| Posted : Sunday, April 24 2005 / 3:28 AM |
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NCAA 2006 hands on preview - part 1
Following his trip to Tiburon Damon has posted his in depth analysis of the new features of NCAA 2006 with particular emphasis on the new 'Impact Players' feature. He also discusses the new control schema and what impact this will have on gameplay.
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Managing Editor/Owner
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Posted by Damon --
NCAA football has come a long way since it’s first release in 1998. EA revamped the series in 2001 and gave it a new look in 2005. The popularity of this game keeps growing as it gets better and better every year. Some actually prefer NCAA over Madden for their #1 football game. You have already heard about the new “Race to the Heisman” feature and now EA has informed us that we can discuss all the other info we have.
Impact Players
The first new feature I am going to talk about is the new Impact Players. College football games are decided a lot of the times on big plays by star players. These players have now been identified as impact players in NCAA football 2006. These elite players will have a glowing icon under their feet during gameplay and also can be identified in the play call screen by a highlight around their number. The glowing icon during gameplay will pulsate slow or fast indicating if that player is close to being “in the zone”. When the player is in the zone his glowing icon will pulse much faster than normal. Your impact player will enter the zone if he is playing well and also on certain situations where that player can excel. When you player enters the zone and gets involved in the next play it can trigger the “Impact Camera” which will make the camera zoom in on the action and enter a slow motion mode while your player sheds tackles or makes and outstanding play of some sort. (note that you are still controlling your player when this happens). This feature was amazingly well done and added a lot to the gameplay. The first time it happened to me it was 3rd and goal from about the two yard line. I was Notre Dame playing Jeff Eckers Penn State. My RB Ryan Grant was in the zone so I ran a HB blast to the right side of the field. The middle was jammed up so I bounced the play to the outside and had one man to beat at the one yard line. I was running to the outside but the defender had the angle on me. The contact happened and the camera panned and zoomed in on the action as I tapped the stiff arm button. Grant shed the tackle with the stiff arm in an amazing looking animation and strolled into the end zone for six. It was very satisfying. I think everyone is going to love the Impact Players feature. I really thought when I heard about it that I wasn’t going to like the messing with the camera and zooming in but it didn’t take away anything but instead added a lot. If you don’t end up liking it you can turn of the impact camera.
New Gameplay Controls
There have been some added controls and also a change in the controls that is important to mention. There is no longer the need to drop the passing icons before trying to scramble with the QB but instead the X button (PS2) or the A button (Xbox) is the global speed burst button. This will allow you to roll out on a bootleg with a QB while looking downfield at your passing options. The receiver that was assigned to the X or A button has now been moved to the triangle (PS2) and Y button (Xbox). The right analog stick will now control the jukes. Flicking left and right will make the player juke in that direction. The new juke called the “back juke” can be performed by flicking the stick down. The back juke is an amazing play when it’s timed correctly and pulled off leaving the defender grabbing only the grass on the ground. Hitting forward on the stick will perform a cover up of the ball lessening the chance of a fumble. I was amazed at how quickly and easily I made the switch from juking with the shoulder buttons to using the stick. I think it’s because of using the hit stick in Madden 05 so if you played Madden and used the hit stick your adjustment will take no time at all. NCAA now also has the package feature that has been a popular feature for Madden. The L2 button (PS2) is now the celebrate button. Some of the great features of last year are still there and have also been improved. The match up stick and Home Field advantage have new looks and have been upgraded slightly.
Gameplay Fixes
Everyone is wondering about things that needed to be fixed from last year and if they have been. I address that here.
1. Drops - This is a question I asked Jeff Ecker as we were playing. He had a good answer which was “do you see any”. He was right, I didn’t see any unusual drops that should be catches. Of course you still see drops in heavy coverage and on big hits which is the way it should be but the wide open short route drops have been fixed. I was playing on the PS2 but also checked out a game going on the Xbox to make sure it was the same.
2. Xbox Slowdown – Saw none – that I think is all that can be said about this one.
One thing I also checked out that bugged me about last year is when I flipped my zone defense in a nickel and my DB went sprinting across to the other side of the field he would get caught on my other players. I tried this many times and it no longer happened.
I have a lot more to talk about so keep checking back for more info. I will be doing adding the following in the upcoming days.
1. A section on Presentation
2. Adding to the gameplay section
3. A detailed write-up on the Race to the Heisman
4. A section on Franchise along with recruiting.
We also have a thread started on our forums where you can ask questions and we will answer those to the best of our ability. You can find that thread by clicking here.
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