NCAA Football 2008

Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: Tiburon
Genre: Sports
Release: July 17, 2007
Platforms: Playstation 2, Playstation 3, Xbox, Xbox 3600, Wireless

Reviewer: Dan

Yes, it’s true. I’m one of those people who each year goes out and buys NCAA Football and Madden each year and at full price. I’ve been doing this since the 2002 cycle, so I’ve seen my share of improvements and mistakes to come to the series. This review is not a review of the entire game. Far from it. This is a review of the changes that I’ve noticed, good or bad, from NCAA Football 2007. It would be next to pointless to review the gameplay as a whole, since it really hasn’t changed since it was first developed. And in my opinion, why try to fix what isn’t broke? Anyway, let’s go over the positive changes.

The first thing you will notice is what is now not there during the loading screen. Before, there used to be a little clip of some cheerleaders or some drunk college students yelling out “EA Sports, If it’s in the game, it’s in the game,” the catchphrase for all EA Sports releases. I would always just skip through this to get to the game faster because there really weren’t enough of them to not repeat after a short while. It also had a problem with, and I thought this only happened to slow PC’s, lag. The videos would sometimes struggle to play properly on my PS2, which made me want to skip them even more. You may think that all of this is just a small detail, but when you had to deal with it every time the game starts, I think not having it in 2008 is a good thing.

To be honest, I don’t really play any other mode other than the dynasty mode. For those of you who don’t know what that is, it’s the mode of gameplay where you pick a team and you run everything about it for 30 seasons. That includes recruiting, training, playing, and all other decisions and processes that go into running a college football team. EA really didn’t change much from 2007 to 2008, but what they did change was a big swing for the better. The one subtle change from last year was the player promises option in coaching options. When trying to get the next big thing out of high school to come to your program, you can occasionally promise them either a position or playing time so that they are more likely to attend your school. During the first season using this, I was able to get the top three recruits of their respective positions to come to my school. This feature adds another nice bit of realism to the game.

But by far the best addition to the dynasty mode would have to be the training. For years, Madden always had in their dynasty mode a training camp option. In Madden, training camp allowed you to use your game skills to boost your player’s ratings so that they perform better on the field. And for years, this was always left out of NCAA Football. NCAA Football always relied on (almost) random boosts to player ratings between seasons, and in a smaller way, still does. However, the 2008 version has a huge amount of spring drills you can run to help boost player stats. It has far more drills than Madden and it is actually easier to obtain the maximum amount of ratings boost per drill. Granted, some drills are hard, but they are all doable unlike the Pocket Presence dill after any difficulty other than rookie.

The gameplay has a few new little features, although none to really get excited about. There are new plays that are designed from the start to put a receiver or a back in motion (if you have no idea what I’m talking about, tough cookies) by default. While I was hesitant to put this as a positive, it is now actually hard to run against good run defense and easy to run against poor run defense. It may seem odd that I was hesitant, but I’ll explain later. Another nice new feature is the position motivation system. When a defensive back makes a big interception, it increases their motivation, which increases their ratings, which increases their performance on the field. Same thing holds true for defensive linemen getting a big sack or linebackers throwing a big hit on the ball carrier. The offense gets boosts too. A tough catch by a receiver boosts their stats, while a long run by a back will boost the runningbacks, tight ends, and the offensive line. But overall, besides a few more defensive player-audibles you can call, they really haven’t changed gameplay that much from last year. As I said before, why fix what isn’t broke? Unfortunately, there are a few broken aspects to the game.

Now, I’ve never had any huge complaints about the non-gameplay aspects of the NCAA Football series. In fact, my one gripe with this aspect of the game was solved when the decided to add the spring drills to the dynasty mode. My big complaints all show up in the gameplay of NCAA Football 2008. Remember how I said I was hesitant to say that it was an improvement that it was hard to run against certain defenses? Well, this year it can be frustratingly hard. It is really obnoxious for two reasons. First, the computer almost cheats each time you want to run the ball. Meaning, if you are trying to run left, the computer defense all shifts to the left and crowds that half of the line. When you try to run over there, it isn’t that they may have a good defense; it’s simply the fact that there are more tacklers than blockers on that side. I wouldn’t gripe so much if the defense was just better than my offensive line, but even terrible teams can shut down your running game. The second problem with the running is the static nature of the route. Let me explain. For example, let’s say in Madden you call a run to the left and the defense shifts that way. There is a very nice feature that when you move the right thumbstick (Assuming PS2) right, the running route that your running back takes will do a mirror image and he will run to the right. This allows you to read the defense and adjust accordingly. NCAA Football never had this feature, and unfortunately, doesn’t break that trend with 2008. It is so frustrating to see most of the defense flood to the side of your run and there is nothing you can do about it. Sure, there is the flip play audible you can call, but it usually causes the defense to shift as well.

There are some problems with the quarterback control as well. They did add the nice feature of being able to avoid sacks by dancing around in the pocket. I prefer the tried and true method of just passing the ball before I get sacked. After watching how many times the computer quarterback avoids my pass rushers, you would think you would have enough time to throw when a defender is a few yards away. In most cases, you’d be wrong, very wrong. There have been times when I’ll press a button to pass, my QB will get most of the way through the passing animation, then tuck in the ball and take the sack. It’s so bad that at times I just want to throw my controller. I’m only this mad about it because it has always been a problem and still isn’t fixed. There is no reason I should be taking 8 sacks a game when I play like Dan Marino (Ask someone who knows football well and they’ll explain). My one other complaint about the QB control is another one that still isn’t fixed. Sometimes when I snap the ball and don’t start moving my QB right away, it will automatically throw the ball right off the snap. This isn’t always bad. Sometimes, it results in a completion, but most of the time it results in a very poorly thrown ball and usually is intercepted. Now, maybe there is a way to turn this off, but I sure haven’t found it.

Final Verdict

I’ll be honest and say that there really are enough improvements to this version of the game to go out and buy a copy. The fact that I have some sort of power over how my players’ progress is a huge plus. If you just play random games here and there, then your older copies should do just fine, but if you enjoy the dynasty mode and enjoy growing your team from a powderpuff to a powerhouse, then NCAA Football 2008 has enough improvements to make it worthwhile. I’ll give the improvements 7 out of 10.