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Cleveland Browns running back Peyton Hillis didn’t just win the Madden NFL 12 Cover Vote, he demolished his competition, Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick. The Madden NFL 2004 coverboy only managed to capture 34% of the vote to Hillis’ 66%. Hillis had an impressive 2010-2011 season, but this vote was clearly a huge upset.

All told, more than 12,000,000 votes were cast throughout the entire tournament and Hillis steamrolled some pretty hefty competition (including head-to-head victories over Ray Rice, Matt Ryan, Jamaal Charles and Aaron Rodgers).

Madden NFL 12 (with Peyton Hillis on the cover) will be released for the PS2, PS3, PSP, Wii and Xbox 360 on August 30.

And then there were two.

The voting for the Madden NFL 12 cover athlete is down to the end and only Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick and Cleveland Browns running back Peyton Hillis remain.

Hillis defeated the heavily favored Aaron Rodgers to reach the finals while Vick ended the cinderella dreams of Adrian Peterson. A Vick victory would give the formerly incarcerated quarterback his second Madden cover appearance while Hillis has run over some of the biggest names in pro football to reach the finals. I think it’s safe to say that few people picked either of these guys to make it this far.

Final round voting will continue from now until Monday, April 25. The winner will be announced on April 27th during ESPN 2’s “SportsNation.”

Rob Semsey, the Director of Public Relations at EA Sports, has tweeted that Madden NFL 12 will be released on August 30. Normally, the Madden series rushes stores during the middle of the month, but with this year’s labor problems between the NFL and the players union, perhaps the publisher wanted to give the development team at EA Tiburon a little more time before the season starts.

Semsey said the later release date was picked “to align closer to the start of the NFL regular season.”

Whatever the reason, the currently cover athelete-less Madden NFL 12 will be released for the PS2, PS3, PSP, Wii and Xbox 360 whether the lockout is resolved or not.

The third round of the Madden NFL 12 Cover Vote has come to a close and now only four names remain.

Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers emerged victorious over New England’s Danny Woodhead. He’ll face Peyton Hillis of the Cleveland Browns in the semifinals, who continued his cinderella run with a win over Kansas City’s Jamaal Charles.

The other half of the bracket includes Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick on top, Vick beat the 49ers’ Patrick Willis in round three. He’ll be challenged by Vikings wide receiver Adrian Peterson, who stomped Drew Brees with 62% of the vote.

Semifinal voting begins today and runs through April 17.

While most of us were pulling our hair out at how atrociously bad the Black Eyed Peas were last night, Ian Cummings, Creative Director of Madden NFL 12 (yes, Madden games have those) took some time out for the fans during half time to blog about some of the game’s new features. One was the input shown above where A, A, B on the 360 controller executes a surprise onside kick. The other major feature is “Tuner Sets” – gameplay balances that were previously featured in past NHL and NCAA games that allows the developers to tweak the gameplay without the cumbersome process of getting Sony and Microsoft to approve a patch. This will probably save all of us a lot of time and go a long way in keeping online play fun and free from exploits.

More Madden NFL 12 information can be found at the Madden NFL developer’s blog.

With the exception of the NBA Elite debacle last year, EA Sports has really been impressing game critics with their last few rounds of iterations. Expect Madden NFL 12 to do the same when it releases later this year.