's just put it this way, At this rate I will not be buying Halo 3 anytime soon -- and for those that know me, I'm a major FPS enthusiast on top of my rabid sports enthusiasm.

I ripped EA for Live and now I'm going to praise them for NHL. This game is my early favorite for Sports Game of 2007. I have not had this much fun with a sports game in some time, and it's a good thing that I feel like I'm not playing a steaming pile of garbage that hasn't changed in 7 years -- a common feeling when playing other sports franchises.

Hopefully the rest of EA takes notice and games like Madden, NCAA, and Live are all up to NHL's standard for next year. My betting side of me says to take the favorite though and bet against that happening.