College football fans across the nation will be able to satisfy their college football thirst Tuesday, July 10 with the release of NCAA Football 2013.
The game has kept some of the game modes that helped make it successful in the first place, including Dynasty Mode and Road to Glory, but has added numerous additions to give players more of a real-life feel. With all the upgrades and new features added to the game, excitement for the game has reached a fever pitch.
Indeed, the GameStop in Midtown Village, the No.1 selling retailer of the NCAA Football franchise in the world, is hosting a midnight release for the game and is in the process of hiring a local band for the event. Chris Shelton, the manager at GameStop, said he believes the store will have record sales from the release of the game.
“Last year alone, on one day, we had over 1000 people reserve that game in our store,” Shelton said. “So we may have four-or-5000 people that show up to pick up their games. Possibly more.”
Many of the upgrades can be found in Dynasty Mode, where, both before and during gameplay, the game will randomly interrupt the game for “studio updates” of games played at the same time as yours.
The commentary has also been upgraded to make the conversation between the announcers sound more organic, and the addition of the ESPN ticker at the bottom of the screen is just another of the many ways the game has added a gameday feel for players.
In terms of gameplay, it has also implemented an upgraded passing system and defensive scheme to make gameplay more realistic. In the new Read-and-React defense, defenders can only make plays on the ball in the air when the ball is physically in the line of sight, unlike in previous games, where defenders could make plays on the ball regardless of where their head was.
For Jordan Hill, a senior majoring in English, the addition of a revamped passing game doesn’t come as a surprise.
“I think that comes mainly from the NFL aspect of it,” Hill said. “I think for effect — you don’t want to play a boring game, you want to have the highlight reels, that’s how it has to be.”
Still, the game has some all-new features for fans of the franchise, most notably in the Heisman Challenge, which allows players to choose one of 10 former Heisman winners and place them on any team you want and see if they can win the Heisman that year.
Some of the former Heisman winners include former Georgia running back Herschel Walker, former Boston College quarterback Doug Flutie, and the most recent Heisman winner, quarterback Robert Griffin III.
Some Alabama fans have felt that former running back Trent Richardson should be on the cover of the game, instead of Griffin and former Oklahoma State running back Barry Sanders. Richardson had arguably one of the best seasons in Alabama history, even better than his predecessor, Mark Ingram, who made the cover of NCAA ’12.
Hill, however, said the developers made the right decision in choosing Griffin and Sanders for the cover.
“As much as we’re all biased towards it, and wanted [Richardson to be on the cover], I think they got the right guys,” Hill said. “Especially with this year, with the addition of Barry Sanders on it, it makes it more of the Heisman experience.”
Still, the lack of Richardson on the cover doesn’t affect Hill’s opinion of the game: the best yet in the franchise.
“Oh yeah, most definitely,” Hill said. “They’re putting in a new kind of system that they’re going to be putting in Madden next year. And they’re doing it on NCAA this year. So I especially think this’ll move in and be not only the best one they’ve done, but also be the next phase of the franchise.”
