What is the defining characteristic of almost any computer program that is allowed to be released before it is ready? Glitches, Bugs, and Errors. Both big and small. Both those effecting gameplay significantly and those simply annoying. With the release of NCAA Football 08 for the PS2 this week EA has effectively said that quality control is for the next generation of consoles. They are done trying putting any effort into the version of the game available to the biggest percent of the world's population. A number of inexcusable bugs, poor game balancing, and a complete disregard for the consumer have come together in EA's new effort to prove that they are not a company willing to put aside their release dates and quotas in order to sell a quality product.
The best way to describe the game is it to a walk through the first few hours of gameplay and point out how many problems were found just in that time frame that any amount of play testing before release should have found. First of all, when you load up a new dynasty game it asks who you would like to redshirt for the coming season, but here is the catch. The computer never bothers to remove the players you have redshirted from the depth chart, so if you redshirt you starting QB in your depth chart he can play the entire season without losing any eligibility. That is a game breaking bug. They took the time to finally add in medical redshirts, something that should have been done 5 years ago because it is so simple, but then allowed this horrible mistake to leak into the game. This fact has to make me believe that there was not really any play testing on the dynasty mode as this error should have been caught within the first hour of gameplay by any tester worth anything. For a console release where problems cannot be fixed through a patch, this glitch alone immensely lowers the quality of the product by ruining a significant portion of strategy in one of the most important game modes. The only option for the user is to manually remove them all from the depth chart themselves. It's doable, but it is highly aggravating and does not make EA's error any more excusable.
Moving right along in the new pre-season training modes that they have finally added to help improve your players based on your own abilities I number of other glitches/problems came about. First of all, there is a speed drill that basically enables you to take any player with a speed of 80 and by the time they are a senior give them 99 speed. I'm sure the game will be really well balanced with a QB or MLB with 99 speed who was already a 5 star player. Just a horrible job of not thinking ahead on EA's part there.
I moved on to working on my DB's in pass skeleton after making my 270lb now have 90 speed, but I could not make him any better because I was penalized on the points I could score based on the QB completing passes even though they were in the flat and the only man I was allowed to control was playing the deep middle. Was there no tester pointing this problem out to the programmers of this mode?
I then moved on to working on my punt returner, but it was kind of hard to get him any better because the computer still refuses to catch the ball inside the 10 yard line despite the fact that I get no points for it bouncing into the endzone. With the view imposed on the user during the punt return mini-game it is imperative that the computer assists in helping to find and catch the ball, so this bug is a game killer. How this was not caught in "testing" is beyond me.
After dealing with all the numerous drills most of which I either was able to dominate or do nothing in, I actually played a game. The first match-up was me (University of Kentucky) versus the CPU (Northwestern). I got a quick chuckle out of the fact that the game refers to both teams as the wildcats so the commentary made no real sense (I'm not going to complain about that problem though), but then I quickly went into the mode I've gone into the last 7 years of playing the game. Completely ignoring the commentary all together because as always it is repetitive, boring, obvious, and adds next to nothing to the game's fun factor (It refereed to my 4 year starting QB as a young, developing player). Ignoring the commentary did not cause me any pains, but when I began trying to play offensive the pain became great.
Running the ball without a completely stacked team is virtually impossible in this game. Even against extremely poor teams and a 90+ running back I struggled to run the ball, not from a lack of skill, but because I was constantly being hit 2 or 3 yards behind the line of scrimmage or having my linemen driven back into me. The only cure for this I suppose it trying to tweak all the sliders for difficulty myself, but I do not pay money for a game so that I can balance it for them (even adjusting sliders is not a percent solution either). Meanwhile, the CPU seems to have no problem running the ball as backs big and small all act like Earl Campbell junior by simply shoving defensive linemen out of the way and trucking right through linebackers. They finally added the madden hit stick to NCAA, but it won't do the user much good if even a 160lb acts like Jerome Bettis. This problem, more than any other, is a game ruiner. Not being able to have any shot at a running game with the average team when running is 50% of the gameplay is simply inexcusable. It is shameful to release a game with this sort of balancing issue.
Meanwhile, when it comes to the passing game, EA finally made the defensive backs have actual intelligence now, but they did this by making them thermo-nuclear rocket scientists with glue covered hands. Even the bad DB's in this new edition will pick off any errant pass. Meanwhile, even the best WR's seem to drop an inordinate number of passes despite high catch ratings. QB's are also made an endangered species as many times even poor defensive lines simply poor through the O-line as if it was not even there. The passing game is not horrible, but it is in need of further balancing that it obviously did not receive from a company that has no problem screwing over their paying customers.
Defensively, the game basically works within the same constructs that is always has only now with super charged DB's dealing with teams that cannot really run. A truly great combination of factors. It would be nice for the defense, though, if roughing the passer was called such a high percent of the time. Many times I would not even be controlling at all or would have switched off the defender who roughed the passer. Even the CPU is not immune to the problem. In one game alone I experienced 4 roughing the passer penalties while the CPU had 3. Those penalties are in addition to 4 or 5 holding penalties that were called on my team in the same game and are completely beyond my control (0 on the CPU). It was as if no one ever bothered to play test the actual gameplay over at Money Bags Inc.
In the interest of time here are some more horrible flaws that should have been found in play testing:
-The CPU is horrible against their own goaline. I got two safeties in one game because they twice ran reveres inside their own 1 yard line.
-Instead of assigning the correct 1-AA school for teams to play in dynasty, it just picks a random one each time you being play.
-As I simmed through UK's first season multiple times, they twice went to bowl games with a 5-7 record.
-It's not a horrible flaw, but despite the fact that Madden season's have let you save in game for years, NCAA still does not.
All of these problems were found in only one afternoon/night of gameplay, so I would imagine there are many more to be found. They are simply inexcusable individually and a beyond horrible thing to foster on the trusting customer when put all together. This year's release reminds me greatly of how 2K Sports treated their college basketball game this year for the PS2, update the roster and ruin the gameplay. If NCAA Football 08 was nothing more than a simple roster update, as is always joked about EA games, it would actually be better. As it stands now, the game is not worth playing. It was not play tested whatsoever apparently, and it is not fun. EA should be ashamed of allowing this game to be released with the problems it has. It is not even worth discussing any of the other modes (which you probably already know all about) because with gameplay so broken and dynasty mode horribly glitched and problematic, do the other mini-games even matter? I could understand EA put more into the next gen games during this development cycle, but they actually made NCAA Football 08 one of their worst releases in the series for PS2. I didn't expect much, and I was highly disappointed in what I got. If I had to give it a number out of 10. How does a 4 sound?
This article was a little ranty for my tastes. But I am really angry about this.
I also have been neglectful in mentioning that Visual Concepts has revived their 2K Football Engine (minus an NFL license) to release All-Pro Football 2K8 this week. It's reviews are not turning out as well as those for NCAA Football:
I can't review it myself because I don't own a next generation console, so you won't get any rant from me about its quality. All I know is that NFL 2K for Dreamcast was the greatest football game ever made (as long as no one played with the unstoppable Minnesota Vikings).
