I am really enjoying College Hoops (on the PS2) a great deal. There are some issues (isn´t there in every game?) but overall having a blast. After a slow start, Sega is really winning me over. Oh, I enjoyed their DC games, but the PS2 versions sort of underwhelmed me until this year. WSB 2K4 was flawed but challenging and fun, ESPN Football was and still is a blast, and now the college BB game.
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<BR>Forget AI for a minute, how did Sega catch up to EA so quickly in the programming department?? ESPN football looks GREAT on the PS2. So much better than Madden or NCAA. Very few jaggies, smooth, quick loading. And while the college game is not quite as pretty, the interface is worlds better than March Madness. MM 2004 feels poorly programmed. Playing around in dynasty mode is like running in quicksand. I just don´t get it. I hope EA feels suitably shameful and makes up for it next year. Since they are hitting up against the limitations of the hardware, I don´t see what else they can do. We sure won´t see larger rosters in NCAA Football or anything that involves using more memory unitl the next generation. Might as well clean up the programming to make things look smoother and quicker.
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<BR>The interface in ESPN CH is a dream. You can choose fictional players and then quickly edit your team to use real names. The first and last names database is well done and intuitive. THe number of names said by the announcers is excellent. Compare that to MM where it takes an act of God (and a discovered workaround to speed the process) to get the teams named.
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<BR>I hope for a few things next year. For one, I hope that someone makes an excellent baseball game that is fun to play as both an arcade game and a sim. I hope EA finds a way to improve NCAA Football to improve an already excellent game. And i hope EA improves their other games to match the excellence of NCAA and Tiger Woods (PC).
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<BR>Most of all, I hope that Sega´s work has paid off and that have solid profits from their sports games. I would like to see them make an NCAA game off of the ESPN Football engine (and tweak the kicking game to allow some missed field goals and blocks).
Enjoying ESPN College Hoops a lot
Moderators: Bill_Abner, ScoopBrady
Enjoying ESPN College Hoops a lot
I´m glad you´re enjoying this game a lot. After pouring over all the posts on the OS forums over this vs. MM2004, I picked it up at the end of last week and just started to delve into it yesterday.
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<BR>It really looks promising. The addition of sliders is a welcome one, and appearently they really work, even though it plays pretty decent right out of the box. The second thing going for it is the in-season recruiting. I don´t know enough about it yet to know for sure, but from what I´ve seen and read, it is a little intimidating at first for all the things you have to keep up with. Between that and the appearent ability to do gameplans for individual games with the help of the assistant coaches, it almost seems Championship Manageresque in terms of the amount of things going on between games.
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<BR>It´s a huge improvement over last year´s game (most improved game of the year?). This could turn out to be even more fun than NCAA Football 2004, which I have come close to overdosing on this fall.
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<BR> <IMG SRC="images/forum/icons/icon21.gif"> <BR><BR><font size=1>[ This message was edited by: RiverRat on 24-11-2003 10:35 ]</font>
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<BR>It really looks promising. The addition of sliders is a welcome one, and appearently they really work, even though it plays pretty decent right out of the box. The second thing going for it is the in-season recruiting. I don´t know enough about it yet to know for sure, but from what I´ve seen and read, it is a little intimidating at first for all the things you have to keep up with. Between that and the appearent ability to do gameplans for individual games with the help of the assistant coaches, it almost seems Championship Manageresque in terms of the amount of things going on between games.
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<BR>It´s a huge improvement over last year´s game (most improved game of the year?). This could turn out to be even more fun than NCAA Football 2004, which I have come close to overdosing on this fall.
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<BR> <IMG SRC="images/forum/icons/icon21.gif"> <BR><BR><font size=1>[ This message was edited by: RiverRat on 24-11-2003 10:35 ]</font>
Now Playing: NCAA Football 2004, ESPN College Hoops ... Go MIZZOU!
Enjoying ESPN College Hoops a lot
I *want* to like this game so much, but there are a few things that are starting to bother me:
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<BR>1. I have the shooting foul slider maxed out and I´m still not getting to the line enough. Even maxed I am only averaging about 8-10 fouls shots a game.
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<BR>2. Why do my players continually shoot fade away jumpers against my wishes? I don´t know how many times I have grabbed a rebound and tried to take it for the slam and I ended up missing a fade away. Please help me!
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<BR>3. I can´t get the CPU to shoot enough three pointers. I have tried two or three different slider combinations at OS. In general, I do not see a lot of variety in the CPU offense. It is fairly good and challenging, but it just seems like their strategy never changes and I´m getting bored with it.
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<BR>4. The CPU full court press sucks and it is just annoying me. I hardly ever turn the ball over. Maybe once ever 3 or 4 games.
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<BR>5. I didn´t really notice this until I started playing ID again, but the forcefield around players is still too big.
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<BR>The game is good, but I´m not sure it can compete with ID for my hoops playing time right now.
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<BR>1. I have the shooting foul slider maxed out and I´m still not getting to the line enough. Even maxed I am only averaging about 8-10 fouls shots a game.
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<BR>2. Why do my players continually shoot fade away jumpers against my wishes? I don´t know how many times I have grabbed a rebound and tried to take it for the slam and I ended up missing a fade away. Please help me!
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<BR>3. I can´t get the CPU to shoot enough three pointers. I have tried two or three different slider combinations at OS. In general, I do not see a lot of variety in the CPU offense. It is fairly good and challenging, but it just seems like their strategy never changes and I´m getting bored with it.
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<BR>4. The CPU full court press sucks and it is just annoying me. I hardly ever turn the ball over. Maybe once ever 3 or 4 games.
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<BR>5. I didn´t really notice this until I started playing ID again, but the forcefield around players is still too big.
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<BR>The game is good, but I´m not sure it can compete with ID for my hoops playing time right now.
Gamertag: Leebo33
Enjoying ESPN College Hoops a lot
"1. I have the shooting foul slider maxed out and I´m still not getting to the line enough. Even maxed I am only averaging about 8-10 fouls shots a game.
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<BR>2. Why do my players continually shoot fade away jumpers against my wishes? I don´t know how many times I have grabbed a rebound and tried to take it for the slam and I ended up missing a fade away. Please help me!
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<BR>3. I can´t get the CPU to shoot enough three pointers. I have tried two or three different slider combinations at OS. In general, I do not see a lot of variety in the CPU offense. It is fairly good and challenging, but it just seems like their strategy never changes and I´m getting bored with it.
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<BR>4. The CPU full court press sucks and it is just annoying me. I hardly ever turn the ball over. Maybe once ever 3 or 4 games.
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<BR>5. I didn´t really notice this until I started playing ID again, but the forcefield around players is still too big. "
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<BR>1. If you play 10 minutes halfs like me, this number is pretty consistent with simmed results for a season, which is the yardstick I go by regardless of whether it feels right or not.
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<BR>2. I have no idea how to command a dunk. I notice this problem too but it doesn´t seem to bother me.
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<BR>3. I see a lot more variation in defense than offense. If you set the close and medium shot tendencies all the way down and the three point up to about 75% or so, it works pretty well for me.
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<BR>4. I´ve never turned it over against the press and I admit it is pretty easy (at least on all conference) to just pass the ball down the court. I have created a couple turnovers on the press.
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<BR>5. It´s still there if you just try to go around somebody, but if you put some moves on (circle plus direction on PS2), I´ve been able to get past guys within the "force field", although I´m still terribly poor at it.
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<BR>2. Why do my players continually shoot fade away jumpers against my wishes? I don´t know how many times I have grabbed a rebound and tried to take it for the slam and I ended up missing a fade away. Please help me!
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<BR>3. I can´t get the CPU to shoot enough three pointers. I have tried two or three different slider combinations at OS. In general, I do not see a lot of variety in the CPU offense. It is fairly good and challenging, but it just seems like their strategy never changes and I´m getting bored with it.
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<BR>4. The CPU full court press sucks and it is just annoying me. I hardly ever turn the ball over. Maybe once ever 3 or 4 games.
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<BR>5. I didn´t really notice this until I started playing ID again, but the forcefield around players is still too big. "
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<BR>1. If you play 10 minutes halfs like me, this number is pretty consistent with simmed results for a season, which is the yardstick I go by regardless of whether it feels right or not.
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<BR>2. I have no idea how to command a dunk. I notice this problem too but it doesn´t seem to bother me.
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<BR>3. I see a lot more variation in defense than offense. If you set the close and medium shot tendencies all the way down and the three point up to about 75% or so, it works pretty well for me.
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<BR>4. I´ve never turned it over against the press and I admit it is pretty easy (at least on all conference) to just pass the ball down the court. I have created a couple turnovers on the press.
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<BR>5. It´s still there if you just try to go around somebody, but if you put some moves on (circle plus direction on PS2), I´ve been able to get past guys within the "force field", although I´m still terribly poor at it.
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Now Playing: NCAA Football 2004, ESPN College Hoops ... Go MIZZOU!
Enjoying ESPN College Hoops a lot
Maybe I should clarify that I have been disappointed so often by college basketball games, that the fact that one is playable and enjoyable is enough.
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<BR>I agree that there are some things that will eventually get to me -but with fouls turned all the way up, I am getting enough of them. But I see your point about the press and the way teams attack you on offense. Just like it annoys me in ESPN Football that the AI rarely misses a FG.
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<BR>But it will keep me happy for a few months. Will it stay on my playlist till the new version comes out next year? No, only NCAA Football is going to do that.
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<BR>I agree that there are some things that will eventually get to me -but with fouls turned all the way up, I am getting enough of them. But I see your point about the press and the way teams attack you on offense. Just like it annoys me in ESPN Football that the AI rarely misses a FG.
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<BR>But it will keep me happy for a few months. Will it stay on my playlist till the new version comes out next year? No, only NCAA Football is going to do that.