Electronic Arts today announced an exclusive deal with the National Football League, one in which the company will be the only provider of NFL licensed products that contain the leagues players, teams and stadiums. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The deal, which spans five years, means that EA titles might be the only officially licensed NFL football games on the market during the duration of the agreement.

"The five-year agreements will usher NFL fans through the console technology transition with new ideas and innovative game play experiences," said EA CEO Larry Probst. In a statement issued earlier today, the company also stated that "For the first time, all aspects of the interactive experience - including console-based fantasy football features and handheld game devices - will be fully integrated within one EA game," This suggests that handheld connectivity and fantasy football features will be involved in the company's future plans for their NFL-licensed products.

The agreement comes as harsh news for EA's strongest competitors, developer Visual Concepts and publishers Sega Sammy Holdings and Take-Two Interactive Software, who are responsible for the resurging ESPN series of football games. The ESPN lineup, which included ESPN NFL 2K5, was discounted this year to the budget price of $19.99 as the gap of units sold between market leader EA (Madden) and the ESPN series closed to a margin of 1.5- to- 1 as opposed to previous years' margins of 10-to-1.

"We started talking about this months before the ESPN product even hit the shelves," Gene Upshaw, director of the NFL Players Association, stated. "It's been an ongoing dialogue about what can we do in this category to make it better for all of us."

Probst also stated the company plans to utilize the exclusive NFL license outside the popular Madden and NFL Street brands, but did not disclose any information regarding the new products.

No official statement has come from Sega, Take-Two or Visual Concepts regarding the deal, but shares of Take-Two fell nearly 7 percent to $33 in after-hours trade on Inet from a $35.42 Nasdaq close after the Electronic Arts/NFL deal was announced.

The deal is exclusive to consoles, handheld gaming devices and the PC, leaving publishers of cell phone-based and fantasy football products (like THQ) unaffected.