NCAA Football 06

"NCAA 2006 Has Earned a Spot in the National Championship Game"

Both NCAA Football and Madden have been getting better each year, but the developers of NCAA take the cake on this one. This was the first year to me in which NCAA was clearly the better game, and there aren't many it's not better than.

Gameplay: 9
It's a blast to play the games. There are new controls, but it's still an option to use last year's. All of the small inconveniences from 2005 were fixed (wide receivers can catch now), which makes everything better just in its own. Special teams are very good, unlike Madden, where it's impossible to return a kick past the 25. Get the crowd behind you when the opponent's 3rd and long, or have to fight through the home team's cheers while you go for it on 4th and short. Once you finally win the game, with a final score of 27-24 in overtime, your game gets added to the best games list. It gives the score of the game, the teams who played, and when it was played. It's amusing to look back on all the difficult games you played in, whether you won or lost.

Game Modes: 10
Easily the best part of the game was all the different modes it has. Dynasty is still amazing, and you could just play that seemingly for years and years. A new addition to this is the in-season recruiting. At the start of the year, you pick 12 guys you want to recruit. As they become more and more interested, you eventually invite them to an official visit and hope they commit.

The latest addition is the Race for the Heisman mode. You create a player, and go through the spring drills (see next section). Based on how well you do, you get scholarship offers from three schools. If you don't like these, you can walk on to any school. Right away, you're a starter, and expected to lead your team to victory. As you get better, the place you live gets better, your "girlfriends'" (pictures) get way hotter, the fan mail gets nicer, and the Heisman bar goes up. Have a bad game, your Heisman bar can go down, and all of a sudden you're fighting to stay in the race. Become so good that you want to leave after junior year, and now you can export yourself, then start your NFL career in Madden's superstar mode. Of course you can stay for the senior year too, which the fans ask you to do.

They also have the spring drills, for each position. Passing, running, catching, tackling, etc. These are good for improving your skills, and definitely to get used to the new controls. You also take it before the Race to the Heisman to gauge some of your skills and what colleges offer you a scholarship.

Another new thing is impact players. They are usually some of the best players on your team, and identified with a white circle under them during the game, which turns gold as they heat up, or with the white circles next to their names on any list of the roster. As you make plays with them, they start breaking tackles (or blocks) and making big plays. There are two to three per team, and it's not players you choose.

Sound: 8
They have replaced the colleges' theme songs with normal, crappy music, like the other EA Sports games. If possible, put your songs on this instead. The announcing is great though. Witty comments from Lee Corso (he also picks the team he thinks will win and puts on the mascot-head in pregame), with Kirk Herbstreit and Brad Nessler are hilarious, and make the game seem that much more realistic. It still has the stadium getting loud and the controller and screen vibrating if the home team has a good enough stadium.

Replayability: 10
You never run out of things to do in NCAA ‘06. Whether you want to start a dynasty and win multiple national championships, or feel like leading your created player to the Heisman in Road to the Heisman, or just enjoy “relaxing” exhibition games, you're always having fun.

This game is a must buy for all college football fans, and sports fans in general. You don't want to miss out on the first football game to top the amount of fun you'd have with Madden.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 12/14/05