How to Bring Back EA Sports NCAA Football!

Every July I would take a day off in the middle to play the new college football game that was released every year. That hasn't happened since 2013.

I've owned every version of the game since Bill Walsh College Football. From SEGA to PS1, PS2, XBOX, and XBOX 1. I wish I had them on PS4 or now Stadia also. But EA Sports hasn't made any since the Ed O'Bannon lawsuit, and its something college football fans all over the place are ready for it to return. Especially after the NIL laws have passed through most states and the NCAA.

How long could it take to build it? I have a plan that could speed it up.

Build it on Madden Engine -- The Madden Engine is pretty fun, it could use some tweaks on the sliders but for the most part its pretty good. They are high quality graphics and game play. Remove the Face of the Franchise mode and add in the Career Mode and Dynasty Mode with the features it had before but add in the Playoffs. The stadiums they had on 2013 are mostly all the same with few updates. It shouldn't take as much effort to create more of the missing stadiums.

Dummy Rosters -- When the game comes out it usually has rosters filled in with players that would be very similar to that of who's on the team. Stats, abilities and profile that make you think that Clemson QB #16 would be Trevor Lawrence except for the name. When you buy the game it should come out with dummy rosters that make it look like the real players. This would avoid any likeness that came out of the Ed O'Bannon Case.

Roster Load -- On previous systems with systems connected to the internet there was roster sharing that was allowed. Users would download updated rosters from users that spent time updating names and filling them out to what the actual teams are. QB #16 would now be Trevor Lawrence when users turned on the game. The roster loads would be free from users. If I were EA I would keep out the roster share portion of the game. As a replacement I would have a file that would be available for purchase (or tied to a bundle) that would be able to be loaded to the game with the rosters already filled out. Tie a cost of $20 to this file and generate some money. Most users I know of this game would easily pass over the money.

Opt Out / Opt In -- Send an opt out/opt in letter to all players that are on the rosters to be able to include the players and their likeness on the previous mentioned roster load. Along with this would come some form of compensation depending on the number of people that opt in and how many files would be sold. That is about 70 players per roster. Since players can now benefit, who wouldn't buy in to this?

Athlete Offer -- Along with the Opt In option to pay the college players for use of their likeness, send each user a copy of the game, this would be a $60 dollar value for each player. Most games now are downloaded to a platform or played via stream but still purchased. They all don't need to be sent a actual package, but could rather be sent a code to download the game.

Payment -- Now how to pay the players. The athletes on average would be in the game for about 4 years. Each player would get an account that would keep accumulating money for each year of the game. Most game players move on to the new version the July it comes out. For players that leave for the pros or graduate they would be able to receive their check for compensation after that July. This would allow the accounts a chance to accumulate some interest and bank as much as possible rather than that of smaller chunks of money. More interest accumulated = more available for image and likeness.

The Numbers -- EA sold 500,000 copies of NCAA 13 and 1 million copies of NCAA 14. I'll run the numbers on the low end. Not a bad little check players could receive, along with a free copy each year of the game they are "In The Game"

EA Sports, what are you waiting for?

Realignment | Scheduling | Post Season | Video Game

EA....put this in the game!

I wrote a blog on how I would improve NCAA Football a while ago – and wouldn’t ya know, some of the stuff was in there.  The starting off a dynasty as a coordinator rather than a head coach.  Really like this.  One it makes it so you can play games really quick. 

I like how the incorporated it that in the coaching carousel you have can’t just pick where you want to go either, you have to be chosen by them.  So in my dynasty I started out as the OC at Eastern Michigan, after a year I was offered the same gig at San Diego State, a year later the OC at Iowa State, then finally after a 10-3 season with Iowa State I was offered the head coaching job at Washington State, a team that went 1-11 the year before.  Not really jumping from lil fish to big fish in the pond, moving the way up the coaching ladder.

So kudos to you EA for putting this in the game, love it…how I would improve the game for NCAA 13.

Expand on the Coaching Carousel. 

-          Go deeper and add in doing a position first rather than cordinator and be able to move up

-          Add in FCS teams and be able to start as a cordinator there, and move up to HC there or position/cordinator coaches at a FBS level

-          Be able to negotiate years/goals somewhat instead of just getting a 2 year or 3 year contract given to you.

-          Make it harder to move up.  I moved up to a BCS cordinator in 3 years, maybe make it harder to earn prestige

-          Make it so recruiting is done by the HC.  If you’re a cordinator, you only go and do your side of the ball, or position wise, do your side of the position.

-          As in NFL Coach where you got attributes, have your performance earn you points toward certain statuses or attributes
-          If a school is just going to extend a coach, don’t have that in the carousel.  It will speed that process up.  Just go through the open ones.

Love the options of Conference Realignment but expand on that too.

-          Be able to remove a league completely, not just having to have minimum of 4 teams in a league. 

-          Be able to rename the conference, not just the divisions

-          When choosing a champioship game location, say if I choose Las Vegas (UNLV’s home field) incorporate the league logo at midfield and put the team names in the endzones

-          Be able to reapply/redo all bowl bids.  We have the option of giving the league champs a BCS bowl spot, but expand so we can assign all bowl bids or make them at larges

-          Encorporate a Playoff option and have the team slotting customizable as to size and conf champions/rankings.  EA Had this in the game in the 90s and then it was gone.

A few other things and maybe a few that have been mentioned

-          Downloaded pack of custom uniforms – which I’m sure is there.

-          More custom coach.  Give us a few more options that are similar to Madden

-          Have our coach be able to be exported to Madden.  Maybe to have a career similar to Jim Harabaugh

-          Add in all the FCS Schools so we aren’t playing FCS Southwest or FCS Midwest, gives us Northern Iowa and Youngstown State

-          Have the band at the beginning, if its not already custom for some, code in that the spell out the school name or nickname or something

-          If the school is obtaining success that your coaching, and has poor facilities when you get there, obviously upgrading the stadium isn’t prob happening, but maybe behind the scenes something coded that facilities after winning do upgrade. 
-          Speed up recruiting, it is cool to go in depth as it does now, but speed it up too

-          Custom plays added to playbook…please bring this back

Above all else improving game play and graphics, EA put this in the game!

Hey EA Sports! This isn't in the game!

My generation has grown up with video games, started with Mario jumping around on an 8 bit Nintendo, to what we have now in Call of Duty:Black Ops and playing games online vs. someone across the world.  And the classics we have grown up on aren’t just one timers, they are franchises.  Mario, Call of Duty, and Madden.  And with each installment you get something new, new storylines, maps, villains, weapons, rosters and add-ons and graphic up grades. 

Mario's Evolution



Super Mario Brothers on NES




Super Mario Galaxy 2 on Wii



And football games have evolved too.

Ten Yard Fight on NES



NCAA Football '10 on Xbox 360





I’ve owned every version of EA Sports College Football, but 1, on many platforms, and also about 70% of the Madden’s.  Most of them include little upgrades year and year that add on to what it previously had.  Plus little graphic upgrades.  Along the way we got the dynasty, the online dynasty, and Superstar modes.  Now a few years ago on I think MySpace or some blog I had I posted how I would improve NCAA Football, we’ll I’m going try to recreate it here….and it will go for Madden also.

First off, on NCAA, get rid of the all mascot teams and the historical teams.  No one plays with a team full of Cy’s vs. a team full of Bevo’s.  It’s stupid.  Waste of memory.  The historical teams are cool but really, takes up space.  Madden has the historical teams, and yea keep it there, it’s cool to be the 85 Bears and roll everyone.

So EA added the super star mode where you get to go from HS player to being recruited and then work your way up the depth chart.  It’s a little too easy but hey, it works.  Now why not do that with coaching your dynasty? 

After your superstar you can either export to go to the NFL/Madden, or why not sign on with the school you just were at (or somewhere else) as a grad asst or a positions coach?  In the dynasty feature you jump right in and are a head coach, don’t have to work your way up.  Is that in the game?  No.  I would think it would be easy to code and create too. 

So your dynasty is over.  You go into coaching instead of the NFL.  You take over a position such as DL coach.  You control just your DL during the game play.  You schedule them game planning, practicing, film watching or so forth during the week.  When it comes to game time the D-Coordinator calls the plays, and like super star mode where you only control 1 player, you control that set of players, so typically like 4 DL. 

For recruiting purposes, a recruiting coordinator would need to be created that would help the complex and time consuming task that is recruiting, but when it would come to a position such as DL that is being recruited, you could decide what area’s to emphasize. 

Throughout the year, how your position performs, you would then get points(to be determined).  One would be for performance to move up to other coordinator positions, the other to buy roles similar to what were used in the brief NFL Coach game.  Help you at what you can coach up the most.  Strength, speed, and so forth.

To move up to the coordinator spot you would need to reach certain levels.  At the school your currently at would be the easiest to move up to.  Schools with a lesser star rating would have a slightly higher threshold and then schools with higher star rankings would require a higher point total.  The only way to move from position coach to head coach is to amass an extremely high amount of performance points and then move down to a lower ranked school.  For example, no being the DL coach at Arkansas State and then moving to the Head Coach at Alabama.  Not gonna happen.

Once you get the coordinator gig, you control that whole side of the ball.  You game plan during the week (or skip – but earn less points).  Help the recruiting coordinator out on all position players on your side of the ball.  You role has expanded, like it happens “IN THE GAME.” 

Again to move up to a head coach you need to amass a certain number of points, and to move up to a head coach to a big time BCS school ala what happens, IN THE GAME.  Urban Meyer just didn’t show up at Florida.  He had to work to get there from Bowling Green to Utah and then Florida. 

A 2K basketball game had a similar feel to it, I believe ESPN NCAA Hoops 2K5, when you had to coach at small schools and get offered jobs to move up.  Why hasn’t EA thought of this yet?  And if anyone from EA reads this, I can help with development of this!  (Shameless plug.)  I think this feature in the EA Sports games would be a great addition and it would tie in what they had in the short lived NFL Coach series that wasn’t given much of a chance.  And would breathe some fresh life into the football games at EA that have had little by little feature upgrades and graphic upgrades over the past decade. 





Who’s in your 5? Video Games

So the wonder of video games have been around since well like 1986 in my mind when I got my Nintendo. From NES to Super NES, Sega, PS1, PS2 and then Xbox and 360 and then also computer games, I’ve played a hand full of games. What are my favorite. Here we go.



T5. Civ series on PC – If only my computer could process it as fast as I wanted so it would run smoother and quicker. I could get lost for hours in that game building up my army and civilization, then trying to take over other countries.




T5. Knights of the Old Republic 1 & 2 – The first real Action/RPG game I played, and getting immersed into the Star Wars universe was awesome. And then building my lightsabers and not only having 1, but 2 going and killing sith! I hope another game comes out from this series for 360!

4. Contra – the best weapon ever on this game. The Spread gun.



3. Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 – the game that got me hooked on online play. Loved spending hours upon hours at night playing this with the now defunct mwcgamers.com clan. If I could have only got my mic/ear piece to work earlier!



2. Tecmo Bowl/Tecmo Super Bowl – the first great football game, and the home of the best video game athlete ever, Bo Jackson. I remember playing with the Bears at my parents old house, and I’d keep stats on the original when the game didn’t, and then draw and create my own BIG PEACH (what the Des Moines Register used to call it’s Sunday Sports) Great memories.

1. NCAA Football series by EA Sports – I don’t even want to know how many hours I’ve spent playing a dynasty on here, or the classic matches vs. Fouch before the bus would leave for basketball games. Add in the new feature of creating your own school online and all the advances up uploading your own highlights. SWEET! I’ve owned ever game in the series but one.