I bought my Madden '08 at launch, and found the passing to be far more difficult than '07, which I had JUST finished a Dynasty season on before playing '08. Decided to start a fresh franchise just two days ago, and haven't played it yet. That patch news sounds promising!!!
As for NBA Live '08, I just picked up a used copy from EB yesterday for $34. With it being $54.99, 25% off the used game coupon found here, and 10% more off with my edge card, I got PGR4, NBA Live 08, and Motorstorm for JUST over $100. My only complaint so far with Live is the Fantasy Draft with Dynasty mode. There is NO randomize button to resort the draft order like there has been in years past. And it seems cheesy to manually choose the draft order for the teams... but in the end that's what I did.
While I wouldn't have been as tempted to buy both at $40 each, they ARE fun games that I'd recommend at that price.