Official NCAA 08 Thread

[Maize]

detroitbasketball said:

^^And rightfully so, because by this time next year, and 360 will be 2 and a half years old.

And the PS3 will be entering its one-year anny, and if the X-Mas price drop does happen, I should be getting one.

[bearcat]

Good thing I didn't sell my 360 like I was going to about two months ago.

[ryandman89]

sportsbuck2745 said:

sports.ign.com/articles/795/795367p1.html

List of Top 10 places to play.

WTF!?!? why is Texas' stadium higher than A&M's. I absolutely guarantee that A&M is louder than Texas at almost any game. I've been to I think 2 games at DKR and all of the home games at Kyle Field and there is no comparison. I might be a little biased but those stadiums are off. Kyle Field should at least be in the top 10.

[bearcat]

ryandman89 said:

sportsbuck2745 said:

sports.ign.com/articles/795/795367p1.html

List of Top 10 places to play.

WTF!?!? why is Texas' stadium higher than A&M's. I absolutely guarantee that A&M is louder than Texas at almost any game. I've been to I think 2 games at DKR and all of the home games at Kyle Field and there is no comparison. I might be a little biased but those stadiums are off. Kyle Field should at least be in the top 10.

They're only up there because of the name on the jersey. I remember watching the A&M/Mizzou game on TV last year, and that stadium just looked like it was going nuts. I'm really glad we're not playing there this year. ;D

[Sportsbuck]

At today's community day, two things have been confirmed thus far.

Gang-tackling is actually in, and you can edit players on the 360.

[detroitbasketball]

sportsbuck2745 said:

At today's community day, two things have been confirmed thus far.

Gang-tackling is actually in, and you can edit players on the 360.

EA actually adding a useful feature? Everyone to the bomb shelter!

[Sportsbuck]

[D-Mac]

EWW thats an ugly helmet.

[r3dnek]

well, it looks like the PS2 version of 08 will be the same game with a couple extra bells and whistles

no ESPN.com, campus legend doesn't look different, and pretty much everything looks like 07 with a new recruiting system

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W5YFtTrlw0

now, i do understand it's the PS2 and won't be as cool looking as PS3, but if it's the same game essentially, i might be looking at a better way to spend $50

[Sportsbuck]

Heisman top 5 in NCAA 08.

Colt Brennan, Brandon Ore, Colt McCoy, JD Booty, Davone Bess

Edit: Also, here's some impressions of the 360 version.

* Not a fan at all of the playcall layout. I respect that EA tried to change some things and invent a new layout, but IMO this isn't the way to go.
* Automotion is AWESOME. (This is on CG and NG, BTW.)
* Some Auto stiff amr and break tackle
* Can get 'on the spot' verbal commitments in Dynasty recruiting
* 35 players you target is year-round...the pool of players exists for the whole year.
* No SI, instead espn.com. It is a 'hub' where you will see team-related info in addition to national news.
* In the My Shrine, you can have 5 videos and 10 pics. You will be able to view others pics/clips as they are sortable. IE: If you want to watch great UM/tOSU highlights from other players, you can sort by those schools. Video and pics will have an overlay reminding you of when the game took place, if it was MNC game, etc. Didn't get to see this, but did ask NG producer about it.
* Play challenge worked. Overturned a play ruled a fumble where RB was actually down.
* 116 stadiums in game. They look AMAZING.
* Player Ratings: I wrote down every rating that was NOT in CG and asked rhombic to state which ones were not in last year's. The new ratings appear to be: Ball Carrier Vision, Spectacular Catch, Catch in Traffic, Block Shedding, Pursuit, Release Rating, and Importance.
* Can control up to 12 teams in Dynasty Mode.
* In Dynasty Recruiting, you can sort players by Commitment Status. The choices there are: 10 schools remaining, 8 schools remaining, 5 schools remaining, 3 schools remaining, Soft Commit, Hard Commit.

[Sportsbuck]

And sorry to double post, but this is so damn long..

Here's another impression from community day.

Next Gen

OK guys, I have to somewhat apologize on this. I did not get a ton of time to play next gen, because we spent about an hour testing current gen stuff initially, then a bunch of current gen gameplay producers got there so we cornered them for about an hour and a half and unloaded our arsenal of complaints on them, and then when we finally settled down into next gen gameplay, the next-gen producers came by and we spent a lot of time talking to them. They had a tournament at the event on next gen, and unfortunately both of us got bounced in the first round because neither of us had even completed a single game yet, when other guys had been on the sticks for about 4 hours already. But this is what I got:

- Next gen gameplay is about 1000% better than it was a year ago. Again, they got the auto-motion in there, which is a huge get. One thing that I absolutely loved was seeing the deep ball. The deep ball on next gen is simply dead, IMO. I tried to get a couple cheap deep balls in my tournament game, and all were either incompletes or interceptions. DBs make some solid plays on the ball, plus they have balls that are off target. Somebody was talking about PI, but I didn't see it one time when I was there, so my impression was that pass interference is not a huge issue.

- We talked to them about field goals getting blocked, and they indicated to us that this was something they had addressed. Given that I didn't see one field goal blocked in my games, or any of the tournament games that I watched, this appears to be a fixed issue.

- The biggest thing about next gen, to me, is the blocking. I got a chance to sit down with the blocking guru and have him show me the new blocking system. They have double team blocks and cut blocks integrated into the game, which is really nice. They have an entire logic where linemen have a guy that they are assigned to block pre-snap, based on the alignment of the defense, but it is dynamic so that linemen can adapt if defensive players move around. For example, the guy showed me one time where a MLB came up to blitz, and the line aborted the double team blocking, and went to straight man vs man type blocking. One of the other things that he showed me was the improved lead blocking by fullbacks, who now do a really cool job of leading you through the hole, rather than making a beeline for the FS. I was pretty impressed. The other thing that he told me was that they now have situations where blockers make more dynamic decisions about who to block, and smarter players will make better decisions more often. They also have some interesting "win" situations for defensive linemen, where linemen recognize that they are getting double teamed and will either try to split the double team, or will actually go to the ground and take out both blockers, so that the LB can make a play unblocked. The guy also highlighted to me that they wanted the run blocking to be more set up towards people reading their holes and picking their way through traffic, as opposed to just sprinting outside. The producer showed me several times where he ran the same play multiple times, and chose an alternate hole different times. I'm not going to say that this is 100% realistic blocking, but it's a giant, giant step in the right direction.

- I do have a couple concerns with next-gen that prevent it from being a "this game will revolutionize football gaming" type of game. First, it seemed as though it was really ridiculously hard to get pressure on the QB with the front 4. I noticed a lot of games where QBs are sitting in the pocket for an eternity. So containing the QBs and getting pressure on QBs will be an issue to look at for sure.

- I saw a lot of broken tackles. Others said that they didn't, and I watched some games where it appeared to not be a problem. But in one game that I played, we had a ton of broken tackles that had both of us scratching our heads. I also saw a fair number of fumbles, so that's the another potential thing to look at.

- We had some issues with it seeming like speed burst wasn't really doing anything. Seemed like a lot of times where guys were almost jogging instead of running full out.

- There were a lot of "wow" moments with the game. Setting aside the player models and running animations, this game has a ton of really cool animations that are jaw-dropping. Stuff from WRs getting a foot in bounds near the sideliens, to blocking animations, to failed strip ball animations (where the guy actually makes an aggressive swipe at the ball, you see the ball almost get ripped loose, but the ballcarrier manages to hold on to it), etc...

- User catching was a LOT easier than last year, but again, I didn't see anybody having success with lob user catches.

- The fast twitch stuff is definitly back. I made some runs with McFadden that were reminiscent of stuff that I used to do on '04. I am not 100% sure how I feel about all of this, but it definitely brings back that sense of user control to the game. It also seemed as though this was an issue that guys with high agility/speed type ratings could do a lot easier than guys without it.

Bottom line to me is this. If you have a next gen system, this is a game that you should definitely buy. I would probably even recommend purchasing this over CG, if you played '07 extensively and are looking for a change there. But the game lacks a sense of polish and overall finish that makes it a game that I can't tell people to buy a next gen system simply to play this game. But we saw a lot of encouraging things, and we talked to a lot of guys that have some really cool thoughts about the future on next gen, so I think it's just a matter of time until they get this thing pretty tight. One of the producers, Ben, was telling us that they've really used the next-gen system as a way to re-examine all of the things that they did on current gen, so there are a bunch of things that they definitely have plans to do in the immediate future in terms of adding some of the features and things that current gen has, and then even expanding on that, but they want to get it right (because as another producer told us, when they have something in that's a failed feature, it basically has to be a complete disaster for them to take it out, simply because it takes so much effort). So it seems like the idea on next gen is to progress steadily, keep gameplay as tight as possible, and make incremental improvements where they avoid doing anything similar to NCAA 2005 or 2006 where they have setbacks and end up having to take things out of the game, or hear about fans talk about how poorly implemented things are.

[sep]

r3dnek said:

well, it looks like the PS2 version of 08 will be the same game with a couple extra bells and whistles

no ESPN.com, campus legend doesn't look different, and pretty much everything looks like 07 with a new recruiting system

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W5YFtTrlw0

now, i do understand it's the PS2 and won't be as cool looking as PS3, but if it's the same game essentially, i might be looking at a better way to spend $50

How could you tell if that was the PS2 version?

[r3dnek]

the graphics look exactly like last year's version

basically, i'm saying if that's the PS2 version of 08, then it's basically a recycled version of 07 with recruiting change and that's about it

no new layout, no ESPN.com feature, none of the little stuff that i thought would be on all platforms, not just PS3 and 360

now, granted the PS2 engine isn't capable of everything the PS3's is, but i'm just mentioning that i might want to spend $50 on something else

[detroitbasketball]

sepsportsfanatic said:

r3dnek said:

well, it looks like the PS2 version of 08 will be the same game with a couple extra bells and whistles

no ESPN.com, campus legend doesn't look different, and pretty much everything looks like 07 with a new recruiting system

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W5YFtTrlw0

now, i do understand it's the PS2 and won't be as cool looking as PS3, but if it's the same game essentially, i might be looking at a better way to spend $50

How could you tell if that was the PS2 version?

That's definitely not the 360 version...guess you haven't played it cause the menus and everything are totally different as well....and those graphics are obviously Xbox quality

Again, why would they revamp the game on last-gen NOW? It makes no sense from a commercial standpoint for them

[bearcat]

Couple of things:

Hope they get the fumbling fixed. That was an annoyance on last year's game, where 3-4 fumbles per game was the norm, not the exception.

It seems like the QB pressure thing can be fixed with sliders, but I'd like to see that improved at least a little before the release.

And in recruiting, I think it would be cool if you could swoop in on a recruit that has verbally committed to a school, whether it would be a solid or soft commit. I guess that's what the "sway" feature is for, but I think it might actually be a option if you're trying to sway a recruit's opinion on something about your school, not another.

[ChisAto]

tbbearcat5 said:

Hope they get the fumbling fixed. That was an annoyance on last year's game, where 3-4 fumbles per game was the norm, not the exception.

From Sportsbuck's long as hell post:

I also saw a fair number of fumbles, so that's the another potential thing to look at.

[Maize]

XBOX/PS2 is getting hosed. It is good to see that they are putting work into the next-gen systems, but it sucks I don't have one .

[D-Mac]

what is auto motion?

[detroitbasketball]

maizeandblue15 said:

XBOX/PS2 is getting hosed. It is good to see that they are putting work into the next-gen systems, but it sucks I don't have one .

Welcome to the world of last generation

[ryandman89]

This really makes me want to get a "current-gen" game system. I might actually look around and think about it now. Which would be better a PS3 or XBOX360. I know the 360 is cheaper, but I've always been a sony guy.