NCAA Football 12 - July 12 - 6/14: Road to Glory Revealed - Demo Out Now

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http://espn.go.com/espn/thelife/vid...amer/id/6215803/first-ncaa-football-12-screen

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How many new features can you spot in the first "NCAA Football 12" screen?

Take a look at the first screenshot from EA Sports' upcoming video game "NCAA Football 12." How many new features can you spot?

The answer will officially be posted tomorrow at 3pm EST on the official "NCAA Football 12" site along with a video that explains some of the enhancements made to the game.

But just looking at the screen, I can already callout the new dreadlocks, the Miami Pro Combat uniforms, as well as what looks to be improved lighting and even more defined grass (yes, I'm now down to examining the grass in video games).

See anything else? Be sure to check out the official "NCAA Football 12" page tomorrow for all of the answers.
 
http://www.ea.com/ncaa-football/blog/ncaa-football-12-first-blog
Jean Adams here, Art Director for NCAA Football. I’m very excited to be bringing you the first blog for NCAA Football 12! We’ve been working on some killer visual upgrades and I am glad that we can finally start sharing them with the community. I’m also exited because I think fans of the “The photographic side of NCAA” will really appreciate these visual upgrades. I’m constantly amazed at how your feedback has taken our game and turned it in to a work of art as we continue to make shots look even more amazing in NCAA Football 12. Anyways, let’s get to the good stuff.

The NCAA Football 12 development team thinks it’s important that the game feel fresh and new, straight out of the box. NCAA Football 11 received a much needed visual upgrade in the form of linear lighting and we wanted to build on that momentum in NCAA Football 12. We felt the next step was to implement something that not only made the game look great, but also brought some life in how the game is rendered. It had to be something that immersed players in the college football atmosphere (I’ll explain why I think this is immersive later).

It’s because of this goal that we thought HDR rendering would be a good focal point. Without getting too technical, HDR (High Dynamic Range Rendering) is a way of rendering bright and dark parts of the game while still maintaining a high level of detail. It allows us to preserve contrast without losing the details that make the game look realistic. We also wanted to address how the game looks when being played under shadows. In previous versions, playing in the shadows made gameplay appear dark and muddy, which really killed the quality of our game. This was especially noticeable when playing in huge stadiums like The Swamp or Death Valley, where at certain times of the day shadows cover most of the field making action hard to see. Previously, we had to sacrifice contrast to maintain brightness on the shadow side, but I’m getting way too technical so let me show you the first screenshot of NCAA Football 12.

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While you may think those images look good, screenshots don’t do justice to the impact HDR brings to every aspect of our game, so let’s take a look at HDR in action.



After seeing that, I hope the photogs out there are salivating at the thought of what screenshots they will be able to take once they get their hands on this year’s game.

The improvements don’t end with HDR and Dynamic Exposure. As you can see in the screenshots, we have added a lot of other eye candy to the game. Dreadlocks, Higher resolution crowds and new gear are featured here, but what stands out the most is the addition of 3-Dimensonal grass and particles. The field surface has looked like a tennis court for way too long, with the addition of 3D grass our game looks more photo realistic and immersive.

ImageTwo_grass_compare520.jpg


This is just a glimpse of some of the visual upgrades for NCAA Football 12. Stay tuned for the next blog revealing more enhancements and innovations for this year’s installment of the NCAA Football franchise.

Jean Adams
Art Director
NCAA Football
 
http://www.ea.com/ncaa-football/blog/welcome-back
There's a new post on the NCAA 12 blog, though it doesn't have much in the way of details:
Another season is upon us and the countdown begins. Over the next 90 days you’ll be hearing about everything we’ve put into NCAA Football 12 and we hope you’ll like what you’re going to see. It represents months of deep development and the next serious step in innovation that we initiated last year with NCAA Football 11.

I have no major announcements today, but I can say that our focus and fundamental strategy hasn’t changed. It’s still all about the three key elements I described in my blog last year “A New Game Plan”; Core Experience, Authenticity, and Innovation.

The community feedback we’ve received on ’11 through emails, forums, and surveys has been encouraging and I’m happy to report that we’ve incorporated many of these requests into the newest edition.


Starting with the core, we continue to acknowledge and agree that gameplay is what matters most. The engine we share with our brothers on Madden is getting some big upgrades and improvements that we will customize and tune for the right collegiate feel. You can also expect another big push on the defensive side of the ball this year. Other than that, there’s not much more I can say just yet. But please be patient, there are definitely “under the hood” details ahead in the coming weeks.

With regard to authentic presentation, we are making a big push in this area as well because it’s a huge part of what college football means -- the passion, pageantry, and tradition is like no other sport in the world (FIFA comes close…). You may have caught a few of the rough iPhone screenshots released so far, but the better looking stuff is coming in the next few days. Here are a few minor details I can share now for my Michigan brethren. At least in the virtual world I can put them in the Rose Bowl this year.



New Big House stadium lights are also in and ready to go…


Another minor item to start planning for – you’ll be able to fully customize entrance music this year, so get your tracks ready…

Finally, with regards to online, the response to NCAA Football 11’s online dynasty mode has been outstanding, so expect some interesting news here in as we get closer to launch.

In closing, on behalf of the team I’d like to thank all the fans who’ve written in with suggestions and comments. While we can’t possibly get to the thousands of ideas that have come in, we do take your feedback very seriously when designing the game and work to get as much in as time and resources will allow. From big ideas to the little things like dreads, bowl patches, band placement, uniform details, and mascot changes – everything contributes to realism and authenticity – and they all came from you. So please keep the cards and letters coming…

Keep the faith, real news is up ahead!

Roy
NCAA Football 12
Executive Producer

PS -- You can still email me at [email protected]. As mentioned previously, given the incredible amount of email I get daily, I don’t always have time to reply, but I do promise I’ll read everything you send. Please keep it civil and spam free ;-)
So the only confirmed detail is customizable entrance music.
 
We've got the cover athlete now that the vote is over:

NCAA-April-XBOX-360-Pack-Art_340x500.jpg


That's a really nice cover, especially the extra touch with the glove. The blog post on the official site mentions near the end that they have a new collision system.

There's also a new trailer here that shows off a lot of the new introduction stuff and the pageantry that they've been hyping every year.
 
http://www.ea.com/ncaa-football/blog/ncaa-12-gameplay-blog-part-1

We have some actually gameplay details for 12 along with a trailer:
Hey NCAA fans! It's Scantlebury here to give you some insight on what the Central Gameplay team has been cooking up for the NCAA Football 12 title. We’ve touched several core areas of gameplay including: tackling, blocking, catching, and coverage. The changes we have made will be evident on the very first play of the game and I’m not talking about your first snap – I mean from the opening Kickoff. Let me tell you a little bit about what we’re doing for each of the core areas of gameplay to give you guys a brand new gaming experience.

NO MORE SUCTION ON TACKLES. Yeah you read that correctly. Did you hate it when you would do a spin move then get sucked back into a tackle? Or when you would be running through a hole in the line—a clear lane—and then a D-Lineman just warps in front of you and makes the tackle? Well this year there is no more warping on tackles. Tackles only occur on collision. So you won’t see a tackle happen unless actual collision is made between the ball carrier and the defender. Jukes and spins are more valuable than they ever have been and running through holes in the line never felt so good.

MOMENTUM ON TACKLES. We’ve all seen this happen: you’re running down the field with a full head of steam and then when you meet up with a defender WHAM complete momentum stop. It’s like the two of you were never running and collided with each other from only two feet away. Well, this year when you see that same situation you will actually notice the preservation of momentum on the tackle. Who wins the momentum battle depends on various factors including speed, size, and weight of the participants in the tackle. If the defender wins you’ll see the ball carrier being driven back as soon as they collide and that will carry through even as the players hit the ground. The movement doesn’t stop as soon as the players hit the ground; it carries through just like real life.

TACKLE BUTTON. This is a new feature that we have added this year; the old Dive Button has been replaced by the Tackle Button. Now this doesn’t guarantee that you’ll make the tackle but once you hit the button you are driven towards the ball carrier. There is a timing aspect to this because if you hit the button too early your defender will lunge in a last ditch effort to make a tackle. This is incredibly useful because the same way CPU defenders have no suction on tackle attempts, neither do user defenders. So, as you can imagine, it is somewhat harder to be pin-point accurate and run into that moving ball carrier. The same steering is applied to our Hit Stick and Strip ball Tackle attempt so the choice is yours. Personally, I like the play it safe and hit the Tackle Button.

NO MORE SUCTION ON BLOCKS. You know if we removed the suction on tackles we certainly corrected that on blocks, too. I know too many of us have said at least one time, “hey I got sucked into that block.” Please believe me, I feel your pain. Right when you are about to make a tackle, out of nowhere you get sucked into a block. The crazy thing is you actually feel like you are being pulled, I don’t mean the character in the game I mean YOU (well that’s how I felt anyway). Now that’s a thing of the past. If you get by that blocker or he’s not in the appropriate position to make the blocks you won’t get sucked back into him, you’ll continue traveling to your final destination which is undoubtedly the ball carrier.

CATCHING THE LOVE. Yes, we had to give some love to catching, as well. We made a deliberate effort to add some new sprint catches to reduce warping and sliding when the receiver positions himself to catch a pass. Another great addition is the brand new dive catches. If the ball is far out ahead of you then a dive catch may get you there to make the play. The dive catches in NCAA Football 12 are reliable and incredibly useful. And, in case you were wondering, yes, the user can trigger the same dive catches that the CPU players can trigger. In previous years, you would get the same ineffective generic dive catch every time you hit the button, but now you get a dive catch that matches the same way you get a sideline catch or a jump catch that matches. Trust me; if you make use of it when the opportunity arises you won’t be disappointed.

That’s just a few of the gameplay improvements in NCAA Football 12 that I know will enhance your experience. Stay tuned for Part 2 of this blog for more information regarding tackling (add-ons and stealing tackles), as well as new and improved defensive zone logic.

Additional information will be released soon, including announcements about your favorite features like Dynasty and Road to Glory!
Sounds like some good improvements, especially the changes to the dive/tackle button and hit stick. I'm looking forward to seeing what they've added to Road to Glory since they did nothing in 11.
 
I'm just glad Newton didn't get the cover. Really looking forward to this game. Would love to take part in the league this year
 
There's not much in the way of news yet (no blog posts on the official site for nearly three weeks), though I've seen a few things:

http://www.gamespot.com/shows/on-the-spot/index.html#upcoming

GameSpot's supposed to have some exclusive first look at NCAA 12 when On the Spot begins at 7 PM EST. EA didn't mention any sort of context for what to expect.

I saw that pre-order bonuses seem to have been announced, so here's what you can expect from the various sites:

Amazon.com - $56.99
Pre-order NCAA Football 12 and get the NCAA Football 12 Starter Guide, which is your handbook for the most essential offensive and defensive plays. Discover how and when to use a run play or explore the short, intermediate, and deep passing routes on offense. Understand how different types of plays work, be able to read coverages, and take advantage of everything that NCAA Football 12 has to offer. The guide will be emailed to you on the day your product ships. Amazon reserves the right to change or terminate this promotion at any time. Offer valid when shipped and sold by Amazon.com, while supplies last. Limit one per customer.
GameStop - $59.99
Nike Pro Combat uniforms

Reserve your copy of NCAA Football 12 and receive Nike Pro Combat uniforms for TCU, Ohio State, Boise State, Pittsburgh and Virginia Tech as exclusive GameStop premium uniforms. Nike Pro Combat uniforms are Born of Tradition, Built for Speed. Available online and in-store while supplies lasts.
Walmart - $59.96
Reserve your copy of NCAA Football 12 and receive Wal-Mart's exclusive Recruiting Advisor. In Dynasty your Recruiting Advisor will give you inside information about some of the Prospects you are recruiting. Each week he will point out Prospects that you earn double Recruiting points with, have extra pitch information unlocked, or even be ready to sign with your school on the spot.
If the Amazon bonus isn't something that's already in the game and that's just a PDF file that you can print out, then they've fucked up on bonuses. For comparison, Madden's bonuses seem to be just special teams (All-Star, Rookie/Sophmore).
 
They just started showing it off and are showing the new introduction presentation that has been added, which features the familiar marching band forming the same shapes before going through new stuff for this Oklahoma/Oklahoma St. demo. The game and the lack of suction blocking/tackling looks quite a bit better than 11, which is easier to see in gameplay footage.

They seem to hint at revamped commentary with the way they highlight keys to each team's victory that they'll follow up on throughout the game. The analog stick kicking still seems to be there. The playcalling menus look the same.

There's not much that's new in the demo they played, so you just get two drives of continuous gameplay and some small stuff that you can pick up with the commentary. It's near the end of the show (started about 55 minutes in for the live feed), so I'll post the link when the show is archived.
 
There's a new coaching option for the dynasty mode:
We already know that the presentation in NCAA Football 12 has been amped up this year with team traditions, the Georgia bulldog sitting on the sidelines, and so on. Still, there's a lot left in this story, and it's yours to write -- particularly in the game's Dynasty mode.

One of the first "professional" video game articles I ever wrote was bitching about how my alma mater Mizzou's coach was a fat ass in the NCAA games but not in real life. Well, five years after publishing that insightful editorial, EA and Tiburon have responded and given players the ability to create their own coaches from scratch. You can modify looks, set ages and even pick an alma mater. Save these changes, and you can share them with the world and every mode in your game.

That stuff might sound cosmetic, but it plays into the cool changes in Dynasty mode. When you start, you can choose to go be the head coach of whatever school you like, but the real challenge is taking on one of the new offensive or defensive coordinator slots and working your way up to running an entire team. Yes, this year you can be one of the assistant coaches and manage just one side of the ball for entire games. Do well, and the shot at a head coaching job might pop up.

Monitoring how well you're doing comes down to dynamic meters and annual goals. As your boys perform on the field, you're going to be able to see how satisfied your school is with you. That's not entirely new, but the change here is that each goal you're assigned has a different weight. Winning your division is going to mean a lot to a smaller school, but Ohio State's going to want that and a National Championship.

At the end of each season, the coaching carousel pops up and shows who has retired, who has been fired, and who has taken another job. This is your chance to see how things shake down for the school you really want to go to. Your prestige is obviously what schools are looking at when offering you a contract, but if you're alma mater is on the market, it'll be more attracted to you and likely to cut you some slack if your prestige isn't rocking. Similarly, if your coach is getting ancient, don't expect people to be beating down his door with offers.

I was a big fan of online Dynasty last year, and applying these coaching options to a group of friends is what really gets me excited. A Dynasty where we all start out as offensive or defensive coordinators puts a new spin on the competition, but it's far from the only tweak. When you setup a Dynasty, you have control like never before -- you can make and break conferences.

Now, sure, you could customize conferences in NCAA Football 11, but that was really just a swap. You could switch a team out of a given conference, but you had to put another in its place. This year, you can do whatever the hell you want. You can take the Big 12 and drop it down to four teams or go nuts and crank it up to 16. You can set it so that your conference only plays weekday games, name the divisions, and even mess with who gets to go to which bowl. NCAA Football 12 gives you the keys and lets you drive the game wherever you want it to go.

Simming a game from a PC will look like this.



I can't wait to see what this means for my online Dynasty with friends, but there are even more bells and whistles in that vein. Whereas last year I could go on the web at work and recruit players for my console-based team, this year I can go on and simulate games against the computer where I'm actually calling the shots. Rather than have to play the AI when I get home, I can play the game from my work PC -- pick plays and even sub in players. I can watch the on-screen dots (it looks like when you watch a football game on summary on ESPN.com) move down the field during conference calls and make progress for my Dynasty. The league commissioner can even advance the week via the web this year.

I like NCAA Football as a series, but before, I felt like I could skip an iteration of the franchise if I had just bought the last one. I have NCAA Football 11, and there's no doubt I'm getting NCAA Football 12. The changes EA has made this year speak to what I've wanted out of the game for so long -- customization. I can't wait to start an online Dynasty with my best friend and work our way up from lowly offensive coordinators to a National Championship coaches.

Plus, not having a really fat Mizzou coach by default will be sweet.
As long as the custom conference stuff lets me mess with that stuff between seasons, that will be great for an online dynasty.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnKMHnoSAWM
 
http://www.ea.com/ncaa-football/blog/dynasty-overview

Some smaller bits of info on various aspects of the dynasty and online dynasty modes with a schedule of when we get more blog posts:
Hey everyone, Ben Haumiller here and we’ve reached one of my favorite points of the year, Dynasty time. This week you will see a lot of news coming out about our new improvements to Dynasty, but before that gets started I wanted to talk a little about what we added, why we added the features we did, and answer a few of the questions I’ve seen come up so far. Let’s get into the features:

Coaching Carousel (full blog posted on 5/24)

This was without a doubt the most requested feature heading into this year (the only thing that was even close was custom playbooks ), so when we started development on NCAA Football 12 our #1 priority was the Coaching Carousel.

We will have a full blog that goes into all of the details on Tuesday, but until then let me throw out a few bullets to outline the feature and also answer a few of the questions out there:

-If coaching contracts aren’t your thing and you want to play Dynasty like you could in the past you can turn off coach contracts at Dynasty Setup.

-You can create your own coach from scratch, or assume the life of an existing coach.

-Full Coach editing (both Head coaches and coordinators) is available in the front end under Team Management. The coaches are saved to the active roster file, so if you upload/download an edited roster file you will also upload/download any edits to coaches that are on that file.

-In an offline dynasty you are on your own to determine your starting job, but in an Online Dynasty the commissioner can force everyone to climb their way up the coaching ladder by restricting which jobs are available when joining the dynasty (i.e. everyone starts as a 1-star Coordinator, start as a 3-star Head Coach or lower, etc.).

-The Coaching Carousel is different than “Coach Mode”; the Carousel is basically your career as a coach in Dynasty mode. Coach Mode is a new control type that allows you to call plays and make pre-play adjustments, but not actually control the players on the field. This is all done from new broadcast view cameras.

-As a coordinator, you will only control your side of the ball during the game. So, if you are the Defensive Coordinator you can either SuperSim the offensive plays or watch the CPU play them out (which can be pretty intense if you are watching your CPU controlled offense try to work down the field for a game winning score in the final seconds and there’s nothing you can do to help.)

There’s so much more I could go into, but I’ll save the rest for the full blown blog. Here’s one more look at the Coaching Carousel in action.

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Custom Playbooks (full blog posted on 5/25)

While not technically a Dynasty feature, since you can use it in other modes, Custom Playbooks sort of feels like a Dynasty feature since all of your coaches out there are going to want to run your own offense through your coaching career.

There have been a lot of details already released on this one. I’ll let the full blog on Wednesday fill out all of the rest of the info.

Web Improvements (full blog posted on 5/25)

The overall goal of the Dynasty website is to allow you the ability to always stay connected to your Online Dynasty, as well as give you the ability to participate in your Online Dynasty no matter where you are. Moving Dynasty to the web has been a tremendous technical challenge, but as you’ve noted over the past few years, we are committed to providing fans the opportunity to access Dyansty anywhere, anytime. All fans will have the ability to experience the following features from any Internet-connected computer:

·Recruiting – complete all of your weekly recruiting tasks from the web

·Dynasty Wire – Tell everyone your side of the story by writing your game recap, or create your own story from scratch and include videos and photos from any game played in your online dynasty

·Comment on any Dynasty Wire story

·Sign up for Email alerts for dynasty events (Game Recaps, Weekly updates, notifications that the dynasty is ready to advance, etc.)

·Set your Auto Pilot status

·View rosters for any team

·View schedules for any team and any week

·View box scores for other member’s games that have been played in the current week

·View the top 25 poll

·View player and team stats

·Download roster, top 25 poll, and team/player stat information to your local pc

·View other dynasties in progress (Dynasty Wire, Top 25, Stats, Standings, etc.)

For fans looking for the ability to complete their games vs. the CPU without having to go to the console, the advanced Super Sim will allow you to play out the game as the coach—making substitutions and calling plays—helping to determine the outcome of the game rather than just letting the CPU sim the game on its own. There is a one-time fee of $2.99 or 240 Microsoft points for this feature. A free seven day trial begins upon your first use of this feature, so you’ll have a week to try it out before purchasing.

Speaking of CPU simming, the next feature to talk about will give the commissioner the ability to advance the week from the web. This is a great addition for everyone in an Online Dynasty because now you are not at the mercy of the commish being home when it’s time to advance the week. This was a major undertaking for us to get the sim logic up on the server so that when the commish moves the Dynasty forward, all of those CPU vs. CPU games will get simmed and all of the stats/records/etc. will get merged into the main dynasty file. While it’s just a single button press for the commish to start the action, there’s a ton of under the hood work that goes into place to advance that week. There is a one-time fee of $2.99 or 240 Microsoft points for this feature.

Custom Conferences (full blog posted on 5/26)

This time last year it seemed as though we were moments away from college football being flipped upside down with the dawning of the Super Conferences. Even though only a handful of moves actually happened it became obvious that we needed to implement a system that allowed gamers the flexibility to not only set things up how they want, but also be able to adapt to what the future might bring. So, if you want to see how a world of four 16-school Super Conferences would have played out, or if you want to move TCU to the Big East in year two of your Dynasty and do it by the book, it’s all up to you.

Just like Coaching Carousel, we will do a full blog going into the details on Custom Conferences on Thursday, but for now here are some quick bullets:

-You can make edits to conference members, conference rules, and BCS bowl tie-ins when creating the Dynasty as well as each off-season of the Dynasty. This will allow you to make future changes based on real world movements, or any other changes you want to make.

-Conferences can have as few as four schools and a max of 16 schools; however independents can have as few as one member and a max of 32 schools.

-The full blog will go into scheduling details and how we made sure that specific games were scheduled on the correct dates even though the size of the conference can change, as well as making sure that certain rivalry games try to continue to be scheduled even if the schools are moved to separate conferences.

To close out on Custom Conferences, I know there are plenty of fans that are going to want to recreate the old Southwest Conference, so here you go:
dynasty-blog2-5-23-2011.jpg


Dynasty Tuning (full blog posted on 5/27)
Finally, it’s not all about new additions for Dynasty. There are also a number of elements that received some nice tuning updates. Friday’s blog will go into all of those tuning improvements out soon, as well.

Well that’s all from me for now. I hope everyone is as excited about these new features as we are. We will be back soon to give a deep dive into each of these features. Stay Tuned.
It looks like they've made crucial changes for online dynasty to allow advancement via the website, for a fee, and the ability to edit the conferences between seasons so that we wouldn't be stuck with the 12 initial teams that joined the conference.
 
http://www.ea.com/ncaa-football/blog/coach-carousel

Details on Coach Carousel:
Hi NCAA Football fans, NCAA Football 12 designer Jordan Peterson here, and it is my privilege to provide you with a more in-depth view of one of the new features in Dynasty, Coach Carousel. Coach Carousel has been one of the top requested features each year from the community and the new addition of coaches, and contracts, will add even more depth to Dynasty.

When starting an Online, or Offline Dynasty, you will be able to create a new coach or use an existing coach. There are three coach positions available: Head Coach, Offensive Coordinator and Defensive Coordinator. As the Head Coach, you will be in control of the entire team and held accountable for completing contract goals both on and off the field. Coordinators, however, are only responsible for their side of the ball, and the CPU coaches will run the other half. Only controlling one side of the ball creates additional drama to your Dynasty games as you watch each play of your CPU controlled offense attempting to march down the field for a game-winning drive. This can keep you on the edge of your seat, cheering your team to pull out the victory.

carousel1.jpg


In addition to the appearance options available when creating a new coach, there are a few that will affect the path your coach takes while climbing the coaching ladder. In particular, along with your coach’s playbooks, your coach’s Alma Mater may come into play later on during the Coach Carousel, so be certain you have it set correctly. Without getting into too many details, when considering potential candidates, schools will take a closer look at a coaching candidate who went to their school.

carousel2.jpg


I know the commissioners out there are wondering what type of setting options there will be in Online Dynasty for Coach Carousel. First, commissioners will be able to determine the starting Prestige and Coach Position for the Dynasty. Meaning the commissioner can set the Dynasty to start from the bottom of the barrel as a One Star Coordinator and climb their way to the top as a 6 Star Head Coach. The ability to move teams around via Custom Conferences provides even more flexibility, challenge and depth.

carousel3.jpg


Whether in Online or Offline Dynasty, you will be able to preview each contract before signing with a particular team, as well as that school’s current roster. Each contract displays the goals the school is requiring for a particular position, their positive and negative impact, and your starting Job Security. As a Head Coach, schools will offer contracts that require efficiency in recruiting and often have a focus upon overall number of total wins, bowl game appearances, and team rankings. Coordinators should expect contracts that focus on their area of expertise, but will also be on the hook to ensure that their side of the ball is excelling on the field.

Each goal in the contract is important, as both Coach Prestige and Job Security are impacted by passing and failing these goals. The arrow indication next to each goal highlights how important that goal is for that particular contract. Job Security determines if you are at risk of being fired based upon your completion or failure of your goals. The lower a Coach’s Job Security percentage is, the greater the risk of being fired.

There are three varying types of rewards for the goals. Required, but expected goals, will display as more red arrows than green. This is a base requirement for this contract for the school and it is expected that the coach must pass this goal. Then there are balanced goals, with both red and green arrows, that the school considers as something the coach should pass and is less challenging. Finally, the bonus goals are the goals with only green arrows. The school considers these stretch goals for the contract.

In addition to goal types varying by coaching position, goals are also tuned by prestige. A Head Coach at Akron will not have the same objectives as a Head Coach at Alabama. As the Alabama Head Coach, you may be penalized for not making it to a bowl game. However, as the Akron Head Coach, your contract may provide a bonus for making it to a bowl game. There are also unexpected goals that may not appear on the contract, but can provide a boost for overachieving coaches.

The type of goals for a Head Coach will differ from Coordinators rather significantly. As a Head Coach, there are goals for bowl wins, total number of wins, rival wins, recruiting, final conference ranking and even recruit visits. Coordinators, however, are focused entirely on their half of the game. Their goals will largely focus upon their on-the-field achievements, such as sacks, interceptions, passing touchdowns, etc. They will also focus upon total number of wins. Keeping these goals in mind as you are playing will, in turn, affect your play style.

For example, if you’ve failed a few goals already and you’re on the hot seat, plus you have a goal to reach 1000 yards in a single season, you may change the way you play knowing that you must pass this goal in order to help keep your job. In this scenario, the coach goals add a significant amount of pressure to the game.

Coach Prestige rating impacts several areas of the game including Recruiting, Player Progression, and the quality of the teams that could potentially be interested during the Carousel Stage. You will also notice that during a recruiting phone call a Coach’s Prestige rating is dynamic. Given all the areas it may impact, including potential job offers during the Carousel, Coach Prestige becomes a vitally important rating. Completing goals within a contract is just one way to improve Coach Prestige.

Another method to influence Coach Prestige during the season is by either beating a higher ranked team to gain a small bonus, or alternatively, losing a game to a lower ranked team, which will slightly decrease your Coach Prestige.

carousel4.jpg


At any point during the regular season, the Coach Central hub is available to view more information about your Coach’s progress on his goals, edit your Coach Philosophy, or to track the progress of other coaches around the NCAA.

During the regular season, the Contract Feedback screen will display direct feedback from the Athletic Director on the latest events impacting your goals. It will also display updated Job Security percentage and Passing, Failing and In Progress goals. Also, any weekly penalty or bonus for beating a better team, or losing to a worse team will be displayed here.

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The Job Security screen will display the current Head Coach and Coordinators for every school, along with the number of years remaining in the contract and their current rating. In an Online Dynasty, you will be able to see how the other human-controlled teams are faring in the Dynasty. From here, you can start to track how you think the Carousel may play out during the off-season. If your dream job is to be the Head Coach of Michigan, this is where you can track how hot the seat is getting in Ann Arbor.

The Coach Philosophy screen is where you can edit all of the Sim information for your Coach. This is particularly useful if you plan on simming ahead a few seasons since these settings have a significant impact upon simulations. Finally, in Coach Info you will be able to create new additional User Coaches or edit any existing coach, including physical appearance and both offensive and defensive styles.

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Recruiting has also seen some changes due to the addition of coaches. While any of the coach positions can recruit, only the Head Coach will have recruiting-related goals in their contracts. Coordinators can handle the recruiting as well, but they will not be held accountable to do so via contracts.

As the Head Coach, the impact you have on your team’s recruiting is evident through the dynamic Coach Loyalty and Coach Prestige ratings. Now, Coach Loyalty will be impacted by how long a Coach is at a particular school, if they have met their goals and if they have signed any contract extensions. During a phone call with a recruit, you can now expect to see the Coach’s ratings dynamically update, potentially helping (or hindering) your weekly phone calls.

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The Coach Carousel screen is the first option available in the off-season portion of Online Dynasty. The Carousel will display any job openings that may occur as a result of a contract expiring, coaches being fired, leaving for a better job offer or even retiring. In an Online Dynasty, the carousel will jump from one player offer to the next player’s offer. If there is any one member that is slowing the Carousel down, the commissioner can always step in and advance the Carousel.

Several characteristics are taken into consideration when a School offers a new job or even an extension to a coach, including their Prestige, Playbook Style, and Alma Mater. As you advance through the Carousel, schools will evaluate their current coaches, determine if it is necessary to take any action on their contract, and consider other coaches that may be considering job offers.

Schools will only offer a Coordinator contract to a coach that has experience on that side of the ball. For example, if Tulsa is looking for an Offensive Coordinator, they will not consider Defensive Coordinators. However, schools may also decide to promote a current Coordinator to a Head Coach. Should the unthinkable happen, and a Head Coach is fired, their expertise in a particular side of the field will be considered when they are offered a Coordinator position.

Occasionally, coaches will accept a job offer even if they are mid-contract if it’s a better job, or if it’s their Alma Mater. This will cause unexpected jobs to be added to the Carousel, which can mix up subsequent coach maneuvers. Essentially, even just one coach’s decision has ramifications across the NCAA. The domino effect from one six star school changing its coach can potentially have ramifications all the way down to offensive coordinators of a one star school.

For example, let’s say it’s year 10 of a Dynasty and Michigan hires South Carolina’s Head Coach because he’s an alumus. South Carolina then hires USC’s Offensive Coordinator because of his offensive style. USC then hires San Diego State’s Head Coach to be their Offensive Coordinator, because of his coach prestige. San Diego State then promotes their Defensive Coordinator to Head Coach because he’s also an alumnus, and so on.

After the Carousel has been completed, advancing to the next week will expose the Carousel summary, which will provide a detailed overview of changes that occurred during the Carousel.

That wraps up this blog for Coach Carousel, be sure to check back this week for more NCAA Football 12 information.
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9mIWy3sjpU

New Road to Glory features:

-Full Senior HS season available to play
-Use teambuilder to import actual teams and uniforms for your high school schedule.
-Play both sides of the ball in HS, so you can be more highly recruited on one side than the other.
-Has an XP system to encourage using practice more to get the starting job and keep it.
-XP can be spent to upgrade your skills.
-There are challenges for practice so that it doesn't have to just be a random set of plays.
-As you gain experience points and level up, the coach gives you more responsibilities, like more freedom to call your own plays at the line of scrimmage.

Not so thrilled about playing more high school football, but the rest sounds like a big upgrade since they haven't really touched the career mode in a few years.
 
It took a bit of time to get the handle on passing, though the promises of improved pass defense seems to be true. The lack of suction tackling and blocking is also a big change, as the Oregon RB was able to get into holes and not be interrupted by canned tackling animations.
 
I don't think these consoles are capable of really doing 3D grass in the way they would like, but I'm glad that it doesn't look like the flat mashed-down grass textures that they've had in the past.

I like the new styles of long hair that they have, which move around fairly well.
 
Hoenstly, I played the demo and I didn't notice much of a difference. It seemed a bit better, but I didn't really have any issues passing. The pass defense was a bit better. I was playing on the default level though, so that may be why.
 
I agree about the tackling being improved and liked that a lot myself. Did anyone else notice there seemed to be some stuttering coming out of menus and such more than last year? I think I even noticed it with some on the field stuff. Hopefully that is just a demo thing.

Frisky, you going to run the custom conference dynasty this year? I started a thread about doing a dynasty the other way and was wondering what your plans were.
 
I didn't notice anything unusual with the menus in the demo.

I'll probably make a thread to gauge interest in another CAGCAA dynasty, as they've fixed a few of my key issues (no custom conferences between seasons, crappy scheduling AI, and no way to advance weeks from the website).
 
Impressed with the demo. A lot of people over at OS are saying the passing is too difficult but I love it. You have to know if they are running zone or man and adjust accordingly. I also love the tackling in this game. I've played three games and haven't noticed any suction tackling. I was getting this game no matter what, but it looks really good so far!
 
I had no problems passing on All-American. The new animations for tackling also make it a lot easier to run. Maybe I can actually hand it to the A back in the tripe option this year.
 
So, what is the best deal thus far? It appears WALMART has the recruiting advisor for FREE if you pre-order. Decent deal I suppose. No AMAZON credit, so that is a bummer. Maybe KMART or someone will come through.
 
[quote name='gbpackers94']Is anyone else having a problem passing in the demo?[/QUOTE]

God yes. So much so that I had to start running the ball to get anywhere. I could not hit any of my receivers either due to the insane pass defense, or the outright misses.

Wasn't too happy to see the AI come back from 21-0 to score 10 in the last 45 seconds of the game either.

I want to get this one as I haven't picked up an NCAA since 07...but the passing is really turning me off from it right now.
 
Man I must be missing something because I completely hated the demo. This franchise is usually a must buy/day 1 purchase for me every year, but this year's iteration left me feeling wanting. The game feels cheap to me. The sounds of the game seem to be non existent. The weight and heft of the players (locomotion engine from last year and the previous year) seems to be gone. The crowd is just bizarre.

The Good:

-Tackling animations/loss of suction tackles.
-Passing is more complex and accurate in terms of realism.
-Kick offs and punts have been improved.

The Bad:

-The grass. On the replays it looks weird, and in the game it looks like a last gen engine. Honestly, it looks like green frosting to me.
-Player control: No weight, no difference between linemen and cornerbacks in terms of control. Players turn on a dime, and feel like paper cutouts instead of human beings.
-Game speed feels too fast and too "crisp."
-Graphics look awful. I played on a 40'' 1080p plasma with my 360 and the colors looked washed out.
-Running animations still haven't been updated. Too easy to run without suction tackles.
-Commentary has not been updated.
-Sounds! Holy deaf man Batman, what happened to the sound(s) of the game? On an outside running play I was completely nailed, and what should have sounded like a bone jarring hit, sounded like a mouse farting behind glass. Where are the sounds of the pads hitting, helmets crunching, etc?
-The crowd did not react to any play as normal. I had the ball inside the 5 yard line, 4th quarter, down by 7, 3rd down. I could hear a pin drop next to the same flatulent mouse they used for the hitting sounds. However, in the 2nd quarter, up by 14, near the 50 yard line, on 1st down, the crowd went wild as if the game was on the line. What the hell?

Honestly the demo made me cancel my pre-order. I was so bored, and pissed off, that I just deleted the demo from my hard drive. I have no idea what people are seeing that I'm not, but oh well.
 
[quote name='Pck21']Man I must be missing something because I completely hated the demo. This franchise is usually a must buy/day 1 purchase for me every year, but this year's iteration left me feeling wanting. The game feels cheap to me. The sounds of the game seem to be non existent. The weight and heft of the players (locomotion engine from last year and the previous year) seems to be gone. The crowd is just bizarre.

The Good:

-Tackling animations/loss of suction tackles.
-Passing is more complex and accurate in terms of realism.
-Kick offs and punts have been improved.

The Bad:

-The grass. On the replays it looks weird, and in the game it looks like a last gen engine. Honestly, it looks like green frosting to me.
-Player control: No weight, no difference between linemen and cornerbacks in terms of control. Players turn on a dime, and feel like paper cutouts instead of human beings.
-Game speed feels too fast and too "crisp."
-Graphics look awful. I played on a 40'' 1080p plasma with my 360 and the colors looked washed out.
-Running animations still haven't been updated. Too easy to run without suction tackles.
-Commentary has not been updated.
-Sounds! Holy deaf man Batman, what happened to the sound(s) of the game? On an outside running play I was completely nailed, and what should have sounded like a bone jarring hit, sounded like a mouse farting behind glass. Where are the sounds of the pads hitting, helmets crunching, etc?
-The crowd did not react to any play as normal. I had the ball inside the 5 yard line, 4th quarter, down by 7, 3rd down. I could hear a pin drop next to the same flatulent mouse they used for the hitting sounds. However, in the 2nd quarter, up by 14, near the 50 yard line, on 1st down, the crowd went wild as if the game was on the line. What the hell?

Honestly the demo made me cancel my pre-order. I was so bored, and pissed off, that I just deleted the demo from my hard drive. I have no idea what people are seeing that I'm not, but oh well.[/QUOTE]


We are all wearing our blinders. At this point nostalgia is a big reason why I buy this game and play it to death every year. I've been playing these games forever, since I was a kid, since I was living in dorms while attending college, etc. I also live in Nebraska where Nebraska football is a BIG deal because we don't have much else.

Honestly after reading "The Bad" there is nothing I really disagree with and would definitely second how bad the graphics are and that the grass is TERRIBLE, I mean REALLY BAD. At one point I asked myself "Were the graphics last year way better than this?". They always say they have new lighting and it always looks like crap.

Anyways I think there is a lot to like here, but I'm admittedly biased. I'll be picking it up for sure, maybe I wont put as many hours into it as my favorite versions but I'll definitely play the hell out of it.

I'm sure EA loves people like me. The only way I wouldn't buy this game is if...never mind I'll buy it every year.
 
I am really really happy to see that I am not the first to say this. Since everyone knows my stand on madden and ncaa football games all I could muster was a ugh when giving this yet another chance.

There simply can not be another genre of game that is more disappointing than next gen football. Although I must say that the feature list look good. I love the road to glory and coaching thing. But the game itself feels so god damn dated that its almost laughable now to even consider this next gen.

The loss of suction tackles is great (how much credit do you give them for taking 10 years to do this though) but the tackling itself is still ridiculously canned and makes very little sense in any given situation.

My biggest nag about the game is simply the look. In a generation where we have achieved fairly good human like graphics Madden/NCAA looks like I am playing...well a video game. Which is a problem because NBA 2k11 doesnt, MLB the Show doesnt, Fifa doesnt. I am not a graphics whore but the game looks like ass and is not worthy of a next gen title, XBLA games come across better.

I am just angry that we never seen the jump to next gen with these two franchises.

Ugh McShitty game.
 
[quote name='FrankySox']Honestly after reading "The Bad" there is nothing I really disagree with and would definitely second how bad the graphics are and that the grass is TERRIBLE, I mean REALLY BAD. At one point I asked myself "Were the graphics last year way better than this?". They always say they have new lighting and it always looks like crap.[/QUOTE]
It didn't. I popped in 11 and they're pretty much the same. I don't think you'll see an overall bump to the visual quality until either they move to a completely new engine or the next generation of consoles. They've been building onto the same engine for the last several years and it's showing its age at this point, so a fresh start would be nice to see since I don't think we'll see new consoles for a few more years and they could better prepare themselves for new hardware.
 
[quote name='FrankySox']We are all wearing our blinders. At this point nostalgia is a big reason why I buy this game and play it to death every year. I've been playing these games forever, since I was a kid, since I was living in dorms while attending college, etc. I also live in Nebraska where Nebraska football is a BIG deal because we don't have much else.

Honestly after reading "The Bad" there is nothing I really disagree with and would definitely second how bad the graphics are and that the grass is TERRIBLE, I mean REALLY BAD. At one point I asked myself "Were the graphics last year way better than this?". They always say they have new lighting and it always looks like crap.

Anyways I think there is a lot to like here, but I'm admittedly biased. I'll be picking it up for sure, maybe I wont put as many hours into it as my favorite versions but I'll definitely play the hell out of it.

I'm sure EA loves people like me. The only way I wouldn't buy this game is if...never mind I'll buy it every year.[/QUOTE]

I'm glad to see that I'm not alone...sorta lol. I've been looking forward to this game for a few months now, and the demo killed me.

[quote name='Soodmeg']I am really really happy to see that I am not the first to say this. Since everyone knows my stand on madden and ncaa football games all I could muster was a ugh when giving this yet another chance.

There simply can not be another genre of game that is more disappointing than next gen football. Although I must say that the feature list look good. I love the road to glory and coaching thing. But the game itself feels so god damn dated that its almost laughable now to even consider this next gen.

The loss of suction tackles is great (how much credit do you give them for taking 10 years to do this though) but the tackling itself is still ridiculously canned and makes very little sense in any given situation.

My biggest nag about the game is simply the look. In a generation where we have achieved fairly good human like graphics Madden/NCAA looks like I am playing...well a video game. Which is a problem because NBA 2k11 doesnt, MLB the Show doesnt, Fifa doesnt. I am not a graphics whore but the game looks like ass and is not worthy of a next gen title, XBLA games come across better.

I am just angry that we never seen the jump to next gen with these two franchises.

Ugh McShitty game.[/QUOTE]

Bingo!
 
I noticed the sound issues as well. The last few really had me in the college football mood, but this one doesn't at all.
 
Ok, this is my last complaint, but why in the hell did they change the grass from last year? It looks way worse. After playing the demo again I'd liken the grass to a children's coloring book.

It seems like there is a lot of different options to customize your experience so that'll be good. I'm curious if they changed anything with recruiting or not.
 
I'll have my review done later tonight. I'm enjoying it a lot, especially the overhauled Road to Glory mode. They got rid of the daily activities stuff that made the previous versions tedious and now have weekly practices with a shop to spend your XP on permanent and temporary stat upgrades. My only issue is with progression, as it's easy to become the starter in your first season even if you're a fourth string freshman. They've added a position battle practice event once you've earned enough XP to deserve a move up the depth chart, which adds an extra week that means it takes two weeks to move up a spot. The quicker progression isn't really new for the series, so it's not really a surprise that they stuck with a more fun way to play the career mode. I'd still like a way to realistically play through a career without gimping myself, like making the amount of XP required to move up much larger each time so that only shallow teams or injuries would make for quick jumps.

The Coach Carousel stuff is also pretty cool, as it makes the decision to start from a small/bad school for the dynasty mode more interesting than in past games. I made an OC for Akron, the worst team in the game, and had a hard time winning/scoring, but I ended with an 8-4 record while completing all of the one-year goals that were set very low. It was interesting to be able to see how other coaches in the conferences were doing throughout the year to see who was likely to be fired. The only weird thing that I saw was that you have to recruit for both sides of the ball even if you're a coordinator, which seems like it should either be a shared responsibility or the head coach should be in charge of that. Since it's the dynasty either way you play it, I'd imagine that they didn't want to develop any special way to handle that. I do wish that you didn't have to take the role of a coach just to play a classic-style dynasty.

Passing is definitely easier in the full game, though the level of play of your opponents and your own team plays a part in whether you can be a gunslinger or make the accurate, safe throws. Some of the money plays from NCAA 11 still work fairly well, though it's less automatic this year and more of a gamble. Everything else is improved a bit due to the lack of suction blocking/tackling. They're still reliant upon animations, so I notice on replays that the DB/WR kind of awkwardly rub against each other before the push/shove animations begin and that kind of stuff needs to be addressed next year.

The other big thing is that they lied about 3D grass in the game, as it only shows on replays/post-play scenes when they can just use preset player data with better-looking scenes. There's no excuse for playing up the 3D grass as a big visual upgrade when it's limited to non-gameplay scenes. It should be pretty apparent to most people that the replays will look better than the game does in motion.
 
Are there any plans for a NCAA 12 online dynasty? If there is I would really like a spot. (I should get the game tomorrow, Amazon delivery date shipping ;))
 
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