'NCAA Football by EA Sports' Fumbles on 3rd Down

At first glance NCAA Football by EA Sports seemed very promising. Navigating through the initial team select screen pumped me up and I was ready to tackle somebody. But I found myself staring at a pretty basic setup which only included Season and Multiplayer (not counting Exhibition mode). This was a precursor to an overall experience that was as exciting as a field goal duel football game.

I went ahead and created a team based on my university and played a few matches, an experience that was most painful.  First off, I fully understand this app was developed for a mobile device and as such is not fully featured like its console counterpart. However, there is no excuse for the atrocious performance and controls. The player models are very primitive at best akin to stick-like figures. The frame rate drops often and makes the game difficult to follow when the ball is in the air and, no, it's not because I accidentally pressed the slo-mo feature. The slo-mo feature is available to help you get a better grasp on the situation when in those crucial 3rd down situations on either offense or defense. You control players by means of a virtual analog stick and several on screen touch buttons to switch between players, check your play art, and perform moves such as tackling, and swatting away balls. The controls are bad to the point I felt like I had no control over the game at all. There were those few moments, however, where I made a good pass to gain some yards on the play. The only good time I had was going through the playbook to choose a play.

All these things keep this game from being remotely good and, therefore, is hard to recommend. There are better apps out there to try out, so give those a try. You won't miss out on anything if you 'pass' on this app. AppPicker Rating: 2 / 5 Stars Pick It Up in the App Store: NCAA Football by EA Sports Other apps by Electronic Arts