* Dynasty mode goes even more in-depth with added recruiting features to add to the realism
* New Heisman Campaign mode allows you to put past Heisman winners on your favorite team Cons * With only a few added catching/tackling animations the game play graphics remain void of change
* As is common in most sports games the announcers get quite redundant
* While adding the ESPN bottom line adds for realism, no other presentation changes are evident
Console: PS3 Date Released: 7/10/2012 Date Reviewed: 7/21/2012 Reviewer: Patrick Every year I have a tradition of buying three sports games in particular. Those games consist of 2K’s NBA 2k series along with EA Sports Madden and NCAA Football series. This year was not unlike years past with myself anxiously awaiting the release of the newest addition to the NCAA Football franchise from EA Sports. I love that each year the dev team implements changes that are designed solely to make the game look and feel more realistic than ever and realism is what I am all about. This year EA took the passing game to the next level and made it ultra realistic. Gone are the arcade style days when you could drop 20 yards back out of the pocket and throw across your body 60 yards downfield to a receiver who is being manned up and has a safety playing a 2 deep zone right on top of him and get a completion. In this year’s game if you try to do that you are likely to get sacked before you get the throw off and if you do get it off you are likely to get your pass knocked down or intercepted. It is this attention to detail and the constant strive for realism that keeps me hooked year after year. While the changes made in this year’s addition might not be up to par with what I was fully expecting, EA did more than enough to make this year’s game a welcomed improvement. Presentation : B Graphics / Animation / Sound EA Sports generally always does a great job of making their games look good, whether it’s tweaking the graphics engine, introducing a new tackling system or just adding more in-depth broadcasting presentation. Unfortunately this year the changes weren’t quite what I was hoping for. The broadcasting presentation gets a slight bump with the ultra realistic ESPN bottom line keeping track of all the scores in real-time or if you are in a Dynasty Mode it keeps up with the scores from within your dynasty instead of real life. Adding the ESPN bottom line also adds to the realism in making it feel as if you are actually watching and rooting for your favorite team on a Saturday afternoon from the comfort of your own man cave. Another graphics tweak that was made was with the actual game play. There have been hundreds of new catching animations added into the game to give the receivers a more realistic catching motion. The biggest thing I am disappointed in is that both graphically (aside from the small catching animation adds) and as far as the commentary goes you really wouldn’t know the difference between NCAA Football 12 and NCAA Football 13. So as a result of the lack of significant changes the best grade I could give the overall presentation would be a B. Single Player : A+ Game mechanics / Length / difficulty I am not a huge fan of video games with a direct story line (RPG’s) because I become bored and disinterested with the mundane predetermined story lines. I love sports games such as NCAA Football because you can dive into a Dynasty Mode. Pick your favorite school and not only get the endless strategic sports play out of it but also get the RPG effect of becoming the head coach of your favorite school and recruiting players to fit your desired system without any predetermined outcome. You control EVERYTHING, from the types of players you recruit for your school, to the approach you use to get those players even down to the morals you honorably uphold in following through on the promises you make to potential recruits. You get to maintain and build your dream program with your dream school. Whether you want to build a pro style run and gun offense or a zone schemed smash mouth 3-3-5 defense, you get the power to build virtual relationships with the players and recruits to mold your roster into exactly that, YOUR roster. And while recruiting is a huge part of the dynasty mode (which can be very difficult if your school isn’t a name brand such as USC or Ohio St.) and takes roughly 20-30 real-time minutes (just in recruiting alone) per simulated week of your season it is not the only great thing about the Dynasty mode. In between recruiting and scouting future players for your program you have to battle it out on the grid iron with your team facing the ups and downs of a regular season schedule to ultimately vie for a bowl game or even better, the national championship. As in real life the season gets tougher throughout as the team is fighting through injuries, inexperience and the pressures of facing your biggest rivals in their home environments. The default game time setting is 5 minute quarters. However I prefer 7 minute quarters which make the games last around 35-40 minutes. Without even touching any other game play mode you can EASILY spend 10-12hrs playing completely through just one season of Dynasty mode. To me this provides for the ultimate game play length because it is basically as long of a game as you want and that’s just that ONE mode alone. You can play up to I believe 25 seasons in Dynasty mode. Another huge single player option for this year’s game is the Heisman Campaign which allows you to pick from an assortment of previous Heisman Trophy winners to place on your favorites schools current roster. In this mode you control only the Heisman Candidate and you have goals to complete in order to gain points and unlock other past Heisman winners to play with. Once you have selected your Heisman player to play through the campaign with, you begin with week one of your teams regular season schedule and play the full season with hopes of replicating your Heisman winners success from real life and translating that into a modern-day Heisman Trophy winning season in NCAA Football 13. Once you have played through one season this game mode is done with that player and if you wish to continue you have to pick another previous Heisman winner to play with. This game mode is fun to mess around with. However it’s lack of depth is an issue for me but for many people who have been long time college football fans dating back to the 70’s and 80’s I can see where this game mode would be extremely appealing.
Other single player game modes include Mascots mode which allows for you to play with nothing but mascots on the field in place of real players. This mode is pretty funny to mess around with just to get a good laugh and would probably be a blast for younger children.
EA also offers up a one button mode for extremely novice players and/or young children. This mode is just a regular exhibition game mode where one button controls everything. It is very simulated and provides for very little user control over game play.
For the depth, mechanics and length alone of the Dynasty Mode alone I have to give the single player an A+.
Multiplayer : A Game mechanics / features / Online features As with last year’s NCAA Football series this year features the return of the Online Dynasty mode. This mode is identical to the single player Dynasty Mode however you are scheduling games and recruiting against fellow users online. The greatest online feature in my opinion is the roster share ability. This option allows you to upload a roster you have edited or download a roster another user has edited. This is HUGE because NCAA Football is shipped with no player likenesses or names in the game. The only identifiers for the players as shipped from EA are their position and number (i.e. QB#10 instead of Matt Barkley). With the roster share function I have to give a HUGE shout out to the guys over at www.operationsports.com. They have a full team of guys who purchased EA Season Ticket which allows them to get the game 3 days earlier than the general public and they spend literally the entire first week that the game is released editing every single player on all 144 teams in the game to include their correct position, height, weight, class, hair style, skin color and of course their name. Thanks to operation Sports you can download their completed roster completely free of charge (although they gladly accept Paypal donations) via PSN user volstopfan14 using the roster share feature and play your Dynasty with completed rosters instead of generic names/numbers that are shipped with the game. Operation Sports role in providing these free rosters is also huge because there are sites out there that charge upwards of $40 just for a fully named and edited roster file. Unfortunately EA cannot include the names/likeness because the athletes that are in NCAA Football are amateur athletes who are not allowed to receive compensation for their name/likeness in the game. As a result of the online roster sharing capabilities and the expansive online dynasty mode I have to give the multiplayer portion of the game an A. The only thing holding it back from getting an A+ is that there are no dedicated servers to play online matches on, they are all user hosted so depending on your opponents connection the game can be a little laggy. Replay Value : C Lasting appeal / Bonus Content / DLC Sports games are hard to judge on replay value. Some players like to go back to old sports games occasionally and replay with their favorite old team. I for one am not one of these people. I generally will play 80-100 hours of a sports game and then I am done with it until next year’s version comes out. The bonus content and DLC offered are all for the Heisman Campaign in the form of additional Heisman winners to play within the mode.For replay value I can’t grade the game any better than a C because I think it is very spotty as far as those who will actual go back and play it once newer versions have come out.
Overall I love NCAA Football 13. I play mostly the dynasty mode and it is nothing for me to sit down on a Friday night around 9 or 10 at night and play this game until 2 or 3 in the morning and then repeat the following night without getting bored or burnt out. The announcer commentary though professional and recorded by ESPN broadcasters does get VERY old, generic and repetitive. As a result of this I just switch the sound over to my music device and blast some music while I do my work on the gridiron. If you are a football fan and enjoy plotting defensive and offensive schemes and game plans, recruiting the players you believe can execute your vision the best and then taking complete control during the game to actually execute your strategy and have some competitive fun then you will surely enjoy this game.
Overall : B+
