Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

[_-King-_]

After contemplating dropping $600+ for NCAA 25 and a PS5 I've decided to just boot up an old PS2 version.

Most of my interest in NCAA games is being immersed in a deep dynasty mode, which unfortunately it sounds like the new one is lacking. I want something with a realistic sim engine and great career stat tracking.

06 seems to be the favorite online but I'm wondering, is there anything special about this game in particular that later games lost when it comes to dynasty? I read that 09 added SuperSim which may come in handy if I want to jump in and play a bit at any point, but I will likely be simming 95% of the time. I heard maybe the later years have issues with player progression, but it seems more of the complaints come from on field balancing issues.

Has anyone who has played some of these recently give me some advice on which one is best?

[alexbond45]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

NCAA 06’s main advantage is that it doesn’t have any dynasty killing glitches and the gameplay is still great.

Jump the snap is a killer in 07+. In 08+ the program standards is horribly managed by AI and leads to major programs getting dumpstered.

06 has a mod called NCAA NEXT that includes proper CFP logic built in to the game (as in, you don’t have to use a third party program to make it work). It seemingly has better logic than CFB 25. In my saves you usually get at least 1 G5 squad with a first round bye and they usually get motorboated by a real team.

[grieserulz14]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

I've been playing NCAA Next off and on in my limited free time and that team is LEGIT! It's an awesome mod for simmers

NCAA 06’s main advantage is that it doesn’t have any dynasty killing glitches and the gameplay is still great.

Jump the snap is a killer in 07+. In 08+ the program standards is horribly managed by AI and leads to major programs getting dumpstered.

06 has a mod called NCAA NEXT that includes proper CFP logic built in to the game (as in, you don’t have to use a third party program to make it work). It seemingly has better logic than CFB 25. In my saves you usually get at least 1 G5 squad with a first round bye and they usually get motorboated by a real team.

[Skyflame21]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

Definitely DO NOT drop $600 for a new system for new CFB game. It is not worth it. Way too many bugs, dynasty mod is barebones and has no immersion or life. Gameplay is decent but not anything to write home about. If you have a good PS2 era game or Ps3/360 game that you enjoy stick with that until they fix CFB.

[_-King-_]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

Definitely DO NOT drop $600 for a new system for new CFB game. It is not worth it. Way too many bugs, dynasty mod is barebones and has no immersion or life. Gameplay is decent but not anything to write home about. If you have a good PS2 era game or Ps3/360 game that you enjoy stick with that until they fix CFB.

Ended up buying a PS5 just for this game and it's probably up there as one of the most fun gaming experiences I've ever had. It's not perfect but it's really ****ing good and has enabled me to rekindle friendships with people I haven't talked to in 10+ years through a shared love of online dynasties.

[esayem]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

Good for you getting 25, it's an excellent game and it's only going to get better as updates keep rolling in. I am a huge fan and nothing beats it as far as football games go.

As far as the PS2 games are concerned, 2005 and 06 are the best IMO. The player models in 2005 are far superior as linemen look like their actual weight. There is a bug in 06 where everyone resets body types when edited and they all look super fit.

06 plays really fast as well, and while the next guys put in a lot of work, the uniforms don't look as detailed as the original. Plus, part of the charm for me is playing with the retro rosters.

As far as simming, those two are the best. 2005 was the first year they got conference schedule rotation correct. Sometimes teams in a smaller conferences will become five star programs, but it's easy to fix this in the DB editor. In fact I was pioneering the DB editor on here years ago and many things I helped discover were used in next without my involvement.

06 introduces the in-season recruiting, which can be kind of cheesy because some of the players are exact duplicates.

[antdroid]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

Good for you getting 25, it's an excellent game and it's only going to get better as updates keep rolling in. I am a huge fan and nothing beats it as far as football games go.

As far as the PS2 games are concerned, 2005 and 06 are the best IMO. The player models in 2005 are far superior as linemen look like their actual weight. There is a bug in 06 where everyone resets body types when edited and they all look super fit.

06 plays really fast as well, and while the next guys put in a lot of work, the uniforms don't look as detailed as the original. Plus, part of the charm for me is playing with the retro rosters.

As far as simming, those two are the best. 2005 was the first year they got conference schedule rotation correct. Sometimes teams in a smaller conferences will become five star programs, but it's easy to fix this in the DB editor. In fact I was pioneering the DB editor on here years ago and many things I helped discover were used in next without my involvement.

06 introduces the in-season recruiting, which can be kind of cheesy because some of the players are exact duplicates.

Just want to comment on this post:

06 Body types do reset. We tried to figure out how to fix it without any luck so far. The NCAA DB Editor i worked on will fix this body size with a simple one button click though.

Our NCAA NEXT 06 uniforms are modeled directly from the actual uniforms. We use the exact same stitching, padding, and textile materials as the real uniforms from actual photo samples of the gears. I don't know if you've tried the uniforms from NEXT 24 and onward, but most of the FBS and some FCS teams all have these updated patterns.

Our NCAA Next 25 mod recent update also significantly improves stats. We have been focusing on that aspect in the past few months solely. They should be really close to real world numbers now, and we're internally testing some new sim code that uses subs more often now for both simming and for in-game usage with a goals of improving HB subs, WR subs, and DL rotation like in real life. The results are very good so far, and we hope to release this by end of the month.

[esayem]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

I didn't mean it as a slight to your work. Trust me, from my experience modding uniforms etc. to be period authentic, I can't get the level of detail to match the originals due to minutia like wrinkles, shading, and texture depth. I believe the original team had a filter they would apply to the uniforms to give them a realistic look.

Check out these pics and you'll see what I mean. They did an awesome job.

[antdroid]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

I didn't mean it as a slight to your work. Trust me, from my experience modding uniforms etc. to be period authentic, I can't get the level of detail to match the originals due to minutia like wrinkles, shading, and texture depth. I believe the original team had a filter they would apply to the uniforms to give them a realistic look.

Check out these pics and you'll see what I mean. They did an awesome job.

Remind us on the server. Maybe we can port it over.

[rookiebatman]

Re: Best PS2 NCAA year for running a sim dynasty?

Circling back to the question of the OP, could anyone tell me what's the best year of NCAA (or Madden) if I want to feel like I'm progressively improving my team throughout the season and not just improving it with one batch of new recruits in between seasons?