By JAMES DRZEWIECKI and BRAD CARROLL

This week Sports Editor and I come back together and take an in-depth look in the pros and cons of NCAA College Football games and Madden games, to figure out which one is the superior football experience.

James’ NCAA Football Pros

n Atmosphere: The college games have an element of atmosphere that can not be matched by Madden. There is something about the fans chanting and stomping to make the stadium shake, that pulls you right into the experience.

n Recruiting: The recruiting in NCAA is deep. I find it some what similar to Madden’s but what I like is the little bit of role playing element that gets added in. During the recruiting process you are able to target certain players you want to join your team and choose to either pitch different areas of the program, like coaching style and play time, and then you get to pick how you would like to deliver the pitch, either through a phone call or a in-house visit from the head coach or assistant.

n Score Bar: The score bar in this game is great, it’s big, easy to see and bright. Madden’s score bar is tiny and crammed together.

n Dynasty Mode: The mode allows you to become the coach rather a player and put your team on the road to become National Champions. You’re allowed to customize the appearance of your coach, pick your team and become in charge of recruiting to organizing your depth chart.

James’ NCAA Football Cons

n Announcers: They simply annoy me with their looping dialogue. For a game franchise that offers some of the best sound effects, I feel the games are truly dragged down by the repetitive dialogue of Corso, Herbstrei and Nessler. Please record something new and interesting, and stop saying stuff that doesn’t apply to the situation.

n Fight Songs: I know Brad loves this, but I can only hear marching band music looping for so long. It just keeps playing and I find myself muting or lowering the volume when I’m reorganizing my rosters, because it’s like the energizer bunny it keeps going and going.

n A.I.: Well what can I say; the computer controlled teams are just dumb. I put this game on the hardest mode and I can still beat any team 35-7 or 45-0. The game is just not as challenging as Madden and that’s one of its major flaws.

n Unbalanced Recruiting: I like almost everything the recruiting has to offer but there is one thing I find annoying. The thing is when your team is really good you’ll always end up with the good players and the teams that actually need good players to improve their game will only get more lousy players and the game gets less and less challenging.

James’ Madden Pros

n Music: The music is Madden is great and there is no marching bands to be heard, which I like. I never mute or lower the volume when playing Madden, because I enjoy hearing each of the songs.

n A.I.: A huge plus for Madden, because the A.I. is actually smart and difficult to play against. If you place this game on the All-Madden or All-Pro setting you’ll have such a challenging game that will not be decided to the final minutes of the fourth quarter and I love that, I love feeling that ever decision I make is important.

n Franchise Mode: You get to pick your coaches, you can even pick your players if you do a fantasy draft, you have to watch you salary-cap and the off-season is so complex and deep – it’s brilliant. I will go as far as saying I like to play the off-season than actually playing the regular season; I really look forward to it.

James’ Madden Cons

n Atmosphere: This is where Madden really lacks, NCAA football pulls you right into the world of college football and it feels like you’re there, mainly because of the fans chanting and the stadium shacking. In Madden you have fans cheering, but you don’t have the stadium shaking and the fans seem a little calmer than college football. To put it simply with college I feel like I’m there and with Madden I feel like I’m watching it on TV.

n Announcers: Like NCAA football, the announcers are plagued with repetitive dialogue that makes you want to just turn them off all together.

n Graphics: Madden has the worst looking score box and pop-up menus and NCAA just trumps them here. The score box is so crammed that you have to look closely to actual see what it says.

Brad’s NCAA Football Pros

n Fight Songs: I know James will say that he’d rather listen to actual music when gong through the game menu, but for me, college is all about atmosphere and it’s all about the fight songs. There was one year where they actually switched to actual music and I hated the game. And I wasn’t the only one, because the following year EA Sports went right back to the fight songs. They also pump you up to play the game. When a cycle of songs goes through and the Michigan songs hit out of nowhere, I’m pumped and ready to kick Ohio State’s butt.

n Atmosphere: When playing college football, you feel like you’re on campus with a 100,000 fans cheering you on. The crowd is into every play and you’re part of it. You can also pump the crowd up to where the screen is shaking it’s so loud. I love it – even when I’m on the road and I get a headache from the screen and controller shaking uncontrollably. In NCAA, there is a clear cut advantage for playing at home – just like it is in real life.

n The Off-season: The game does a great job with recruiting players from high school to your team. It is a five-week process (not real time, of course) that puts you up against all the other college’s to sign the top high school prospects. Sometimes you get the players you want, sometimes they sign with a rival school. Also, players will transfer to other schools if you break promises to them or if they’re just not playing. It’s realistic.

n Heisman Trophy Award Ceremony: A great advancement the game has made in recent years is actually having an actual presentation of the Heisman Trophy award. They go through the nominees and then the winner walks up to the podium and receive the Heisman Trophy. It only lasts about a minute, but it’s a great minute.

 

Brad’s NCAA Football Cons

n Non-Competitive Games: You could be playing a Top 10 team in the nation and still win by 35. Even though someone might think that’s a great thing, I actually want to play in games that come down to the wire, especially when playing a ranked team. Competition is good, but it’s hit or miss in college. It is a huge deal when I lose a game. Believe me, I don’t want to lose, but I want to play in a competitive game.

n Recruiting: I know this is sort of going against one of my pros, but I truly hate that the good teams in NCAA always get the good players. I know this first-hand because I played for Rutgers for a while instead of Michigan and only high school players that were 2 or 3 stars would sign with me instead of the 5 star players you would get at Michigan. I know some might say this is realistic, but if I’m going 12-1 at Rutgers, you would think someone would want to play there. It takes a while to build a program from the ground up.

n Intelligence: For the most part, the computer-controlled teams or players are dumb. I’ve tried to combat this by bumping up the A.I. for the computer as high as it will go. But it still sometimes isn’t good enough.

Brad’s Madden Pro’s

n The Off-Season: EA Sports took the Madden off-season to a whole new level with last year’s game … it is simply awesome. I still can’t over how good the NFL Draft is set up. The creators did a great job with it. Also, the free agency fight to sign players is great as well. The off-season is close to if not better than actually playing the regular season.  It’s that good.

n Real Life: It might not sound like a lot, but having to work around a salary cap and also having to sign not only head coaches, but coordinators as well is a great thing. It brings a real-life feel to the game.

n Music: As much as actual music doesn’t work in NCAA, it works that well in Madden. There are still songs from games’ past that pop on the radio and my first thought is, “who’s playing Madden?”

 

Brad’s Madden Cons

n No Atmosphere: There is absolutely no home-field advantage in Madden. The crowd is at the same noise-level the entire game. Whether you’re up by 40 or stuck in a 3-point game in the final minute, you couldn’t tell by listening to the crowd. The place is dead and that sucks. It is the opposite of the college game.

n Super Bowl: You play all year to capture a world championship and then the celebration is over in a second and we’re off to next season. Where’s the celebration? I know EA Sports can do it; they did it with NHL back in the day. The last hockey game I played, the championship cut-scene was great. The players carried the Stanley Cup all over the ice and then all came together for a team photo. It was great and you really wanted to win the Cup just to see that cut-scene again. Madden can and should do something like it.

n Disgruntled Players: Madden has player profiles and one of the things in it is the player’s morale. It’s a great idea, but for the most part, every player has great morale. I wish that wasn’t the case. We all know some players hate their situation in the NFL; it would be great if that was played out in Madden. It would be great if a player tried to force a trade. It would add a new element.

James’ Pick: NCAA Football or Madden

To pick a winner out of the two is hard, because each game has it’s pros and cons as I listed. When I made my choice I broke it down to a few things, including which one I have more fun playing and that game is Madden. NCAA has the atmosphere, but Madden has the challenging gameplay and when I play a game I want to be challenged. Yet, this was a hard decision and I really do enjoy playing both games and I would recommend them to anyone who loves football.

Brad’s Pick: NCAA Football or Madden

In the battle for football video game supremacy, I don’t even now if I can come to a clear-cut conclusion and crown one winner. Both NCAA and Madden have its pros and cons and both can lay a claim as the greatest football franchise ever. Picking a one and only winner isn’t easy but I’ll solve the problem right here. My thought process is simple for naming the best of the best – if I could buy just one game next year, which one would it be? My answer, believe it or not is easy, and therefore I have the one and only game to walk away with the pigskin trophy. And that is NCAA Football.

The Winner

Brad and I seem to be split in our decision, so who actually wins between these two game franchises? For us, it’s obviously a draw. So, what do you think? Which one is better? Post your comments and vote in our poll at bradcarrollgameday.blogspot.com and you could find yourself in a future column.