After a few days of debating if I was going to buy NCAA Football 12 again this year, and deciding that I shouldn’t waste the $60 yet again, I went to the local Gamestop and bought it. Of course I traded in last years version as well as Madden. Why not? The new Madden comes out in six weeks and who cares that I really only had NCAA Football 11 for the draft rosters to import into Madden. So anyways, I get home, fire up the Playstation and quickly realize it will be a while before I can play, I had to update the PS3, then I had to download the update for the game, then of course I had to get the named rosters. No way am I even touching this game playing as QB #12. So after about an hour I finally got to the game.
Graphics: Nothing is really improved here. I mean certain helmets look cool. The Oregon and the new Washington State University silver helmets looked amazing but overall, the graphics are nothing special. The new dreadlocks look just like the hair from the WWE wrestling games, which is horrible. The grass was a big new addition and when you’re actually in the over head camera, looks exactly like it did in the last few editions. Basically, nothing special.
Grade: C-
Dynasty: Creating your own coach and having him in the coaching carousel is somewhat cool. It’s nice to be forced to met more goals than in years past and it’s fun to see coaches changing schools on a fairly regular basis. However, and this is a big however. Dynasty is almost impossible to play as a coach. By this I mean, someone who spends countless hours recruiting stars, getting the best possible depth charts and then simming to the next recruiting session. Now I know that the majority of you play every single game. That’s all good and dandy but for those of you that spend forever, recruiting that #15 HB, trying to convince him to come to your school and finally succeeding. You are in for a major disappointment. Too many times I recruited a four star stud, only to find out that he was in fact rated lower than some 3 star guy that I got weeks before. For example, I recruited the #20 HB, a 4 star speedster. I also recruited the # 45 HB, a balanced runner. I thought to myself, this four star guy will be my prize offensive weapon in a few seasons. Well here we are at the position change screen and what do I see? The four star recruit is rated 68 and the 3 star guy is a 69. How am I supposed to contend for the conference championship with that? Not only that, but the awareness ratings are low all across the recruiting board. Most guys are in the low 50′s making it impossible to win a simulated game.
Grade: F
Road To Glory: Create your player. Give him a position to play on each side of the ball, spend the next 10 boring hours playing nine high school games. Finally with that being over with you can select which school you want to attend and decide which position you ultimately want to play. There were a few changes in RTG mode but honestly, I couldn’t find the motivation to play too long because the horrible HS experience drained me of my will to play this mode.
Grade: D
When all is said and done, I highly regret getting this. Maybe when EA releases a patch in a few weeks (hopefully), the game will be much more enjoyable. The lack of anything really new and mesmerizing (well, besides the cool tackle animations) has put me in a bad mood yet again. I just hope Madden doesn’t disappoint me this year.
Overall Grade: D
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Paul Novak
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