NCAA Football 10
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 Finally! A Worthy CPU Adversary |
| Review Date: July 29, 2009 |
| Reviewer: W. R. Stockstill Jr., Marietta, GA United States |
| EA Sports has finally made a challenging football game. Playing the CPU on Heisman mode is like playing last year's Madden on Your Level. The game now adapts to the way you play just like a real (good) coach does. You can't run that option over and over, you will get stuffed!
In addition to making CPU play harder and more realistic, there is a new mode called Season Showdown where you chose your favorite team and everything you do on and offline gets tallied toward an end of the season winner. In Season Showdown mode, you get points based on many categories including Skill (making certain plays yourself), Strategy (Choosing the upcoming play type while on defense and successfully stopping it), and Sportsmanship ( where good sports that don't go for it on 4th get points and those that do or run up the score get them taken away). There is also an online trivia component where you go to the EA Sports website and answer 10 trivia questions each week for points. During the season, each week you can play your team's game online against players from the other team to get points. You get points whether you win or lose, but you get more for winning. Season Showdown is a great way to show support for your favorite team and it also gives a rating so when you are in a lobby you can tell if someone who is participating in Season Showdown will go for it every 4th or not and if they know how to stop plays by looking at their Strategy rating. Teambuilder is another new mode where you can go to the EA Sports website and create your own school and design the uniforms, stadium and player names and attributes and then download it into the game. And you can use your Teambuilder teams in online dynasties, which is pretty cool. Online dynasties are better, you can now create a custom team conference by swapping your members teams with teams in an existing conference. For example you can swap all the Big 12 teams with all 12 of your dynasty member's teams. This makes it easier for scheduling user vs user games. They also fixed last year's bug where you talked a player into staying (from going to the NFL draft or transferring to another school) they and they still left. The recruiting process is more involved now, you can talk down other schools the recruit is interested ins attributes and you have a recruiting adviser that tells you when someone is ready to sign, is interested in your school or gets a call from a mom who tells some of a recruit's interests. The other new addition is Road To Glory, which has been in the game before but is vamped up with a video segment on your player after winning games that is hosted by Erin Andrews, who discusses your play during the game with Herbstriet and shows auto saved highlights from the game. Look for a similar video show presentation in Madden NFL 10 which will have a video show for the online leagues showing highlights from members of the leagues teams each week. PROS Season Showdown - It has brought a new sense of competition to the game, where everything you do helps your favorite school in the rankings. Adaptive CPU Play - You have to really be on your toes to win against the CPU on Heisman mode now. All American mode is as hard as Heisman in NCAA Football 09. Road to Glory - Your player is now ranked so you can see how others playing on your favorite team are doing. Plus you get to see Erin Andrews. lol. Family Mode - This is another adaptation from Madden, which has an easy mode. Now, you can play a tough game against grandma. Family mode is a very simplified set of controls where even your sister can make a TD pass. So now, just about anyone can play and be good at it. PS3 Trophies - For the first time you get trophies for your game play. Tweaks to Graphics - Close ups are more polished, although most of the graphics are the same. Marching bands are now shown pre game and they have added additional uniform settings and TD animations (My team, USF, can now do the horns hand sign after TDs) Players Are More Realistic - No More sub 4.3 40 yard dash players. Speed is not as much a factor as ability to catching or running through a tackle. Ability to Tweak Team Play - Now you can tweak how your D and O play on different aspects such as blocking or tackling, with choices being Aggressive, Normal, And Conservative. Cons EA has now gone the money route. Additional items, like "Dynasty Accelerators" where you get things like an extra pipeline state in Dynasty Mode you have to play for, WITH REAL MONEY! You want to be a 5 star high school recruit in Road To Glory? You can pay for it now, 2 bucks. If you lost your manual for the game, you won't be able to download your Teambuilder team to the game without paying for it. And if you want to download other teams you have to pay for each team. Its not quite as bad as they have done with Tiger Woods Golf, but look for more of it in future additions depending on how successful they are this year. Adaptive CPU Play - I know, I said it was a Pro, but its both. I am seeing players struggling in Dynasties that are set at Heisman mode, good players. When someone is ranked high against other players (top 1000) plays a game against the cpu in Heisman mode with Penn St and loses to Akron, you know something is wrong. Luckily, the CPU sliders are still included in this addition. Sliders can be adjusted to so that CPU and User play can be adjusted, like increase the likelihood your receiver will catch balls or your QB will throw more accurately. Graphics and Presentation - While I know that they have worked more on game play and features this past edition, it would be nice to see a better presentation. Not all the mascots are in 2010 yet, there are more in the PS2 version. Many of the lines of the commentators are the same they have used for several versions now. The graphics are pretty much the same, although you get a glimpse of some better graphics during the brief close ups after plays. Putting your D on Aggressive Stripping the Ball results on face mask penalties on just about every play. Its pretty much useless. The video is pretty repetitive in Road To Glory. Heck Erin doesn't even have a wardrobe change. It would be nice to see her change wardrobe, and spice up the video some. Overall, great improvements to last year's game. Much of this is because Tiberon, who makes the game for EA Sports, let seasoned NCAA gamers have a day with the game early enough in development to get input and use it to change and tweak the game before it was shipped. They also did this to Madden this year. UPDATE: The more I play Madden, the less I like NCAA 10. Why? On the harder settings its like work. And conversely, Madden is pretty fun, even when you are losing. On the harder settings in NCAA 10, one mistake can cost you the game. The game presentation is boring and rather dull compared to Madden. Even though I am #1 for my school in Season Showdown, I still am considering selling my copy. Hopefully next year EA Sports will take the things that work in NCAA 10 and Madden separately and include them in both of next year's offering. |
| This is great portable college football!! |
| Review Date: September 19, 2009 |
| Reviewer: David L. Rogers, California, USA |
| If you have a PSP and are a fan of college football, I definitely recommend buying this game. I hadn't played any of the previous versions of this game for PSP, but I read some good reviews for the 2010 version and decided to pick it up. This is a great game, it is loads of fun to play at home or on the go. The last version of NCAA football that I played was 2007 for PS2 and this game is more fun than I remember that one being. The graphics are almost as good, with some details being sacrificed resulting in some generic stadium architecture, no refs and players on the sidelines, and you can't zoom in/out during replays. It doesn't really matter though, because the graphics and animation are great where it counts - for the 22 players on the field. Great animation, great control, bright and colorful graphics, and even real fight songs (although I wish my team's song played more often). The best thing that this has over the console version is that you can play it during TV commercials while watching live college football games (if you only have one TV, that is). Another great feature is being able to tweak the AI in fifteen different categories (for your team and the computer's team) in case you feel that the receivers are dropping too many passes, the defense is intercepting too many passes, or kick/punt returns for touchdowns are too easy. Even if you're dominating your opponent, it's still fun because you'll want to run the score up to help your team move up in the poll rankings. This game is a ton of fun, reminds me of playing Tecmo Bowl on the NES - it's great to mix up passing and running plays (and option plays) to put together some very nice offensive drives. The one control problem is more due to the PSP's design than the game - when I hold my PSP at a comfortable angle for viewing/holding, it's awkward to push the "L" button, which is usually one of your receivers on the left side of the field on pass plays. But it's not too bad and doesn't ruin the game, it just takes some getting used to if you have the same issue with how you hold the PSP. The loading times for the UMD can be a little annoying, but usually you don't mind it because you use that time between plays to think about what offensive play or defensive scheme to use next. As with most EA sports games, all of the licenses are there - all the college football programs that matter (FBS and FCS teams), a good selection of mascot teams, and ESPN logos mixed in. Overall, an excellent game. I had avoided trying the prior year versions because of mediocre reviews I read about them, but 2010 is a winner and worth picking up. |
| An Unbiased Review |
| Review Date: February 19, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Michael Crawford, Toledo, OH |
| This will be short and sweet, for the benefit of those of you who just want an unbiased viewpoint on this product. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this particular game (a parent or grandparent buying this game for a child or grandchild, perhaps), it may be helpful to realize that this is a hotly debated item. Some people think it's amazing, others think Electronic Arts should be paying them to play it. In the end, however, "NCAA Football 10" is a neither perfect nor unplayable. It's a good game, nothing more.
There are several issues to consider when purchasing. First, and foremost, this game is best experienced with an internet connection. Highly advertised features such as "Teambuilder", a feature which allows the player to create a team to play as, is a web-based application (meaning it can only be accessed on a computer with an internet connection) which requires the player to download created teams from Xbox Live. Also, players will need to connect to the internet using the "EA Sports Locker" in order to download rosters other players have created (in this way, many people have cleverly circumvented the NCAA's rule on allowing collegiate athletes to be represented in video games. If you want authentic names in the game, you'll need the internet). Another important thing to note: this game is most thoroughly enjoyed when bundled with EA Sports' "Madden NFL 10". These two games interact with each other well, and purchasing "Madden" will provide continuity after the first game has run its course. "NCAA Football 10" has it's flaws, yes. But so does every video game. It is a thoroughly enjoyable experience, and one I would wholeheartedly recommend to any sports fan. |
- Practicing against an opponent's playbook during the week with up to 10 plays on offense in order to increase your chances against live competition.
- Experience the all-new Season Showdown, a career mode that includes Web-based games and a trivia challenges that sets players on the road to capturing the Heisman Trophy.
- The EA Sports TeamBuilder that allows you to build your favorite FCS, historical, or high school teams, and share them with the rest of the nation.
- An all-new play calling system featuring simplified game controls and playbooks makes NCAA Football 09 the most accessible college football game ever.
- Running back comboand other moves that allow you to set defenders like never before by stringing together multiple moves, including jukes, spins, and stiff arms.
