Love for NCAA 2005

[paytonsplace]

I know some folks don't like it, but I love the passing game in NCAA 2005. I find that you really have to read the defenses to find the open man. No airing it out into triple coverage for a completion here. Also if you see the opposing CB rattled, give a pump fake. Chances are good that he or the safety may bite (first time pump fakes really meant something in a game). Finally you need to put a bit of touch on the pass to place the ball in the right area for a completion (and I love the satisfaction of "user completion"). There are some dropped balls but these seem to go down when the pass is well placed to the open receiver. The passing game from 2004 felt automatic. This game is a major improvement.

This is the first football game that has forced me to actually use (and have fun with) the practice mode.


I'm having a blast with NCAA 2005 on XBox. I hope those of you that dismissed it at first will give it a chance. It has the most realistic passing game I have seen in a football game.

[Jason]

I'm playing the PS2 version but feel the same way you do. I've always liked EA's passing game better than Sega's and this year is no exception even though ESPN's passing has been improved. The ball just feels like it has more weight in EA's games.

I've just started taking advantage of the Match-Up stick and find myself attacking the defense at its weakest spots on almost every play. At first I thought it was gimmickly but now it's become an important part of my gameplan.

What surprised me was that I almost passed on this game and have now given it much more time than ESPN which was the game I was really looking forward to.

[JRod]

The match-up stick is a must for every game after NCAA. Playing against poor team or players, with the right sliders is quite evident.

I like the game but I don't like some of the problems. I'll go back to it after ESPN initial shine has worn off.

[Badgun]

There are some dropped balls but these seem to go down when the pass is well placed to the open receiver. The passing game from 2004 felt automatic. This game is a major improvement.

It has the most realistic passing game I have seen in a football game.

First of all, what open receiver?

I know you mean well, but how you can make that last statement is beyond me. Never before in all my years of gaming have I ever seen a passing game so UNREALISTIC. I see a guy downfield and it looks like he's got his man beat so I throw the ball to him. By the time the ball gets there, all 3 DBs from his side of the field are there along with the three that somehow miraculously came from 50 yards across the field in 1.7 seconds.

Also, I don't know how you can watch receivers with Jerry Rice abilities drop 8 out of 10 balls thrown to them.

The over done dropped passes and flash gordon dbs make this the most unrealistic passing game I've ever seen. EA simply screwed the pooch on this game this year. I've grown to accept it with all its flaws and I just resign myself that my qbs will always go 7 for 24 for 240 yards or somewhere thereabout. It's like someone else said...when your qb goes 9-31, you're supposed to lose. Not me...I'm 6-0 with Florida State and Chris Rix has completed about 30% of his passes.

What else is funny is all the 6-3 and 7-0 online games I play because no one can complete a pass. When was the last time you saw Florida and FSU ties 3-3 late in the 4th quarter? College football is about scoring...it's not about defense and never has been. Why on earth EA had to screw the game up I'll ever know.

I'm glad you're enjoying it, though. The only reason I even kept my copy is to import my college players into Madden. Beyond that, I have no use for the game.

[dbdynsty25]

College football is about scoring...it's not about defense and never has been. Why on earth EA had to screw the game up I'll ever know.

Tell that to the Big 10.

[Badgun]

College football is about scoring...it's not about defense and never has been. Why on earth EA had to screw the game up I'll ever know.

Tell that to the Big 10.

I don't recall a lot of 7-3 games in the Big Ten. As a matter of fact there were quite a few barn burners in the Big Ten last year.

[K_Mosley]

Oklahoma plays some pretty good defense, too...

Anyway, I agree mostly with Badgun's points. The problem is that - even with their backs turned to the play - as soon as the QB releases the ball, the DB's attack the location of the pass. Omniscient DB's are a "cheap" way to improve pass defense.

I did read a post over at GameFaq's describing that when you deliver the ball, and whether or not you lead the reciever, has a big impact on completion percentage. For example, you can't throw a hitch or curl until *after* the receiver makes his break. You must lead receivers on the out route. You need to throw crossing patterns before the receiver gets beyond the QB (roughly the middle of the field), and so on. I've found that by implementing some of these things in my passing attack, I've had more success. Still, there are too many drops, though, which is *very* frustrating.

I'm still giving it time, but as far as actually gameplay goes, I preferred 2004. Also, 2004 didn't have the slowdown problem on the Xbox, either.

Just my two cents...

Kevin

[RiverRat]

I've got lots of love for this game. Very few problems.

I'm playing on AA with defensive awareness at minimum for both Human and CPU, and passing sliders maxed out for both, and I have no problems with dropped passes at all in the open field (getting hit is a different story). I love throwing to backs on little angle routes over the middle and I have a lot more success throwing short than I ever had in any other NCAA game. I've played four games with my current sliders between evenly matched teams. Won two close games, lost one close game, and got blown out once. I play five minute quarters and have averaged about 35-40 points per game combined for both teams.

The matchup stick is also VERY important. One game, I played as Stanford and their tight end is the best player on the team. I think I completed six consecutive passes to him at one point, all over the field. It honestly was like playing pitch and catch, and I don't do anything different than I've done with any other game in this series. Just read the safeties, try to time it right, and either lob or throw a dart .. whatever you think will get it there.

My only complaint now with my sliders is that I don't get enough yards per carry on either side of the ball, too many sacks, and not enough picks (at least for my taste). Assuming I can fix those things (I don't see why I can't), 2004 is history.

[Blublub]

Same as River Rat, with essentially the same settings. Neither I nor the CPU are having any problems passing now. Badgun, try AA with passing sliders maxed out for both you and CPU. Actually mine are slightly different, as I think I have my accuracy turned down some.

I too really like the slightly slower speed and find that it allows just enough time to actually read the coverage and find the open man. Yes, the DBs will close very fast on lobbed passes, but if you put a little juice on it it's not a problem. And on long fly routes you can float it to your heart's content and still outrun/jump them with good receivers.

But what brings me back is the running game. It's just so damned much fun. Far and away the best of any game to date, IMHO. Outside and up the gut can both either work for big gains or big losses, and with the right team you can really grind out the clock with sustained drives.

I'm ashamed to admit it, but after bitching and moaning so much after it came out, I've done a complete 360 now and am having a very hard time putting it down. I'm into my second dynasty season with Arizona. Started off something like 2-6 and then came back to eke into a minor bowl. Had a boffo recruiting year and now am ranked #16 in the nation, only loss so far is a drubbing at Tennessee.

Even things like the tips, which I thought were way overdone initially, are turning out to be nice additions. They seldom come into play, and when they do the results can be thrilling - like the time I beat Stanford on a ball tipped at the line of scrimmage with no time on the clock that ends up in the hands of my TE in the endzone.

Another thing I love about the game is the handling of fumbles. Recoveries are not the random event they are in most other games - you can actually fight for possession and pounce on balls.

The ability to talk players into staying is way cool as well. I had a junior wideout want to go pro that I talked into staying and now is a Heisman contender.

My only concerns at this stage are that the CPU still has a hard time beating a zone and is too effective against the man. This is a real problem, but hopefully not a game killer.

[Bill_Abner]

Personally, I just don't think the game is finished. It plays more like a Beta than a finished product. EA does this from time to time because of their rushed/quick turnaround release dates (Sega does this too); I firmly believe NCAA 2006 will be what NCAA 2005 should (or could) have been.

The passing game being the most realistic ever? Well, not the copy that I have. You either max out the sliders and then you make catches with 3 guys draped all over you or you lower them to where you won't make every circus catch but then you'll drop multiple passes that hit you right in the hands. Pick your poison. My SE and TE lead the Big10 in drops after 8 games. And they lead in that category by a ridiculous number. As for receivers getting open? You need to play on Varsity level for a player to really get open like they do in college, otherwise it's just like NCAA 2004 when your YAC is pretty much a non factor.

And for those that get a good CPU passing game on AA or even Heisman--that's good to hear. But again that's not the game that I'm playing. If the CPU completes 40% on me then I had a bad game. Yes the OSU defesne is good, but come on. If I want the CPU to have a chance at passing I need to play tight bump and run the whole game, otherwise it's going to be another 30-35% passing day.

The running game is passable, but even then you'll see stuff that just makes no sense. When OSU RB Lydell Ross takes the ball off left tackle in the first quarter, the Penn State defensive end on the other side of the line should never, ever, be able to take an angle and push him out of bounds 25 yards downfield. Not in a million years unless that Penn State DE is Courtney Brown. But a 68 speed DE staying with Ross from the opposite side of the field?

And fumbles? You mean you actually see them? After 8 games Ross has YET to fumble. The only fumbles I have seen are by the QB on sacks, or a punt returner that doesn't call a fair catch. Seriously, I have yet to fumble with a RB of a FB in 8 games.

In short:

The Discipline system is pure comedy
The simulated stats and game scores are TOTALLY screwed up (and they were fine in 2004, which again points to it being not finished)
The HFA is a gimmick (IMO)
Composure, to me, is just window dressing because I see way too many players with no composure play like All Americans
The gameplay is spotty

2005 is about 6 key fixes from being another classic football game, but those 6 or so fixes are doozies. There are a lot of great IDEAS in NCAA 2005, but the ideas need to be properly executed in the game to be worthy of a lot of praise.

And as much as we love to heap praise on NCAA 2004, and I'm certainly one of those guys, we need to remember that 2004 was by no means perfect. It had a lot of faults, too. But I cannot help the fact that I had a whole lot more fun with 2004 than I have had thus far with 2005, and that's a real shock to me. I want to like it; I keep playing it in the hopes that it'll finally just click. I want to find that magical slider set that makes it play like the game I want it to be, but I haven't found it yet.

[Badgun]

I decided to revisit this game last night after reading this thread. My game was a critical one. I was taking my 8-0 Seminoles into College Park, Maryland to take on the 6-1 Terrapins in a battle for first place in the ACC.

I have my passing accuracy and catch sliders maxed out completely for both me and the CPU. I have my run sliders pretty much at default and I have the CPU's running slider set to 18 and the run block to 13. I have both defensive awareness sliders turned down to 0 and INTs turned down to 3. Break Block is turned way down as well. With these settings I started my game on 9 minute quarters.

I won the game 31-24, but my passing stats were once again horrid. Rix was 7-22 for 232 yards and 3 TDs. Seven completions for 232 yards is more than 30 yards per completion. I actually kept track of where my completions were just for the sake of knowing. On deep balls, I was 5-8 and on short to medium passes, I was 2 for 14. So even with different sliders, I am having pretty much the same results as far as completion percentage. I only saw about 3 drops, but the bigger issue for me has always been the amount of area the DBs can cover and the breakneck speed in which they cover that area. While I will agree that with a well timed pass to an open man that you will have some success through the air, the inherrent problem is that you just don't get that many open men so you wind up throwing way too many passes into coverage that really didn't look like coverage when you threw the ball.

I really enjoyed the way Maryland played as their QB was a tad over 50% for the game for 260 odd yards. They also pounded the run at me and for the first time, I couldn't shut them down. Their back had 24 carries for 90 yards...not bad since I average giving up only 22 yards rushing per game.

Say what you will about the game, but if they had simply left the gameplay untouched and added whatever fluff they added, it would have been a much better game than it is. I visit a lot of different forums and you just can't read a post about NCAA 2005 without reading complaints about the passing game. Those of you that are happy about it are dwarfed by those that aren't.

The original poster mention practice mode and I'll admit that although I never use it in any game, I was desperate enough to try it with this one. I didn't really see a difference and to be quite honest, most people don't want to have to work at a game to enjoy it...I know I don't. The bigger problem here is not with people like me, but with the casual gamer. I'll come back next year regardless of how bad they screwed it up this year. The problem with this year's game is that it lacks the "pick up and play" simplicity that all sports games should have and when the casual gamer finds that he can't complete a pass, he's not going to "work" at it, he's going to find a game that he can have fun with. If EA had wanted to make the game this way, they should have had two modes. Maybe last year's game could fall under "classic" mode and then they could have added "Super DB mode" for all you guys that think you should have to "work" at a game to have fun with it. Either way, I think EA's going to alienate a lot of people with this year's passing game, intentional or not.

[K_Mosley]

Good feedback, fellas... I'm going to turn the "awareness" sliders down and see if that helps me. With the success that a couple of you are having, I hope to see if I can make it work for me as well.

I love college football, and I'm not ready to give up yet!

And, as mentioned already in this thread, to be fair, there certainly are some things to like about NCAA 2005...

Kevin

[Blublub]

Say what you will about the game, but if they had simply left the gameplay untouched and added whatever fluff they added, it would have been a much better game than it is. I visit a lot of different forums and you just can't read a post about NCAA 2005 without reading complaints about the passing game. Those of you that are happy about it are dwarfed by those that aren't.

I don't disagree a bit, nor do I claim that there aren't problems with the short passing game. It's just that there are payoffs when you spend more time with the game, flawed as it is.

Bill, I've seen many people complain about the lack of fumbles, but all I can say is that it hasn't been a problem for me - either my team or the CPU. I'm seeing on average at least three combined per game. It probably is still a little low, but not enough to pose a problem. I fumble enough to really hesitate using the speed burst when I know I'm going to get hit. As to why I'm "lucky" enough to fumble a lot, I don't have any idea.

I did bump into something very interesting last night. I noticed that in the "personal bests" section there are entries for "user catches." Strangely, I have none. Now I thought I was using manual catching the whole time, but then again I've never seen a "user catch" notificaition in a game - I wonder if there isn't some sort of secret button that we're all not hitting to minimize the drops.

You are entirely right to gripe about the problems with the game, which there are many. I'm just not entirely convinced (yet) that these cannot somehow be overcome. I too would have vastly preferred the same gameplay balance from last year with a few fixes (like blocked punts) rather than kicking up the DB AI as it seems they did.

The disparity between CPU success and failure vs. zone and man coverage still has me very concerned, though. I've had a number of games where I could more or less completely shut down the CPU passing attack just by sitting in a zone and nothing else. Anytime I deviate from that against these teams I get burned badly.

[MizzouRah]

I agree that it's a rushed out product, just like ESPN was... BUT this year NCAA is sitting in it's case after 5 games, while ESPN is getting playing time. That's never happened since NCAA's been around, it always saw a huge amount to play from me.. this year something just doesn't feel right with the gameplay. I have some decent sliders from Jistic, but although they have helped, there is still alot I don't like about playing this game.

I really wonder what they test when testing games? Do they actually play a game?


Bill, if you have any sliders to share, please do.


Todd

[Bill_Abner]

I agree that it's a rushed out product, just like ESPN was... BUT this year NCAA is sitting in it's case after 5 games, while ESPN is getting playing time. That's never happened since NCAA's been around, it always saw a huge amount to play from me.. this year something just doesn't feel right with the gameplay. I have some decent sliders from Jistic, but although they have helped, there is still alot I don't like about playing this game.

I really wonder what they test when testing games? Do they actually play a game?
Bill, if you have any sliders to share, please do.

Todd

Blub -- three fumbles per game?! Yeow.

Todd, that's exactly how I feel. Usually I'm well into my NCAA Dynasty when the NFL games ship and I only play the NFL games to review them and then happily go back to NCAA for the rest of the football season. This year the roles have reversed and ESPN is getting a lot of PT and NCAA gets a game, I get mad, I shelve it for a 2 days, I get lured into playing again, I get mad, etc. Heh, damn game.

As for NCAA sliders, here's what I do:

1) Play on Varsity. Yes, Varsity. On this level you will see DBs blow coverages and your receivers can actually get open. The sliders themselves, I'm going off memory, but I lowered (all the way):

Human QB Accuracy
CPU D Awareness
CPU Knockdowns

I think I have Human catching around +8 or +9. You'll see drops, but you also will see fewer catches with 3 guys all over you. Go into practice mode to test this to your liking.

I have CPU Accuracy and catching at +20, and i think pass block at +13 or so. At +20 you will only get sacks with your LB if he blitzes. I have CPU running and blocking maxed at 20 and the CPU can without a doubt run on me.

Human running...I think is something like blocking at +2 and running at maybe +5 or 6. Can't remember. That's all I can remember off hand, but I also suggest:

-Switching to AA level on field goals. Takes time and kills that goofy point thing, but it's worth it.

-Use deep zones only on 3rd and 10 or more. If not, the CPU can't complete passes.

-Turn off that dumb ass discipline system. Oh, wait, you can't turn it off.

That's what I'm doing anyway.

[RiverRat]

And fumbles? You mean you actually see them? After 8 games Ross has YET to fumble. The only fumbles I have seen are by the QB on sacks, or a punt returner that doesn't call a fair catch. Seriously, I have yet to fumble with a RB of a FB in 8 games.

...

The simulated stats and game scores are TOTALLY screwed up (and they were fine in 2004, which again points to it being not finished)

The fumbles ... I'll give you that one. Don't know how to fix that, and it will probably annoy me some.

The simulated game scores ... that's an interesting point. I've heard lots of people complain about this one. For the heck of it, I simmed out one entire season and at the end, I went to stats and looked for MEDIAN points per game. That is, what the points per game was for the 60th (roughly) ranked team. That figure was in the 30-31 ppg range. Then I went to espn.com to look it up for real for 2003 for all D1 teams and the median was in the 27-28 ppg range. I would conclude from this that the game scrores are a little high (maybe 10% too high), but not all that bad. Made me feel a little better about it. Since the median tends to throw out highs and lows, I concluded that the game isn't all that bad in this regard.

[Bill_Abner]

And fumbles? You mean you actually see them? After 8 games Ross has YET to fumble. The only fumbles I have seen are by the QB on sacks, or a punt returner that doesn't call a fair catch. Seriously, I have yet to fumble with a RB of a FB in 8 games.

...

The simulated stats and game scores are TOTALLY screwed up (and they were fine in 2004, which again points to it being not finished)

The fumbles ... I'll give you that one. Don't know how to fix that, and it will probably annoy me some.

The simulated game scores ... that's an interesting point. I've heard lots of people complain about this one. For the heck of it, I simmed out one entire season and at the end, I went to stats and looked for MEDIAN points per game. That is, what the points per game was for the 60th (roughly) ranked team. That figure was in the 30-31 ppg range. Then I went to espn.com to look it up for real for 2003 for all D1 teams and the median was in the 27-28 ppg range. I would conclude from this that the game scrores are a little high (maybe 10% too high), but not all that bad. Made me feel a little better about it. Since the median tends to throw out highs and lows, I concluded that the game isn't all that bad in this regard.

Well, I simply disagree with that conclusion. Damn it RR you made me do some work!

In looking at previous weeks, roughly 40 teams, each week, score at least 40 points. The median will only tell you part of the story. This number is way too high. 35% of the D1 teams scoring over 40 a game is just too high.

I simmed out my Dynasty today and here's what I see:

20 teams average at least 40 points per game
73 teams average at least 30 per game (this is the real killer)
113 teams score at least 20 per game (pretty much everyone except Ohio U)

Look at 2003 in the real NCAA. There were:

6 teams averaged 40 points per game
35 teams averaged 30 a game
99 teams score at least 20 per game

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/statistic ... 3&group=80

The average points per game in the real NCAA is 25.3 per game. In my Dynasty it's closer to 34, which is closer to 35% higher scoring in the game. (I think that's the right math I know that's not the median, it's the mean, but still...taking the median will only give you part of the story.

I don't expect to see a deep sim engine with NCAA in terms of scores, but this is not good enough. Too many teams are scoring 30 and 40 per game in this thing and each week we see way too many shootouts and 45-7 blowouts and it's not always the Oklahomas over the UTEPs that are causing it. Every week you can count on several games where the teams score 90 points combined.

I looked at the entire season schedule in my Dynasty and every week the number of games where both teams score (combined) no more than 40 points per game is laughable. Each week there are 1 to 2 games where this happens. A 20-17 game in NCAA 2005 is ULTRA rare. Man I'd love to bet the over in this world.

On the flip side, let's look at defense. In my Dynasty, 5 teams gave up fewer than 20 points per game. In real football? 24. (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/footba ... fense.html) Quite a difference. The median might play out and look ok, but I think that's a bit deceiving.

Now, ALL that said, the high scores are more of an annoyance than they are a deal breaker. But it's the STATS of the simmed games that are truly bonkers. Look at the rushing totals. This is where the stat engine breaks down. See how many teams rush the ball over 50 times per game? Yep. It's a lot. Sim some games one at a time and look at the box scores. Usually you'll see several (like...20) teams each week (and not option teams) run the ball SIXTY+ times. I saw the Michigan RB carry the ball 59 times against Iowa. I saw Arizona State rush 68 times as a team against Colorado. Florida State ran 59 times against Florida. Iowa ran 65 times for 388 yards against Michigan State.. the examples of this go on and on (kinda like this post). But the team D rankings really prove this point. In my Dynasty NO team, NONE, averaged giving up less than 100 yards per game on thr ground. Last year in the real NCAA, 12 teams did this, and Ohio State, LSU and USC gave up fewer than 70 per game. Wow in looking at this, Central Michigan last year gave up 245 yards on the ground PER GAME. Holy moly that's bad.

Ok this is way long enough. Sorry bout that. But anyone that tells me that this sim engine is just fine and dandy, well, the numbers I see in my Dynasty tell me otherwise.

[XXXIV]

NCAAs passing game is seriously flawed.............END OF f***in STORY!!!!!!!!!!

I have the game...If you cant type the f***in truth .go to OS........Im tired of reading Bull s*** .........

EDIT: yes Im drunk......and the f***in sim scores are embaressing!!!!!!!

[RiverRat]

Now, ALL that said, the high scores are more of an annoyance than they are a deal breaker. But it's the STATS of the simmed games that are truly bonkers. Look at the rushing totals. This is where the stat engine breaks down. See how many teams rush the ball over 50 times per game? Yep. It's a lot. Sim some games one at a time and look at the box scores. Usually you'll see several (like...20) teams each week (and not option teams) run the ball SIXTY+ times. I saw the Michigan RB carry the ball 59 times against Iowa. I saw Arizona State rush 68 times as a team against Colorado. Florida State ran 59 times against Florida. Iowa ran 65 times for 388 yards against Michigan State.. the examples of this go on and on (kinda like this post). But the team D rankings really prove this point. In my Dynasty NO team, NONE, averaged giving up less than 100 yards per game on thr ground. Last year in the real NCAA, 12 teams did this, and Ohio State, LSU and USC gave up fewer than 70 per game. Wow in looking at this, Central Michigan last year gave up 245 yards on the ground PER GAME. Holy moly that's bad.

Wow. I didn't even know you could see those kinds of stats in simmed games. Tells me what I know. Hats off to you, Bill.

And I wasn't trying to convince anyone that the engine was fine, just that I thought it wasn't quite as bad as some people were saying. I admit it's a high scoring game, and it would be awful hard to tune a game with sliders and quarter length to be competitive with those kinds of stats.

[JRod]

Bill,

You are close to the "inside" than we are and you'be been around the business so you might shed some light on this.

Why did NCAA release in the state it is. Granted the probably hit the beta cycle with glaring problems and spent that time instead of polishing the game doing salvage work. But I don't understand how NCAA took a few steps back this year.

Maybe I'm too simpleminded, but if they kept the franchise mode the same, and tweaked the playing model they would have kept a bunch of people happy.

Were these design decision or when crunch time hit they ran out of time and just got the game "playable".

I think the on-field play is almost the same to last year plus a few additions. The passing thing was a problem last year. Heck Madden has been doing this for years. Going 10-40 for 250 yards is a common occurance in all EA Sports games.

I just don't get it. We expect this to happen with FIFA but EA has really had a poor showing this year. Last year ESPN couldn't get off the ground, from a rather dismal NBA showing, to hockey there weren't many bright spots to ESPN arsenal. Now if you go side by side with MVP to ESPN MLB and ESPN NFL to NCAA/Madden, Sega Sports is two for two. Sure there are some problems with ESPN games but they aren't glaring gamestoppers.

So maybe you can shed some light on the process behind the scenes, "when good games go bad."

[Bill_Abner]

Bill,

You are close to the "inside" than we are and you'be been around the business so you might shed some light on this. So maybe you can shed some light on the process behind the scenes, "when good games go bad."

I can't speak for anyone on the NCAA team, all I can relate to you are things I have been told in the past from people at Sierra Sports, EA, and 3DO about this kinda thing. So it's 100% speculation.

1) EA Sports has the kind of $$ to develop in multiple cycles, meaning that chances are very high that work was being done on NCAA 2006 at the same time as it was being done on 2005, and thus programming hours may have been lost on the latest version. I know for a fact that this happened during the Madden 2001/2002 days.

2) They simply could have ran out of time. When you have to release games every year, and you have to make them as new as possible, the details may simply get the short end. This can happen if the latest version is deemed inside the company as a "semi update" or a "non priority update". This also seems fairly common at some companies that make yearly sports games. The suits decide that this year of "Game X" is not going to be a big update and the focus will be on the following year's game. Of course they will hype it like it's a big, new release even when it isn't.

3) Coding issues that cannot be solved in the alloted time. This is also called High Heat Baseball 2003 Syndrome. Perhaps when the developers went in to tinker and change the dynamics of the game, that they ended up biting off more than they could chew, the release date came, and EA Sports does NOT MISS release dates. It's one reason they are the darling of the game stores. Game ships, stuff is broken, and there you go.

4) New people work on this version, and they are not familiar with the code base like the old team. This is called Football Pro '99 Syndrome. They say they can do the job, they end up messing up stuff in the process.

If I had to merely GUESS (which I am) I'd say it's a lack of time to fully implement the stuff that they wanted to do and we will most liklely see the REAL NCAA 2005 when NCAA 2006 ships next fall.

But I would bet $100 that if you were able to speak to the programmers off the record that they know all too well what's not working as it should and what is. The public is WAY too quick to assume that the game that you have is the exact game that the developers intended to make. That's not always true or even close to being true in some cases.

[wco81]

First of all, EA may not necessarily agree that there's a problem with the game. It's gotten good reviews (maybe not great but still good) and they claim that first week sales were 50% greater than last year.

Second, they have a much smaller team than Madden. It might make sense that they're planning 2006 for a new console (Xbox2). But EA is probably doing that with a separate team, a skunkworks team, which is probably apart from the product teams.

Or they may not be doing anything radically new for the Xbox2 -- they might for the PS3, however.

I remember them claiming they implemented more things in Madden 2004 than they had in any previous version. Yet a lot of people who had bought Madden for years expressed real disappointment with it. Still it set all kinds of sales records.

So the way we perceive things and the way they perceive things, or for that matter the way the mass market perceives these games, are not the same.

[MizzouRah]

Thanks Bill, I'm willing to try anything at this point, even Varsity.

I also found these over at OS, might give them a whirl as well.

For those that have found Jistics sliders a little to easy, give these a try. I am a 29 year old gamer who has always been pretty good. I have found that with these settings, I lose to teams that are 2 letter grade steps (b vs a-) have a chance against 1 letter grade differance (b+ vs A-) and if I play smart, will usually beat teams that are ranked the same as me. I can easily beat teams that are rated lower than be, but if I get away from my gameplan, I can lose as well.

All-American Sliders
9 min

OFFENSE Human/Comp
Accuracy 15 / 20
Pass Block 10 / 8
WR Catch 20 / 20
RB Ability 10 / 20
Run Block 9 / 20

DEFENSE Human/Comp
Awareness 3 / 5
Knockdwns 1 / 1
INTS 10 / 10
Break Blk 10 / 12
Tackling 10 / 11

[GridIronGhost]

The problems many are experiencing with NCCA 2005 seems to be a top layer problem in the DVD. This problem can be fixed by simply putting the disc in boiling water for 5 seconds and then dried with a soft cloth. Your game should play 100% better then the 2004 version after appyling this simple fix.

Your welcome!

[reeche]

The problems many are experiencing with NCCA 2005 seems to be a top layer problem in the DVD. This problem can be fixed by simply putting the disc in boiling water for 5 seconds and then dried with a soft cloth. Your game should play 100% better then the 2004 version after appyling this simple fix.

Your welcome!

I hope your joking. Anybody who says that is deluding themselves. Slowdown has nothing to do with the disc and everything to do with a creaky game engine.