he roar of the crowd, the linebacker eyeing you from the other side of scrimmage; few things equal the intensity and experience that is college football.  For years, qualities such as these have sometimes been the hardest things to recreate in college football games.  But EA has managed to pretty much change all of that with their wildly popular NCAA Football series, by first adding an expansive Dynasty Mode and then the unique Stadium Pulse feature that lets you pump up your crowd and rattle your opponents.  For their 2006 installment in the series, EA is shooting for even more new gameplay and from what I’ve played so far, they could just end up hitting the nail right on the head.

While NCAA Football 2006 contains the requisite football offerings, such as the ability to play online, practice training drills, and set up a rival or mascot game, the title adds into the mix the hugely ambitious new Race for the Heisman mode.  This new mode aims to take players throughout the entire process of becoming a college football star, from the lowly high school graduate to the four year superstar bound for the NFL.  But the real question is, however, does it work?

When you fire up the game for the first time, you’ll be immediately taken to the Race for the Heisman mode where you’ll create a unique player and a position for him to play.  After the selection process you’ll play through some short training games.  Keep in mind, however, the training just isn’t for fun.  In the stands are college scouts and depending on how well you perform during your drills dictates which college will end up becoming interested in you.  At the conclusion of your training you’ll be shown a list of schools that want you to become part of their football program.  You’re in no way obligated to sign a letter of intent with any particular school, and if none of your favorites show any interest, you can simply choose to walk-on to the school of your choosing.

The Impact Stick helps make jukes much easier to execute

With high school now under your belt, it’s time to get down with college football.  Being a lowly freshman, you don’t start off your college career exactly at the top of your game.  Funniy enough, you actually start it all off in your Dorm.  The Dorm, besides being a hovel of a place, serves as your main hub of operations.  There you can read Fan Mail, check out and play games in your schedule, follow your team’s failures and successes in the school newsletter, view awards and trophies that you’ve accumulated during your career, view your players personal information and stats, review team stats, and improve your game by taking part in practice drills.  Besides being the catch all area from which all other events branch, the Dorm is also the main location to view how you’re faring in the hunt for the Heisman trophy.  The “Heisman Hype” on-screen meter keeps you constantly updated with just how well you’re faring towards getting the award.  But needless to say, it’ll take quite some time to really get the hype to an important level.  After all, you’re just a freshman, you loser!

The only real way to assert your power on the old gridiron is to perform well.  This comes in the form of playing games.  Since I picked a quarterback as my player position, I found it pretty easy to keep the spotlight on him.  As you play through and either win or lose games, your stats will start to affect your Heisman chances.  But just completing passes and scoring touchdowns won’t net you the award.  You’ll need to carefully balance all aspects of your game, from completing passes, touchdowns, composure, and win/loss record.  Mixing up your throws to different positions will also positively affect your player’s chances of netting the Heisman, so it’s always in your best interest to spread the love around the field rather than just focus on one key player.

Stadiums and character models have gotten a visual makeover

But, if you do choose to focus on one particular player, you will notice some new benefits.  Making their debut in this year’s installment are Impact Players, special players that have the ability and drive to change the entire face of a game.  Each school comes complete with three Impact Players; one offensive, one defensive, and one randomized player that can be either offensive or defensive.  The key to successfully using your Impact Player is either getting him the ball or getting him involved in big plays.  Say your offensive Impact Player is your wide receiver.  While playing you’ll notice that his character has a special white indicator at his feet.  The more you feed him passes, the more the indicator will increase in size.  If you keep getting him big plays, he’ll eventually go into the “zone,” where he’s capable of pulling off flashy plays and other notable feats.  When you do pull off a fancy play, the game utilizes a special Impact camera to let you revel in the glory of making your opponents look like a rag tag team of JV scrubs.

To go along with the new emphasis on the word Impact (we kid!), you’ll be able to utilize the new Impact Stick, which in laymen’s terms is also known as the right analog stick.  The Impact Stick is the tool with which you can pull off power moves and left, right, and back jukes.  If you’re playing defense, you can use the Impact Stick to lay out particularly devastating hits to an offensive player, much like the Hit Stick in Madden NFL.  But like in that game, the Impact Stick comes with a price, and missing an opponent with a big hit virtually leaves that player out the rest of the player since it takes so much time to recover from using it.

If you ever feel that the man lining up against you on the line of scrimmage is in over his head, he you can use the Match-Up Stick to compare composure ratings.  Using the right analog stick you can zero in on any mismatches may be on the field.  Pressing the analog stick up will expose mismatches between the offensive and defensive line, pressing left will show mismatches between receivers and the defensive secondary, and pressing down will display any imbalances between the offensive backfield and your linebackers.  To give you even more data, the composure system utilizes a color-coded icon system that shows just how rattled a player may be.  Green indicates a player with good composer while red displays a player who would probably rather be in the arms of his momma than on the field.  This really proves helpful when you’re trying to get your Impact Player some big plays, since going up against a player with low composure will usually result in a barnstorming performance for you.  To take advantage of this, you’ll still be able to use the Stadium Pulse system, which lets you pump up your home crowd.  The more the crowd is pumped up, the more they cheer (complete with shaking screen).  This has a tremendous effect on opposing players, especially those with low composure.

Moves like this help get Impact Players "in the zone"

While the game does feature some other new modes, such as a relatively deeper Dynasty Mode, the ability to create your own school, and the all-new Spring Drills (which let you take part in some practice drills to hone your skills even more), it’s pretty obvious that the main focus of NCAA Football 2006 is the new Race for the Heisman mode.  But, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.  College football fans have been asking for this sort of thing for quite some time. True, Dynasty Mode lets you get in the coaching seat and take a team through to the national championship, but the Race for the Heisman mode finally gives you the chance to really experience that kind of thing from a player’s perspective.  While it may not be for everyone, it certainly offers up enough compelling gameplay to keep football fans extremely happy.

From a visual standpoint, EA has managed to graphically overhaul the college football experience, from player models to turf textures and stadium designs.  As such, the game exudes a higher degree of realism at pretty much every turn.  But, there are still some visual anomalies; players still look robotic in their animations, the players’ eyes seem to have no life behind them, and the pre-game commentary character models are quite a bit less than perfect.  But compared to last year’s game, the visuals in NCAA Football 2006 are definitely a step in the right direction.

From an audio standpoint, the game brings you exactly what you would expect: thunderous crowds, bone-crunching hits, and colorful commentary.  The Stadium Pulse feature will rattle your bones if you have the volume turned way up, and I like the way Brad Nessler, Kirk Herbstreit, and Lee Corso deliver their humorous commentary before the kick-off.  Musically, EA once again taps into their massive vault of EA Trax, so you’ll be able to get an earful of some colorful contemporary music tracks. 

Overall NCAA Football 2006 offers up a pretty impressive range of new features for all you college football fans.  The new Race for the Heisman mode gives you a great opportunity to get a feel for the game from a player perspective, while the rest of the different modes compliment the new additions.  The lure of online play for both the PS2 and Xbox only sweeten the deal.  Whether you’re a fourth year superstar or just a walk-on nobody, NCAA Football 2006 should provide more than enough football goodness to keep you busy until next fall.