Gaming Tuesday

It's Thursday again. I don't think you guys should expect a post calling "Gaming Tuesday" to come out every Tuesday :p

I'm a pretty big fan-boy of the NCAA Football video games. It's probably the only game I can actually fit the bill of fan-boy for. I've enjoyed the College Football games much better than the NFL games for many years. Last year's edition was the best so far and I think it far surpassed Madden 11*.

So, as you might expect, I'm excited about the upcoming edition of NCAA Football. There are visual and mechanical improvements that seem like they'll improve the game play. However, that isn't why I'm so excited.

Dynasty Mode is the reason I'm such a fan of the NCAA Football video games. It has been lacking a few features that I would've liked to see, but it has been much, much better than Franchise Mode in Madden. This year there are going to be additions to Dynasty that will make it even better. These are things I've wanted to see for a long time.

The coaching carousel is going to introduced in NCAA Football 12. The absolute lack of any overturn makes the game feel pretty static. I don't know exactly how this is going to be implemented, but I look forward to seeing how this change is going to break up the monotony. Also, with this addition you don't start off as the head coach at your dream school. You have to work your way up from a coordinator and take job openings to advance. Maybe I'm odd, but I think that will make it more fun.

Another addition to Dynasty Mode will be fully customizable Conferences. In the past you could do a straight swap between conferences, but you couldn't, for instance, add Nebraska to the Big 10 without putting a team in the Big 10 into the Big 12. The place where this will be most beneficial will be in the Online Dynasty Mode. This year you can create a super conference to compete in with your friends rather than being stuck in a conference specific-dynasty.

Something that will be interesting is how the Ohio State situation is handled by the game. Since it seems likely that Terrelle Pryor and others won't be on the team next season will they still be in the game? They aren't allowed to do roster updates like Madden, because they aren't really supposed to be who they represent. I expect that QB #2 and company will still be in the game. Last year, Jeremiah Masoli was still in the game as Oregon's QB even though he had been booted off the team long before release.

This will be the first year in a long time that I will only be getting NCAA Football. I'm done with Madden for now. I don't believe them anymore when they say it's improved and I don't trust reviews because they always seem to give the Madden brand a pass.

Thanks for reading and please comment.

-Michael
*I absolutely hated Madden 11. I don't understand how it go so much critical praise. I might be an NCAA fan-boy, but the world is a Madden fan-boy.