NEW YORK -- At 12:01 a.m., as Monday night turned into Tuesday morning, Reggie Primus came bolting out of the GameStop store on 33rd and Broadway with a copy of Madden '06 in his hand.
"I can't wait to get home and play this," the 21-year-old Brooklynite proclaimed.
He was all smiles, even though he started the line by plopping down in his folding chair a little after 2:30 p.m. on Monday. Nine and a half hours later, 87 more people had joined the queue behind Primus, all of them forced to wait until the stroke of midnight to get their copies of this year's version of the sporting world's most popular video game.
Theo Moses, 44, planned to play all day Tuesday. He was going to call into work sick, but what he really has is "a bad case of Maddenitis."
Dasaon Wells, 23, said he'll use the day to get a jump on the competition -- his eyes on the $100,000 Madden Challenge prize, which includes a trip to Hawaii for the national champion.
As for Primus, his boss at Kmart isn't expecting him for two days -- admittedly the most important vacation of the year for the "Madden-oholic."
The launch of Electronic Arts' Madden NFL football game is the closest thing the sports world has to the release of a Harry Potter book. Over the next few weeks, hundreds of thousands of games will be shipped and bought, adding to the 43 million copies sold of Maddens past, dating back to its origin in 1989.
The game is the centerpiece of a booming business, which has experienced double-digit increases every year. Five years ago, sports video games accounted for about $900 million in sales, according to market tracking firm NPD Group. In 2005, that number could reach $1.5 billion.
How big is this game?
Rapper Snoop Dogg, while on tour in Europe, called EA offices to make sure he was getting his advance copy of the new Madden game. So did actor Vince Vaughn, who featured the company's NHL game in the movie, "Swingers."
Rumor has it that, in recent years, John Madden's agent (Sandy Montag) has been hounded with more requests to get guests into the "Madden Bowl" -- EA's exclusive party where players come to the Super Bowl host city to go head-to-head in a video game tournament -- than for tickets to the Super Bowl game itself.
Players complain about their in-game ratings. And they jump at the opportunity to be on the cover. In their six-year history of having a player on the cover, they have never had to go to their backup choice, according to Todd Sitrin, vice president of marketing for EA-Tiburon.
"This is the legitimization of your status in football from a commercial standpoint," said this year's cover athlete, Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb.
So it should come as no surprise that when Madden game producer Jeremy Strauser went to visit the training camp of his beloved Eagles in 2001, the roles of fan and idol were switched. When Strauser was introduced to running back Duce Staley, Staley reached for his cell phone and dialed up a friend.
"Yo," Staley said. "I got the producer of Madden here with me. Here, say 'hi.'"
The latest craze involving the Madden game is the competition among the artists to get into the game's sound track.
Three years ago, all the songs that made the cut were sought out by Steve Schnur, EA's worldwide executive of music and music marketing. This year, Schnur did absolutely no soliciting and had his choice of 3,000 songs to pick from.
It's no wonder, given the game-to-stardom stories of groups including Yellowcard and Jet, both of whom made their national debuts in Madden games and went on to multiplatinum success. This year's game features a group called Avenged Sevenfold, which was signed to a deal by Warner Brothers after appearing on Madden 2004.
Stanley Benton, aka Stat Quo, made his professional debut in EA's "Fight Night" three years ago. He was since signed by Eminem, and his song "Rock the Party" is in this year's Madden game.
"EA believed in me from the beginning," Benton said. "It's an awesome way to get out there in front of the kids."
"Ten years ago, artists would be jumping up and down the first time they heard their song on the radio," Schnur said. "Now, you've made it when you get into Madden."
And it's not just the up-and-comers.
Last year, Green Day timed the entire production schedule for the release of its single "American Idiot" so it could be included in the Madden game first. This year, a very well-known artist came to visit Schnur personally to play and pitch his song. He was beaten out by other familiar names, such as Rev Run and the Foo Fighters.
Games like Madden are such a big force in the sports industry that some insiders have wondered whether the attraction of the games themselves should be blamed for the decreased ratings in sports television viewing in the 12- to 34-year-old category. Executives who spend millions on sports sponsorship and advertising certainly have noticed the value of paying attention to the video game space. Reebok logos are more visible on the jerseys of the players in Madden than they are to the audience watching the actual games on television. Plus, the video game audience is a more captive, more targeted audience.
"We've spent a lot of research time and found out that a kid will see the content of a video game as many as 25 to 40 times as much as he'll watch television in a given day," said Reebok chairman and chief executive Paul Fireman.
One of the best ways to observe the rise of the Madden game is by looking at the growth of the company that produces it, Tiburon. The Orlando, Fla.-based company, which was purchased by EA in 1998, had 140 employees in 2001. But now, thanks in part to a Madden franchise, the company has 525 employees -- 200 of whom work on Madden.
"It's a phenomenal business," said Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who visited the Tiburon facilities Monday. "And it's not just minimum-wage jobs. They're paying some of these guys $80,000."
Bush is a Madden fan, and the company gave him a sample of his likeness in a Dolphins uniform.
Tons of letters flow in to Tiburon's offices from fans of Madden hoping to make the game their careers. Occasionally, things work out. Three years ago, Sitrin met a guy who called himself "D-Cast" at a Madden Challenge event in Tampa. "D-Cast" talked to Sitrin about how he thought the game could be made better. Sitrin invited him to EA-Tiburon's offices, and now the man (whose real name is Daniel Castorani) is an assistant producer for the game.
EA has put a clamp on the competition, buying the exclusive rights to the NFL for the next five seasons and striking a 15-year-deal with ESPN. Some consumers have voiced concerns that EA doesn't have the motivation to make major tweaks from year to year and can still get away with its $49.99 price point. But this year's Madden allows gamers to utilize a new quarterback "Vision Control" system. Users also have a chance to choose various agents who will guide their off-the-field life.
No doubt Primus, Moses and Wells -- the guys who stood in line at GameStop on Monday -- are trying them out on day one.
Said Bush: "These guys know what they're doing. There were only two sequels to 'The Godfather,' but EA has been doing Madden for 16 years."
Darren Rovell, who covers sports business for ESPN.com, can be reached at Darren.rovell@espn3.com. Insiders can find his sports biz blog here.