NCAA 14 - Review - Gotmadskillzson's Blog

Gotmadskillzson's Blog

NCAA 14 - Review

Posted on July 5, 2013 at 10:32 PM.

It is that time of the year again. NCAA 14 is here and it has a stumbling problem. Let me just say this from the start, ball carriers fall down way too easily from the slightest touch. This is mainly a CPU BALL CARRIER problem because it seems as though the CPU don't ever use the stumble recovery feature or the back juke.

So unlike a human controlled player that can keep his tripping ball carrier from falling most of the time, the CPU falls flat on it's face every time. This reminds me of when Madden 13 came out, ball carriers were always falling. Same problem is in NCAA 14. Don't even have to be a hit, just blow on them, let one hand or one elbow brush against them and that ball carrier is going down.

Which brings me to big 230 pounds and higher backs. In the hand of a human player, they are deadly, a thing of beauty to see. In the hands of the CPU, nothing to look at. 1 hit and they go flying backwards 99% of the time. It have me screaming you are a power back, a litter more trucking and stiff arming, way less running up right now even trying to use your size advantage.

Next up, pass rush or the lack of a pass rush. Another year and the left defensive ends still get majority of the sacks in a 4 man rush. Mainly because CPU QBs favor their right. They drift right, they scramble right way too much directly into the arms of the left defensive end.

Have no fear, this game is not full of doom and gloom. CPU can actually run all the options quite well. They can run all the screen plays too. Granted though, the better the team, the better they will do. But at least now it goes for positive yards most of the time. If the team you are using is full of low awareness players though, you might want to stay basic and not try to get fancy with them.

Negative yards, negatively impacts your players composure level. So you want to limit that, because once they get in a funk, things go from bad to terrible pretty fast. I like this feature actually, adds a level of realism to the game.

As of right now, I would give this game a solid 8. If they fix the ball carriers from falling down way too easily and actually have them use stumble recovery and back juke, the CPU AI would be deadly. If they are deadly this game could easily be a 9. But with the issues of falling down with the slightest wind, it is a solid 8 at best.