NCAA Football '12 impressions thread

[johnnyshaka]

I'll likely pick this up, but just not for a week or two.

[Kodos]

I sent the wife and kids out tonight, and will be curling up with NCAA 2012 as soon as I get home.

[Mike Lowe]

This game's release date is not official for me until the rosters are done for PS3. I'm not even tempted until then and it gives me time to see what EA fucked up.

[MizzouRah]

Mine is coming via free super saver shipping, which means next week. I wouldn't play anyway until the named rosters are completed.

I have been reading good things though.

[Pumpy Tudors]

I can't name a single Division I football player, so I feel rather indifferent about the rosters. I'll be ready to play tonight!

[MacroGuru]

I want it...just need to get it...when I do, Dynasty will be on it's way.

[BYU 14]

Going to pick it up now, the impressions on operation sports have been better than any edition in memory so I am pretty stoked to fire it up.

Will be testing sliders and overall gamplay until the named roster are released, so will post some thoughts later.

[whomario]

i read that Road To Glory is again pretty much "you are rated 99 by year 2" if you use the advancements you earn, so i hope that your player also progresses in training camp so that way i could just not use them or just in a limited manner.

I very much look forward to that mode, had tons of fun last year and all improvements mentioned there are real nice.

Also hope that custom playbooks are easy to set up, looking for fitting playbooks took up tons of time last year for me in later years of dynasty ...

Will hopefully get it on thursday or friday , acording to the shop i ordered from it´s getting packaged tomorrow. Would be nice since i have Friday off, not much planned this weekend and a shitty weather forcast

[Scoobz0202]

I could probably get excited about this game if I felt the RttS was worth a damn. I recall last year trying it after being off the NCAA boat for a few years and the time management, and just the timing in general, being absolutely horrendous and it ruined any sense of fun I could feel. Anybody know if that is fixed?

I'm talking, 1st and 10 with a minute left and no timeouts and somehow i'm punting the ball with 45 seconds left. (been awhile so I could be recalling something that didnt happen but the type of issue still remains)

[SirFozzie]

I'm waiting for the game to be delivered. UPS is late :P

[Kodos]

Played my first game. Enjoyed it a lot. But I need to work on not throwing so many picks.

[dubb93]

I have the game but I'm waiting until after the RFL National Championship game tonight to tear into it.

[Groundhog]

Has anyone simmed 6+ seasons in yet and checked out the roster talent?

[Ajaxab]

I just created my own promotion/relegation system that features a decent amount of movement. I divided the teams by the game's rankings and have 2 conferences of 16 teams each at the top. The worst 8 of 32 go down. The next tier has 4 conferences of 12 teams each. Conference winners and runners-up go to the top tier. The worst 2 from each second tier go down. The third tier has 4 conferences of 7 teams each. Conference winners and runners up go up. The worst in each conference goes down. The fourth tier has 1 conference with the remaining teams left. 4 go up to tier 3. The worst are replaced by independents. That part of the setup was pretty easy.

I was a bit disappointed that the editor wasn't a bit more robust (but I suppose it is EA after all). The only bowls you can edit are the BCS games and these games are limited to conference winners or at large teams. There's no assigning the 3rd place team in a conference to a BCS game. I would have loved to be able to do that to reward teams in tough conferences. I went ahead and created only one conference tie-in for the title game so that my top tier conference winners would play each other for the BCS title. I left the other spots for at-large teams. Unfortunately, that created a bit of a problem at the end of the first year. Duke won the 3rd tier WAC and received an at-large bid to play the 2nd tier Big 12 champ, Northwestern, in the Orange Bowl. Not ideal to be sure...but maybe it's good because it gives lower tier teams a shot at a BCS bowl.

I also learned that if you want to do promotion/relegation that you need to write down which teams will be swapped before going on to the next season. By the time you can customize conferences in season 2, the team records from the previous season are gone (unless I'm missing them somewhere).

I hope to sim 4 seasons to see what happens.

[MacroGuru]

RTG has given me a stiffy....I can't wait to write a dynasty for one...

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by Pumpy Tudors

I can't name a single Division I football player, so I feel rather indifferent about the rosters. I'll be ready to play tonight!

I'm the same but find the real names help me when it comes to football season. I remember playing as some of the names.

[DaddyTorgo]

Amazon borked my "release day delivery" so i can't be playing. S'ok - I have 900 or so pages to read to keep me company.

[Eaglesfan27]

I picked it up on the way home from work, but have too much work to dig into it tonight

Look forward to playing some this weekend.

[Kodos]

Just like in 11, I'm getting a bunch of brief freezes during gameplay. Frustrating.

[k0ruptr]

if on 360 the gamer tag : Patrick Morty has a pretty decent set of starter rosters and all coaches named.

[k0ruptr]

dola, and for PS3 try gamertag: GamingTailgate

[JonInMiddleGA]

I saw on his Twitter feed that pastapadre has named rosters available through his gamertag as well, not his work but one he apparently liked well enough to share ... strictly fwiw of course

[BYU 14]

After spending an hour plus on a custom playbook I played a game on default settings, AA, 8 min quarters with BYU against Utah State, won 31-0. The default settings are better than I think they have ever been with the exception of sacks and I recorded 12 against the Aggies. The CPU run game is also overmatched (though Utah State sucks overall they have a decent TB)

2nd game I tweaked the sliders and played Wyoming, AA, 8 min quarters and won 41-18.

Stats
Passing
BYU 15-30 324 yards 3 TD, 1 INT
Wyoming 26-51 326 yards 1 TD, 3 INT

Rushing
BYU 29-124 yards
Wyoming 24-20 yards

I sacked Wyomings QB 4 times, I was sacked 2 times, much better. Also the one pick I threw, which went for 6, was a shitty read. Wyomings picks where also reasonable (Punter threw one on a fake)

The one thing after this game that still did not feel right was the number of times the receivers dropped or had the ball jarred loose, so I tweaked those sliders and also dropped human run D. After 2 games I currently have sliders set as follows.

AA - 8 minute Quarters (This got me 138 plays in the Wyoming game)
Game speed - Normal
Speed Threshold - 30

Slider - Hum / CPU
QB acc - 45 / 50
Pass blk - 55 / 55
WR cat - 60 / 60
RB skill - 55 / 60
Run Blk - 55 / 60
Coverage - 40 / 40
Pass rush - 40 / 50
Int - 20 / 20
Run Def - 40 / 50
Tackling - 30 / 50
FG Pow - 40 / 50
FG acc - 40 / 50
Punt Pow - 45 / 50
Punt acc - 50 / 50
KP - 45 / 50

Will probably tweak some more, but these will likely be close to the final version I use based on limited play so far. Even in the Wyoming game, I never felt threatened as BYU is decidedly better, but they still had moments where they drove on me and even ripped off a couple of 10+ yard runs, though they lost yards a lot (hopefully lowering human Run D will help and I will also play a team with a better line next)

The new tackling is amazing, nearly every play felt different and while gang tackling still isn't all the way there, it is a lot better than last year and momentum definitely plays into it more than ever too. I scored one huge hit that put one of their receivers out with a concussion and also whiffed going for the big blow a couple of times, so I mostly stayed with the tackle button. Once you get the timing down on tackling it really boosts the overall enjoyment of the game. Running backs and receivers are very fluid and replays are beautiful. My biggest complaint ingame is the commentary feels stale after a half, so I find myself tuning it out.

One other gripe is the default rosters, does EA really check teams depth charts during/after spring practice? Wyoming still has Austyn Carta-Samuels on their roster and he transferred before spring ball. BYU has O'Neill Chambers on the roster and he was suspended in the middle of last season through the 2011 season as well. They also have several players I can't figure out who they represent on the real roster. I can see missing players like Pryor or others that left school/transferred in the last couple of months, but the default rosters should at least be accurate through spring ball, which is 4 months ago. Still I can edit all this so it is only a mild annoyance ATM while I wait for named rosters.

Overall very happy with this years release, the best yet IMO based on limited exposure, though I am curious to see how recruiting is in dynasty mode 5-6 seasons down the line. If recruits are more realistic this year I will be VERY happy and this edition will stay in rotation for a long time.

[Izulde]

Try playing UNLV and see if you can win by 50. :P

[Simbo Klice]

Big problem concerning conference swaps mid-dynasty... I just ran into a 255 team swap limit and the conferences are now stuck as they are. Fuck you, EA Sports.

[whomario]

i read that you can´t adjust quarter length in Road To Glory ? Seriously ?
Or can you only adjust it at the start and then have to live with it ? (that´d be ok)

And super sim broken again ? Plays are aparenbtly again run in 10 seconds every damn time (even when up 20 with a minute left) which then will screw up the simulated stats ...

[markprior22]

I got the email link yesterday for the .pdf strategy guide. Opened it at work just to glance at it and closed it. Today, I no longer have it. I guess it's possible I accidentally deleted the email. It surely doesn't only give you one chance to look at it and if you don't save, it's gone? Does anyone have the link they could send me in a PM so I could print it off?

[DaddyTorgo]

Originally Posted by markprior22

I got the email link yesterday for the .pdf strategy guide. Opened it at work just to glance at it and closed it. Today, I no longer have it. I guess it's possible I accidentally deleted the email. It surely doesn't only give you one chance to look at it and if you don't save, it's gone? Does anyone have the link they could send me in a PM so I could print it off?

I saved it on my laptop at home - I can send you the PDF version tonight.

[markprior22]

Thanks DT...appreciate it.

[Scoobz0202]

Originally Posted by Scoobz0202

I could probably get excited about this game if I felt the RttS was worth a damn. I recall last year trying it after being off the NCAA boat for a few years and the time management, and just the timing in general, being absolutely horrendous and it ruined any sense of fun I could feel. Anybody know if that is fixed?

I'm talking, 1st and 10 with a minute left and no timeouts and somehow i'm punting the ball with 45 seconds left. (been awhile so I could be recalling something that didnt happen but the type of issue still remains)

Originally Posted by whomario

i read that you can´t adjust quarter length in Road To Glory ? Seriously ?
Or can you only adjust it at the start and then have to live with it ? (that´d be ok)

And super sim broken again ? Plays are aparenbtly again run in 10 seconds every damn time (even when up 20 with a minute left) which then will screw up the simulated stats ...

Mother fucker. How the fuck do they not fix this. Seriously. Are we really picky and the majority of people don't notice this or what?

[Pumpy Tudors]

lol

[Ksyrup]

Originally Posted by Izulde

The $20 Amazon credit convinced me to pull the trigger on this.

I went ahead and did this on Monday, since the game is my annual birthday present from the kids. I paid for it and it shipped today - how do I get the $20 credit, or where will I find it on my account?

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Ksyrup

I went ahead and did this on Monday, since the game is my annual birthday present from the kids. I paid for it and it shipped today - how do I get the $20 credit, or where will I find it on my account?

It should just pop up/be factored in to your next purchase.

[Ksyrup]

It's not. I just put something into my cart to test it, and there's nothing.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Ksyrup

It's not. I just put something into my cart to test it, and there's nothing.

Has your order shipped yet?

Note: "The promotional credit will be added directly to your Amazon.com account within two days after your order ships."

[Ksyrup]

Thanks. I don't have my order email on this computer so I was wondering what the fine print said.

[MizzouRah]

You will get an email after the credit hits your account.

[DeToxRox]

I am doing a coaching carousel dynasty on here if anyone is interested. I am trying to get a feel for how much of a challenge it is so I am starting out as a DC with a 1 star prestige team.

[korme]

Do coaches move around this year or are they ZIPS Coach or BUCKS Coach forever?

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by korme

Do coaches move around this year or are they ZIPS Coach or BUCKS Coach forever?

They will move around this year

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

They will move around this year

That's why I'm going to wait until FK 2nd roster update which will have real coach names.. should be neat to see coaches moving around.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Looks like the punting bug is back again as well. If you punt the ball out of bounds before entering the end zone, but it bounces past the plane of the goal line out of bounds, it counts it as a touchback rather than marking at the appropriate spot. Stuff like this that was reported constantly last year that isn't resolved just makes you want to smack your forehead.

[MizzouRah]

Can you change the color of the dreads?

[cartman]

In over 100 games in the previous version (2011), I never saw that punting bug.

[dubb93]

The interface in dynasty mode is a total lag fest. I can't believe how slow to respond it is.

[MizzouRah]

Originally Posted by cartman

In over 100 games in the previous version (2011), I never saw that punting bug.

+1

[Philliesfan980]

Originally Posted by dubb93

The interface in dynasty mode is a total lag fest. I can't believe how slow to respond it is.

I've heard this as well, as well as some people are reporting the game is stuttering between plays for some individuals.

That's what concerns me, as developers push hardware further and further, they have to be getting close to what the current gen can do. Now granted, going through menu's slowly seems to be more of a bug than anything, it makes you wonder.

Can anyone confirm or deny? Would be nice to hear some more impressions from people here (OS is a complete mess with all the people posting there), as I trust peoples judgement here.

[MacroGuru]

I have played an entire High School season in RTG....several exhibition games and my son has played a ton of 1 button games.

1) I do not experience the lag that has been reported, but I do have a newer gen unit (7 months old).

2) RTG is freaking amazing, a full high school season...while schools come to you...I need to work with the sliders on it...by the end of my season I was at 4 stars and had Texas, Oregon and USC offering (Had a 79 sparq to start the season)

3) I haven't played with Dynasty mode, I did download a roster that looked pretty close to what everything is currently.

Oh and for the punting bug, never experienced it.

[Tigercat]

Decent amount of lag in menus and occasionally in non-action in game transitions. Its a bit frustrating, having played smoother previous versions, but I find it more than bearable.

(I've got a 60gb PS3)

[Big Fo]

I hadn't played one of these since NCAA 2009 maybe. I was surprised at how time consuming recruiting has become in Dynasty Mode. The on-field gameplay seems pretty good so far after three games.