Me on NCAA 09 and Operation Sports

[Skitch Beatz]

I registered for the operation sports forum because of the hype for ncaa 09 and boy it has opened my eyes to the flaws that are in this game. I'm not the hardest of hardcore gamers when it comes to sports games. I own NCAA 06 for the original xbox and NCAA 05 for the ps2. other than that I own NFL 2k5 and madden 08 for the PC.

this was my first NCAA experience in about 3 years. I was a fan of NCAA 06 and played it with friends and family. I had shyed away from 07 and 08 after playing the demos about a year ago and not being convinced that much had been improved. The animations in the demos had little variation and there were features that were missing that I had liked from previous years.

When I first saw the trailer for 09 I was excited. Over the past year my roommates and I had become competitive between each other while playing 06 and it had become fun again. From the trailer alone I thought 09 was going to be a great experience and I thought EA had gotten their act together. When the demo came out I had a great time with it. Apparently I sucked at it and couldnt win a game on the demo with LSU (I hate OSU). When I first played the demo it was the most cohesive college football experience that I had witnessed in a video game.

Then July 15th arrived. I spent all day at work not working. I looked up custom sounds for the team that I was going to use in my dynasty (which is what led me to operations sports), I looked up offensive and defensive strategies, the whole... 9 yards. After work I rushed to Best Buy, paid the $63 after tax and rushed home to play the game. I immediately downloaded rosters, (not knowing about the freezing glitch) fired up a play now game and played as Michigan vs Michigan St. Long story short is I won on a last second touchdown pass something like 23-21. My first NCAA 09 win.

The game was a great experience but I started to notice some things wrong with the game. My recievers always seemed to get open over the middle. It was something I hadn't noticed in the demo. I started exploiting it thinking the CPU would... you know.. do something about it. They didn't. I started bumping the difficulty up but nothing happened. I also threw way too many interceptions. Something like 6 per game at one point. I turned the slider all the way down but nothing happened.

So I came back to OS trying to find out why. In my quest to find out why the game was becoming WAY too easy I discovered that other people had found problems with the pass rush, zone defenses, pursuit routes and a few other problems. There were a ton of problems that I had been oblivious to. I guess I had attributed Mich st.'s loss to the skill of their team.

So now I have played a few years of my dynasty and a few years of campus legend. I've played more games of 09 than I have of 06/05. Why? I don't know. Maybe its the pretty graphics? Maybe I'm trying to get used to the game so I can play online and beat some cheesers. Maybe i'm trying to see how bad it is now and see if the 2nd patch will fix it's problems. I'm hoping EA gets their act together or I won't be buying another NCAA football for a while. I WANT to give them my money. I really do. But they've got to earn it.

EA basically just holds the key to our football gaming happiness. They continue take the "one step forward, two back" approach IMO. On-line dynasty is the best feature ever put on a sports game but it's almost overshadowed by the many gameplay flaws.

It's frustrating but I'm just trying to enjoy the game for what it is rather than what I wish it was.

[fistofrage]

Quote: Originally Posted by stewaat

It's frustrating but I'm just trying to enjoy the game for what it is rather than what I wish it was.

The problem is we have already seen what it could be. I don't ever remember Heisman being this easy. The pass rush used to work. The AI used to call a decent run game instead of QB choice play after play(On the PS2 anyway.) The list goes on and on.

If you know how to do something right, breaking it has to be done on purpose or attribute it to utter incompetence, take your pick. Just take all the things done right over the years and put them together. You have the knowledge, you have the technology. Just make it work.

Quit fouling up stuff that worked in previous versions. Its like having your kid completely potty trained and next year they just start crapping in their pants again. WTF????

[m00d]

Quote: Originally Posted by fistofrage

Quit fouling up stuff that worked in previous versions. Its like having your kid completely potty trained and next year they just start crapping in their pants again. WTF????

[seawolves9]

Hhahahaha very good analogy.