Remember the Playoff option? Old Defunct Features in NCAA Football - RaychelSnr's Blog

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RaychelSnr's Blog

Remember the Playoff option? Old Defunct Features in NCAA Football Stuck

Posted on January 18, 2013 at 06:30 PM.

(21)

Remember the magic of NCAA Football 2001?

If your thinking cap is on, you will remember that the very last game to step foot on the PS One in the NCAA Football series had a very unique feature: the ability to nix all bowls at the end of the season and settle things with an old fashioned playoff.

To me, this was one of the coolest old features in the game, as I remember epic struggles while fighting through a bracket of powerhouses while vying for a National Championship.

There was my 2005 Alabama Crimson Tide, I had brought the Tide back to respect and after a successful undefeated regular season (11-0), we had the playoffs. First there was the Rice Owls. How Rice became good, I'll never know. But there they were and there they went in a blowout. I remember the quarterfinals featuring a matchup against UCLA. Another blowout win.

Piece of cake.

Then things got serious. A rematch of my SEC Title tilt against Tennessee. I remember vanquishing the Vols by a score of 30-10 in that earlier matchup, preserved thanks in part to finding an old notebook which inspired this whole story. The semifinals game was a bit different. I remember frantically driving down the field with the seconds ticking down to kick a field goal to win the game. I have it scribbled down in my notebook and double underlined, 23-21. I'm pretty certain that I was down 21-10 at the start of the fourth quarter...so I must've been happy in my young age.

The National Championship featured a game that was rather pedestrian. I beat the Miami Hurricanes of the Big East conference (my how things have changed) 35-7.

I miss the playoffs feature.

There is a big part of me that wishes I could go back and play NCAA Football 2001 just to experience the thrill of playing through a bracket again at the end of the season.

With the absence of NCAA Basketball games, I can't even do that for any of my Alma Mater's sports. A shame indeed.

But most of all, I do miss the playoff feature of the PS One days. That is a feature I sorely wish we could bring back. Reality is overrated sometimes anyways.

What is your favorite old (and now defunct) feature of the NCAA Football series?

Comments

# 1 biggiejerseys @ Jan 18

Man I would love to see the return of the FCS teams and the ability for mid-major teams to get an invite to a BCS conference.

# 2 MAGboyswifT27 @ Jan 18

Funny you bring this up because I've been thinking about all the great things that used to be in the old NCAA Football games! This is one of those features that I miss! Wishful thinking and nostalgia makes us as fans of the franchise hope that one day NCAA Football games will be fun and innovative again..

# 3 BreaksoftheGame @ Jan 18

I wish games would think outside of simply replicating their "license". For instance old school offenses in EA football games would give me hours of enjoyment....or a play creator which used to be a feature in football games.....and Choops 2k8.

Playoffs would be great for the current game. How about create a division so we could replicate division II and III playoffs etc....

Innovation is sorely lacking with the EA brand.

# 4 scottyo60 @ Jan 18

I loved that feature. Of course being 12 or so my full cheese was in effect with Miami... Man video games just are not the same.

# 5 RandyBass @ Jan 18

This blog entry angers me.

# 6 DJ @ Jan 18

To bad we can't go back and play those games. Feel too dated now. Love the playoff feature and yes, it has been sorely missing from NCAA Football.

# 7 jyoung @ Jan 18

The playoff option in EA's NCAA Football series actually dates all the way back to College Football USA 96 on the Sega Genesis. It carried over as an option into the PS1 NCAA games, then once EA made the switch to PS2, the playoff option disappeared from their NCAA games and has never returned.

# 8 Cardot @ Jan 19

As goofy as it was, I was kind of bummed when they removed Celebrate with the Mascot. I was also disappointed when team specific entrances didn't make it to the new gen...until of course it came back in '12 as a "New" feature.

# 9 kingsofthevalley @ Jan 19

My favorite old and now defunct feature would definitely be player weight/momentum. Haven't seen that since the PS2 todays. Well, there's a semblance of it in current gen 08 versions.

# 10 Bolt957 @ Jan 19

I gotta admit, I still fire up my PS2 from time to time just to pop in NCAA 2000 and do the playoff system. I miss it so much

# 11 malky @ Jan 19

Well hopefully they put in the playoff option a year early than is required but I'm not holding my breath

# 12 Deetrain1040 @ Jan 19

I cannot remember what version or which console, but i enjoyed the NCAA sanctions the game levied on you for recruiting violations, and not disciplining your players hard enough for various team violations. That was fun.

# 13 cusefan74 @ Jan 19

Quote:


	I cannot remember what version or which console, but i enjoyed the NCAA sanctions the game levied on you for recruiting violations, and not disciplining your players hard enough for various team violations. That was fun.

I agree that was fun. I also miss the playoffs in the game. There is no reason that we can't have that again, but as we all know, they love to take features out that people really enjoy.

# 14 Retropyro @ Jan 19

I really do miss the sanctions. Having to setup the right discipline for a players problems. Go too hard and you use up all the discipline points for that season and you may not have enough for something really serious. Go too easy and find yourself with a bowl ban.

# 15 acarrero @ Jan 20

Well that would be the first and only time Bama has defeated Rice. Owls undefeated vs Tide in real life, including at least one big bowl win (Sugar Bowl) back in the day.