Reviews of NCAA Football 08 - Xbox 360

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Let me start off by saying that when your playing in a game scenario, this game can be fun, But problems start rather quickly. One of my biggest complaints is in the passing game, the lack of location based passing makes throwing the ball nerve racking, often times on a crossing route your receiver will have to spin around backwards just to make the catch. And if your hoping to throw over your receivers shoulder where a defender cant reach it.... good luck, once again, most of the time he will spin around and try to make a dramatic catch, often times losing the chance to get extra yardage. Then theres one of my favorite pass plays, the deep comeback. This play is insanely frustrating, your reciever will go out the usual 10-15 yards, the problem is, when he turns back for the pass, he comes back a few yards, you throw, he catches, BUT KEEPS COMING BACK!!! It takes him so long to turn back around, that when he gets tackled he has turned what should have been a gain of 10-15 yards or more into a gain of 4-8 yards. And also if your not a fan of using tight ends in the passing game, you better be damn good at this game, because in the harder difficulty levels it is extremely hard to get the ball into your receivers, since the defense is so tough. Make friends with your tight end, he could save you. And also make good use of your hot routes and motions, and remember, just becuase your pass isnt a huge gain, as long as your not losing yards, your doing pretty good. My next problem is the running game in campus legend mode, when you are the quarterback, or any other position, your running back is often a lame duck, unless your on a team with a excellent running back, even then you will have to turn your running backs AI waaayyy up so that he doesnt just do a spin move and get dropped in the backfield. Also in Campus legend mode, when you are the quarterbackback, you want to make sure that you do choose a balanced or running quarterback, otherwise you may be on the wrong side of a sack very often, especially since the offensive line this year is very inconsistant. Now I know that your gonna get sacked sometimes, that obvious, and also part of the game. But what i mean by inconsistant is that, one play the O-line will do a pretty good job, but then on the next two of your guys will grind together trying to pick up a block, and allow the whole D-line to get through and take you down (thats why you want a mobile quarterback). The load times are long, which can be frustrating, especailly in campus legend mode, where the games are considerably shorter since you only play when your player is on the field. But one place the 360 version of the game shines over the ps3 version is the framerate, which is at a lovely 60 frames per second, while the ps3 struggles at 30fps. But so many frames a second can cause some hiccups.

The main menu can be frustrating and confusing at times, but nothing too hard to overcome. i also find myself wishing there was more to do with your player during the week in campus legend mode. Every week goes as follows: Practice, night event (you only read about what you did that night), then comes the next day. You do this all week, then you can play the game at the end of the week. the night event can earn you stats (which will help you for the week), and popularity points (Which will help fill up your legend meter). You cant even do anything during the offseason, no training, no mini camps, not even a spring game. :(

Thats not to say that everythng is bad in this game. Like I said, this game can be pretty fun. The new ESPN.com feature is very nice, and does a good job keeping up with stats, although often I find that a team that was ranked 25th or lower in the BCS one week, is ranked in the top 5 the next, which for anybody who knows college football, can be irritating since this is NOT supposed to happen. To be fair, I have not played on defense very much, so I can't really discuss that. But let me just say, being a middle linebacker is tough.

All in all this isnt a horrible game, its actually very addicting, its just easier to point out the flaws than it is to talk about the good stuff. The frustrating things do happen, but if you love college football, its easy to overlook...Creating your own highlight reel can be fun, but if your like me and dont have box live (at the moment), its just a sad reminder of how you cant show off your skills. The Stadiums are well done, as well as the whether effects, in the winter you could be having a snow shower, then the next thing you know, it has turned into a blizzard that has completely covered the field. Oddly though, you never see a player slip on the slippery surface (as in Madden 08). The Announcers do a good job with the emotion factor. I cant really say much bad about them. They are a little inconsistant though. For example: they will be very excited over the 4th game of the season, but then in the National Championship, they will be very mellow.

If you have a problem with little irritations and flaws, pass on this game, but if you can overlook these thing, trust me... this game makes for a satisfying experience. I just hope this review has helped all who are reading. and i hope it didnt take too much time out of your day.

Thanks for your time! :)

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Normally I just dig right into the dynasty mode expecting to lose a few games learning the particulars of the game engine, but this time I started by trying out some of the other features. First I tried the minigames of Tug of War (you get 1 play to move the ball and then the opponent gets the same, first to touchdown wins) and also Bowling (10 yards to goal, each yard is a pin with two shots at the end zone).

Next I moved on to Campus Legend Mode. And to be honest it is good enough that I have not left it. First you start out by designing a player and picking a position for them. Next you select your home school and state (high school that is) and you get put right into the high school state playoffs. I picked ROLB to start with figuring that defense is a good place for me. So first off, the only person you can control is the player you have created, so many plays are just not going to involve you. Although there is a lot more pressure because when you blow a coverage or tackle you can't switch to another nearby player to make the tackle. Once you have completed the high school playoffs, you have to select the college that you want to go to. In my case I picked Penn State because I would not be a starter, but I also wouldn't be 3rd string.

Your college career consists of 2 things per day. First is practice where you get 10 reps at various plays (coach calls all plays in both practices and real games). When you make a play it is worth points. These points eventually will earn you a spot on the starting line. For me, I earned my starting spot right before the 3rd game in the season. The different strings make it interesting in the game as well. When you are second string, you are hoping for a blow out so that you can get some field time other than on special teams, where as you hope for a close one during regular play.

One of the nice things in this mode, and frustrating is that the games tend to be really short. This gets a tad annoying as the load times in this game are incredibly long. Another drawback to this mode is that you may play your heart out and do an incredible job, but the team could still lose because the other half of the team is unable to get the job done. Besides the long load times, I have also seen a lot of very screen stutters and lots of xbox 360 fan and drive noise. Just seems to be slightly too intensive.

Graphics wise, this game is good, but not really something you are going to shout from the mountain tops about. Sounds are incredible and after 9 games, I can't complain about the announcers yet. So with all the problems, I still give this game a must buy for Football fans. It is just as fun as it's previous versions (I have played NCAA 01, 04, and 05).

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I've been a fan of the NCAA series for the past 5 years. I owned last year's version on the original Xbox and thought it was great. Now that I've moved to the 360, it feels like the game has regressed (except in the graphics area). There are too many bugs and problems and it really seems like the game was rushed to meet the shipping date. I think it would have been a lot better if extra time were taken to test and work out the kinks. The basic gameplay is still good but the number of interceptions is completely insane. I found I can beat any player on-line by not throwing any passes while my opponent will usually have 5 or more interceptions. Since I don't even take control of the DBs, it's totally the game's AI that's doing it. I hope that next year's version can iron out these problems as it will be the 3rd year on the 360 and blaming being on a new platform won't be a valid argument anymore. With all this being said, I wouldn't recommend skipping the game since it's still plays well overall, but I would be prepared for a number of annoyances and frustrations.

Honest reviews on NCAA Football 08 - Xbox 360

My major issue with this game is the lagging of the gameplay as well as the announcing. It seemed it took a quarter of a second too long to switch between players on defense, which of course can cause undesired results. The gameplay was akward as well especially on defense. I found playing on the defensive line was nearly impossible. I could never get any pressure on the QB. The graphics are out of this world and the game is very nice to look at overall. The football aesthetics is aplenty but the gameplay needs to be fun in order to have a good game. I found the gameplay and the lagging was too much to overcome. I sold the game and have not looked back.

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This year's game is a step ahead from last year's...except for in one (and the largest i.m.o.) category fps. The gameplay is so slow a lot of times, imagine the worst lag you've had playing online in Madden or any shooter game; that's what normal off-line gameplay is like on ncaa '08. If you played last year's title, the offline lag is worse this year...Other than that it's a great game and EA is almost there in terms of a great game. The graphics are wonderful, the gametypes are extremely fun ("You decide to veg out on the couch and watch movies with friends...Popularity +1"), and the achievements are a little more challenging this year (getting six interceptions with one player in one game....grrr).

Overall, it's a fun game to rent and play for a weekend when you have nothing to do, but I wouldn't buy it...next year's should be the one to put the series over the top.