The History of EA's NCAA Football Series

[Music] when you think of ea's ncaa football series of video games you don't really think of a fall in quality the series ended on a high note with the final game ncaa14 considered by many to be a classic so while other games have truly fallen off in terms of quality such as madden or fifa that really isn't the case with the ncaa games some might say there was no fall for ncaa video games at all but i feel like multiple lawsuits and no new games in nearly a decade is considered a fall it wasn't because the games were bad as ncaa 14 along with nhl 14 were probably the last great sports games created by ea the ncaa was always the underrated younger brother to madden while the games were usually behind madden when it came to new engines or major features the core game modes gameplay and presentation always felt like it had more love put into it when madden started to lose depth over the later years of ncaa football's run the college games continued to have one of the deepest offline experiences in all sports games with the incredible dynasty and road to glory game modes certain features such as the home crowd scrambling the button icons when viewing play art before the snap and the routes squiggling around never made their way to madden and made the ncaa games feel more authentic the marching bands the incredibly large selection of teams team builder the espn presentation and more all came together beautifully resulting in a popular franchise that may not have sold as well as the madden games did but had a much more die-hard fan base while the games themselves were great the series eventually of course died off despite plans for a customizable college football 15 ea abandoned college football games after the ed o'bannon lawsuit came to his conclusion throughout the history of the ncaa football series players had likenesses in the game but weren't being paid for them in ncaa 14 for example you'd see a texas a m player who's a little short pretty fast and wears the number two jersey in older games you might see an all-star quarterback wearing number 15 for florida while ea likely would have been willing to pay players if they could have the harsh old-fashioned regulations of the ncaa left them with two options release a customizable game with no player likenesses and spend a ton of money negotiating for the rights to each school individually or simply cancel the series ea chose the latter and after 20 years of college football video games the world had zero this is the story of the ncaa football series meteoric rise and it's unexpected sudden fall welcome to bill walsh football [Music] it all started back in 1993 when ea decided to release a college football game to produce alongside madden they negotiated a deal with bill walsh to get him to be their title man and bill walsh college football was born on the fourth generation of consoles the game did not have the ncaa license and instead had generic city names for colleges florida state was called tallahassee for example this was a cheap way for ea to create a college game without having to pay the ncaa a licensing fee or negotiate with individual schools the game featured generic versions of the top 24 teams in college football and 24 of the all-time greatest teams since 1978 as well the game featured exhibition playoffs and all-time playoff modes and was basically a madden skin in terms of actual gameplay the next year ea released bill walsh college football 95 which featured 36 division 1a teams introduced windowless passing which has become a staple of football games since and provided statistical tracking throughout the season mode you could end the season with generic bowl games or a playoff system the next year ea dropped the bill walsh name and instead went with college football usa 96 which was ea's first game to feature all division 1a teams and real bowl games the playbooks expanded with 400 total plays including the wishbone veer tea offense and a 4-4 defense ea released another game under the college football usa title only to change the titles one more time next year with the release of ncaa football 98 this was the beginning of the ncaa football games we know and love today the game introduced a dynasty mode allowing players to run a school's program for four seasons and was ea's first game to actually have the ncaa license and logo ea acquired the license originally for their college basketball games but was able to use the ncaa license in their football game as well which ended up being a bigger deal in the long run and while ncaa 98 ran on madden 97's year old engine it was a massive stepping stone for the series and built the foundation for years to come the next iteration ncaa football 99 was the first game in the series to feature fully 3d rendered players it also added the create a player feature which was a step towards a career mode the heisman trophy finally made its appearance as well replacing the generic ea sports mvp trophy in previous titles another huge feature was the ability to import created players into madden 99 this of course would later lead to the ability to import players and draft classes into later matting games two years later ncaa football jumped to the playstation 2. the initial transition was rough as certain features such as custom leagues tournaments and create a school weren't brought to the next generation ncaa football 2003 brought these features back however and saw the series join the xbox and gamecube the next few years were all fantastic for the series leading up to what i believe to be the greatest ncaa football title ever made ncaa football 06. if you haven't already check out my video on the game but as a summary ncaa 06 was the pinnacle of college football video games it had an insanely deep dynasty mode featuring in-season recruiting a fantastic career mode called race for the heisman which would eventually give us road to glory smooth and fluid gameplay in presentation nearly on par with espn nfl 2k5 the amount of detail and care put into this game was impressive and this is what i consider to be the peak of the series the next year brought us another console transition with ncaa football 07 releasing on the xbox 360. fcs teams were gone along with other features the gameplay was a bit weird and stiff and the transition was simply clunky meanwhile the ps2 and xbox version of 07 was fantastic ncaa football 08 is one of my favorites in the series for one the soundtrack is amazing the game brought back a lot of depth to the dynasty mode and improved gameplay from o7 this year however legal issues started showing up ed o'bannon a former basketball player for ucla filed a lawsuit against the ncaa and the collegiate licensing company claiming that there were violations of the sherman anti-trust act and actions that deprived him of his right of publicity this was sparked because he noticed his likeness was used in ncaa basketball 09 with the classic 1995 championship team there was a player on that team with his position jersey number bald head height and weight he was not paid for this and he felt that he deserved compensation for his likeness oscar robertson and bill russell joined the suit and the case went on for a few years just keep that in the back of your mind for now ea continued to release ncaa games for both football and basketball while the lawsuit was being settled however their final basketball game was ncaa basketball 10. ncaa football 10 was a major addition to the series with the iconic team builder showing up for the very first time team builder was a website where you could design an entire team from the logo to the uniforms to the school campus it was the deepest creation suite ea had ever created and was beloved by fans this allowed players to add colleges to the game that were too small to originally make the game or use their creativity to create fun original teams like the ugf pandas for example ncaa 11 12 and 13 were all fantastic games with some of the deepest dynasty and career modes ever seen in sports games at that time the gameplay was great and the ncaa football series finally found its glory days on the 7th generation of consoles and then ea released their final college football game ncaa football 14 a game that has actually gained value over the years which is rare for a sports game you'll be lucky to find a copy under 70 dollars today over seven years later the funny thing is originally ncaa 14 wasn't as well loved as it is today many people felt the recruiting was dumbed down from ncaa 13 and some people preferred the gameplay of the previous games due to 14 switching to a new engine media outlets called the game a small update and overall mediocre however ncaa 14 is probably the most beloved and most popular game in the entire series kind of like with nfl 2k5 the fact that ncaa 14 was the last game of its series gave it a legendary reputation people tend to hold the final version of something on a pedestal and while ncaa 14 wasn't perfect i do think it is worthy of all the praise it gets because it was and still is a fantastic football game and i find way more fun and enjoyment out of it than i have from any madden game released over the past decade check out my video on ncla 14 if you haven't already the lawsuit with o'bannon concluded in o'bannon's favor and ea in the ncaa agreed to pay a 40 million dollar settlement it was ruled that the ncaa was violating anti-trust laws by not paying their athletes for their likenesses and instead of saying okay fine we will start paying our players now the ncaa simply refused to renegotiate their license with ea and decided they would rather have no college sports video games at all instead of simply paying their players people love to hate on o'bannon and blame him for ending college sports games but it's the ncaa people should be angry at o'bannon was simply asking for his fair share since the ncaa and ea used his likeness in their products and the court ruled in his favor he was right the ncaa is simply a backwards-run corporation that would rather exploit athletes than pay them fairly this is changing today although very slowly ea was working on a college football 15 title that would not have the ncaa license and instead negotiate with individual schools and offer an in-game in-depth creation suite to allow players to create all the schools ea couldn't get the rights to but ea abandoned the project likely after realizing the cost of development compared to the potential revenue of the game since ncaa 14 ea has not made a college football video game and today the closest thing we have is mods every year players create ncaa rosters for ncaa 14 and recently there has been a mod released for the game titled college football revamped available for the ps3 and pc through an emulator that lets you run the game in 4k the mod adds 20 20 uniforms in stadium updates to ncaa 14 making the game feel new again this is fantastic because team builder is now all but shut down the ability to mod teams into the original game brings new life to it there are also the college football mods for the pc madden games and while those guys put a lot of work into recreating the stadiums fields and uniforms the gameplay is modern day madden which most people find unenjoyable at least i find it unenjoyable i would much rather play ncaa 14 than a skinned madden 21 and that right there should tell you something maybe it's for the best that we stopped getting ncaa games from ea because i guarantee you the games would have been stripped of their depth moved over to the frostbite engine and the focus would have shifted away from core game modes and instead towards ultimate team and probably microtransactions in modes like road to glory ea probably would have killed the series off anyways by simply skinning madden and its terrible base today people beg ea to create a new college football game but let's not act like it wouldn't simply be madden 21 with college logos and uniforms maybe worse the ncaa football series ended on a high note the swan song for the series was a legitimately fantastic and fun game that people still play today i consider ncaa 14 to be the last great ea sports football title and with good reason the gameplay is fun respects physics and the game modes are actually deep what a way to fall i don't know about you but i'd much rather retire on top like john elway had ncaa football continued it likely wouldn't have the hardcore fan base and legacy it has today maybe someday college sports games will return when the ncaa either learns to be ethical or dies out entirely when that day comes hopefully there is a company ready to create a modern day college football game that is actually good it could be ea maybe it'll be 2k sony maybe a new company maybe in a few years doug flutie's maximum football will actually have gameplay that can rival ncaa 14. but for now we will all continue playing ncaa 14 or ncaa 06 or whichever game in the series was your favorite the rise of ncaa football was fast as was its fall it's almost poetic how it turned out and while we all want a new college football title you have to admit that ncaa 14 was a fitting end for the series thanks for watching [Music] foreign

Channel: SOFTDRINKTV

Views: 160,747

Keywords: softdrinktv, softdrinksports, madden, nfl 2k5, retrospective, documentary, ncaa football 14, ncaa 06, ea sports, ncaa football, ncaa football 20, 21, 22, return of ncaa football, what happened to ncaa football games, college football video games, cfb games, dynasty mode, teambuilder

Id: ryKWFTzeTyY

Length: 15min 38sec (938 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 22 2020