The Xbox version NCAA Football 2005 was a huge disappointment for many fans of the series. While it introduced Xbox Live support for NCAA Football, the game suffered from some inexcusable graphical slowdowns before and after the snap. So for many Xbox owners who were disenfranchised by last year's release, this one will most likely prove once and for all whether EA is serious about supporting Xbox owners with their NCAA Football games.
Features
One of the biggest features of NCAA Football 06 is the Race For the Heisman mode. The idea behind the Race For the Heisman is you create a player who is just finishing high school and guide him through his college football career. Depending on his position and style, he is given a drill to perform. His performance will determine which schools offer him a scholarship, or you can choose to walk onto any school's program. The pointless part about this is that no matter where you go, you're automatically elevated to the top of the depth chart. For instance, the first time I played this mode I accepted a scholarship to Fresno State as a mobile quarterback. However, Fresno State already had a decent quarterback who happened to be the team's only impact player (more on impact players later) on offense. Another time, I purposely tanked the drills, but walked on as a running back on USC and was promptly positioned ahead of Reggie Bush on the depth chart.
Anyway, all the preamble aside, the core of what you're trying to do in this mode is to create the best college player as possible to win the Heisman, and also to rack up as many trophies and awards too. What's so special about this mode is that it's like a stripped down dynasty. You don't have to worry about recruiting, organizing the team's depth chart, or keeping track of the team's discipline. Still, this isn't quite as robust as the career mode in a game like MLB 2006 where your player can interact off the field. In NCAA Football 06, your player doesn't really do much except admire himself and his accomplishments. It's more of a way to dress up a series of quick matches if you like playing with the same team each time. While I applaud EA for putting this feature in as it will really attract casual fans who otherwise disliked the Dynasty modes, the Race For the Heisman mode could be a little more robust. Some examples of what they could do include: do you risk going to parties and getting into trouble to bond with teammates, or do you stay home and study to remain academically eligible? Do you discuss your playing time with the coach, or do you take your frustration to the school paper? Did the program get a new coach with a new system that you don't like? Then transfer to another school. Either way, this mode in its current state is really shallow, and could use something to spice it up just a little bit.
NCAA Football 06's dynasty mode has also added some new features. The biggest feature added is the recruiting format. The in-season recruiting is modeled somewhat after the one in ESPN College Hoops 2K5 in that each week you must choose which recruits to court and which ones to pass up. One aspect that differs from the College Hoops model is that your total recruiting time is already budgeted, all you have to do split up the time between each target. Overall, this feature is something that I really like and it adds much more pressure to win that big game when your blue chip recruit is visiting that weekend. Another aspect of the recruiting is the addition of pipelines. One aspect I thought was odd from last year's game was that it took too many recruiting points to court a prospect who lives across the country. With pipelines, once you get one great player in, subsequent players will follow based on the stature of your school. It's just one more element of realism EA's added to the dynasty mode.
The Spring Drills minigames are not only available in the Race For the Heisman mode, they are also available in their own stand-alone section. These drills, while similar to Madden's mini-camp drills, have their own unique college flavor. For instance the option attack won't be found in any professional playbook. These games are fun, and just as challenging as their professional counterpart.
One of the other features in NCAA Football 06 is the addition of impact players. Impact players are members of the team who can step up their play for a given moment. Impact players tend to add positive intangibles beyond their physical prowess. Whether it's that they tend to force turnovers more regularly or make defenders miss with more ease, these impact players tend to stand out among other players with simply high ratings. Impact players have a white bubble circle beneath them, which serves to let them standout on the field. Once they break off a big run or force a huge turnover, that circle will begin to fluctuate. This means that they are in the zone and their abilities increase even more. While this feature does add a lot of strategy to the gameplay, having only 3 per team seems a little odd. I wouldn't have put in that restriction, but rather have it be a pleasant surprise from good recruiting or player development. Another thing which is kind of strange is this feature is now combined with the composer indicator introduced last year. All these rating modifiers might eventually complicate matters if more are introduced.
Multiplayer also returns through Xbox Live connectivity. Online multiplayer is rather disappointing. While the online portion is much more stable than last year at this time, there just aren't a whole lot of new features. You have your standard one on one matches, challenges, OT Drill, and Tournaments, but that's it as far as gameplay types. While I didn't see a particular section for it yet, I assume they'll be roster downloads in the future. There are rankings and the typical EA messenger as well. The gameplay online is also pretty disappointing. Playing strangers is consistently worthless in that most of them will be one of five different teams and run only a handful of plays all game. EA, nor anyone else for that matter, has really developed a good way of establishing smaller subset communities of online gamers. That is, ones that are looking for games that resemble a more balanced approach, or a community that likes to play only with mid-major teams. Violators or abusers of the community would be policed internally. As of right now you still have to find a your community through the internet, but outside of the game itself. As for cheating, I didn't encounter any blatant "hack the game" cheaters. The closest thing I've seen so far are the players who quits when they're losing, but that's pretty standard. Overall the online portion is rather lackluster unless you have friends to play the game with.
Gameplay
The overall gameplay has really improved. For the first time in a long time I finally feel as if EA is finally beginning to understand the mechanics of football. Instead of creating DB swat machines and receivers with hands of stone, EA improved the defense by using sound AI. For once it's not good to throw it up with two or three defensive players playing over the top coverage where linebackers are fast enough to cover the underneath. Also defensive personnel act within the confines of the play without needing ESP to anticipate passes. The only exception is with the Heisman difficulty level. EA still insists on using cheesy tactics of augmenting opposing players' ability ratings such that they are always superior. However, based on the amount of games I've played on the All American setting, as long as you play within the confines of the rules and not use cheesy tactics, like money routes, you won't see many blowouts.
The computer will also be a lot more competent with its passes. Intelligent quarterbacks will be smart with the ball and rarely force it where they shouldn't. Similarly, with the improved defense, you won't have to worry about mediocre quarterback consistently acting superhuman in situations where you've called the correct defense. While I have seen many great late game drives by a relatively mediocre computer quarterback, I have also stymied them enough that I can safely say that I don't think there's any catchup AI.
Besides the improved passing game, the pass rush has been toned down quite a bit. With a talented defensive line, you can get some pressure if you only rush four, but not a ton of sacks like in NCAA Football 2005. Similarly, if your line isn't talented or the opposing offensive front is too talented, you'll have to blitz a player or two to get pressure on the quarterback. The result if you don't is that the QB will almost always have enough time to find an open receiver, or simply take off running.
There's one minor change to the kicking game. The kick meter has been modified to look more like Madden's. When I saw this, I almost had a heart attack because I hated the Madden meter so much due to its varying speed. However, the meter in NCAA Football 06 does move at consistent speed within a given power setting and difficulty level. With Madden, the more power you generated, the faster the meter moved back. It was very hard to kick even extra points sometimes, which was very unrealistic. However, the kicking meter in this game is still tough to master but easy to pick up, which is all I ask for.
One of the aspects of NCAA Football 06 that needs a lot of improvement is the playcalling AI. The computer players will not adjust to your playcalling. I tried calling the same play several times in a row, and while Lee Corso berated me for making myself seem too predictable, my CPU counterpart just did not pick up on it. I even threw the ball to the same receiver deep downfield, but the computer didn't call deeper coverage the 3rd time in a row, thus almost guaranteeing a 30 yard gain over the span of 4 downs. Even worse is the computer didn't pick up on the fact that I was running 4 different plays from two different formations all game long. Even though the actual plays were very different in nature and purpose, a human opponent would have shut them down with a talented team. The same goes for when I'm calling defenses. I constantly played a cover 2 defense for an entire game, mixing it up between man and zone. Only a handful of times did the computer try to exploit this. It seemed as if the computer was picking random plays instead of playcalling to what should have been my very predictable tendencies.
Another aspect of the gameplay I didn't like was the limited playbooks. On offense there are several formations, but they are all common. What would have been great is to add a-create-a-play editor with the same amount of freedom as the Front Page Sports Football series. There are college teams that have some really original and unorthodox offensive schemes like Houston and Boise State, but NCAA Football 06 doesn't really capture their offenses well at all. A better offensive and defensive play editor would foster some creative thinking among the hardcore following, especially if you can take these custom plays online.
Controls
One of the hardest parts about playing football games on the Xbox is the lack of a two tier trigger system that exists on the PS2 controller. That system allows for bi-directional jukes and stiff arms, instead of praying that the game decides to juke or stiff arm in the correct direction. That is why I really liked the control improvements in this year's game. First, they moved the juke controls to the right analog stick. While the stiff arm is still controlled by one button and suffers from the same problem, I tend to use the juke more. I would have preferred to use the stiff arm button to as a modifier to the right analog stick moves.
The other control enhancement that made a huge difference is making the offensive and defensive controls more common. That is, the sprint and switch offender/defender buttons are consistent for offense and defense. The NFL 2K series has been doing this for years, and it's good that EA has finally caught on given that they now have a monopoly on all fully licensed football games.
NCAA Football 06 also reorganized the passing buttons. The passing game is still icon-based, but the A button now allows you to sprint with the quarterback while still having the option to chuck the ball downfield. This is yet another feature borrowed from the 2K series, but I actually think it's better to have the sprint button consistently mapped to A button instead of one of the triggers like is ESPN NFL 2K5.
One control issue still remains from last year's version and that's the implementation of the black and white buttons for use with the option. Again, this is where the PS2 version really excels because it allows those controls to be exported to the second tier of shoulder buttons. However, it's hard to really manipulate your hand to press two face buttons at once, when one of them is either the black or white button.
Graphics
The graphics are kind of a mixed bag of improvements and repeated mistakes of the past. On the good side, the player models look much more detailed along with the stadiums. What's more, there are tons of additional player animations including gang tackles, lunging snags, and shoulder thrusts. While there are many repeated cutscenes from last year, there are also many additional cutscenes as well. My favorite is the dice roll after a player scores a touchdown. For some reason, I can't get enough of that one.
However, despite all these improvements, there are still some serious graphical issues. First, there's still tons of clipping, especially during cutscenes. It's so blatant, that some players just walk through members of the opposite team. It also happens at least a handful of time per game. Secondly, there's still some graphical slowdowns. The good news is that the slowdown isn't every play, but the bad news is that it happens during some cutscenes and during 3-5 plays per game. The only conclusion I can ascertain is that it seems to happen more later in the game than earlier. Still, the slowdown is present and it still hasn't been completely fixed after yet another year of development. There are still a few animations that really have been recycled for too long. First, the ball carriers all run in the same robotic running style. There's also the problem of runningback animations when they get stuck behind a blocker. Instead of stopping, or pushing the pile like Priest Holmes is famous for, the ball carrier will just run in place as if he hit an invisible wall. This is very sloppy and seems to have been around forever in EA's football games. With all the features and mechanics EA copied from the 2K Sports football games, appropriate ball carrier animations would have been a nice addition.
Finally, there is one graphical feature added that really takes away from the flow of the game. Every once in a while the camera will zoom in on the ball carrier and do a bullet-time mid-play cutscene as he's executing a juke or stiff arm. While I can appreciate the homage to Tecmo Super Bowl in this feature, it doesn't work. Tecmo Super Bowl displayed its cutscenes in such a way that rarely did you have to worry about taking control of your player immediately after the end of the break in the action. And even then, it's usually after a reception where split second timing isn't as crucial. In NCAA Football 06, the cutscene regularly displays itself when you're running in traffic. It seems to be as pointless and as counterproductive to the gameplay as the aftertouch feature in Burnout 3.
Sound
I have always had a soft spot for the audio in college sports games. As long as they have good quality school fight songs that are queued up properly, I feel satisfied. Last year's NCAA Football 2005 did a pretty decent job of blending in school fight songs both on the gridiron and in the selection menus. Fortunately, NCAA Football 06 is no different. Not only have they brought back all the school fight songs, but they also included many newer common songs to accompany the tried and true "Beat the Drum". The one aspect about the music that doesn't quite work is the "EA Trax" more commonly found in their Madden and MVP franchises. Keeping in mind I'm 4 years removed from college, I was left completely dissatisfied with their choice of music, and switched the menu music back to the bands. Luckily they didn't try to integrate some of these songs to the on the field aural atmosphere. If they did that, it would have been heresy.
The audio commentary has the same team from last year. Much of the play by play from Brad Nessler is the same from last year, but there's additional analysis by Kirk Herbstreet and Lee Corso. The in-studio College Gameday script is pretty funny and entertaining the first few times you see it, but it gets old pretty quickly. The in-game analysis is above average, which doesn't say much, but I actually preferred the chemistry between the Herbstreet and Corso from NCAA Football 2005 as they tended to raz each other with a little more edge. This year seems much more tame.
The stadium atmosphere seems to remain mostly unchanged as well. I'm not too upset about that since they really did a good job of creating an electric environment for big games in booming stadiums. The aural representation of the stadium pulse feature really does a good job of immersing you into the atmosphere of the moment. Teams that do not attract a big-time football sized crowd still can depict a pretty accurate aural atmosphere as well.
Replay Value
Offline, EA did a great job of adding new features that are relevant and add actual replay value. Even though I won't be playing much "Race for the Heisman", I can imagine it attracting a certain audience that normally doesn't get much into franchise/dynasty mode play. The new features in the dynasty mode are definite improvements that I would have clamored for if they weren't there. Even though the in-season recruiting was ripped off of the College Hoops franchise, I'm glad to see EA accepting the evolution of the genre rather than resisting it even if the idea wasn't original. Also the offseason mini-games was a good feature to import over to Madden, which adds a lot more depth into the dynasty mode.
The online portion of NCAA Football 06 doesn't bode as well. As of right now, most players will chuck the ball downfield every play, or run with a mobile QB. Luckily, these repeated tactics can be corrected on the fly with cover 3 and cover 4 audibles as well as effective qb spies. However, the lack of diverse or custom and importable playbooks really will allow for many money plays to be exploited. The fact that many of the same plays remain, means that the online portion will become mostly unplayable pretty soon if not already.
Overall, I was pretty impressed with this year's installment of NCAA Football 06. EA most likely didn't do as much to win over its harshest critics as the game still feels very much like last year's with some minor glitches fixed and many other issues still left unaddressed. However, its commitment to create useful new features and import successful features from the 2K Sports games at least shows that they are willing to sacrifice the pride of using their former rival's successful innovations to improve their product. It certainly is much better than the blatantly lazy Create A Sign and Create A Fan features from last year's football titles. Still, much like MVP Baseball 2005 I felt that much of the development this year was to correct the blunders from NCAA Football 2005. If this is the way EA is going to approach the development of their sports games, then perhaps the next college football game they release should be NCAA Football 08. At least it would save me $50.
