NCAA Football 2003: An amazing game that is completely marred by TERRIBLE A.I.
FeiFongWong
80% score
First of all, I must admit, I'm a pure-blooded Nebraskan. Anyone who is remotely a football fan knows that we're bred on the sport here, and I even WAITED until EA Games cooked up the Option game. Well, I got it. I'm disappointed, and pleased at the same time. You see, the graphics and sound are terrific, regardless of the occasional slowdown and polygon clashes. The system is grade A material. Never has the college football "system" worked so realistic, as well as the diverse play types (the Option is superbly translated). With that said, let it be known I would have given this a 5.0 were it without the ABSOLUTELY terrible A.I. Simply put, it's cheap. Darn cheap. Even on the lower difficulties, you'll see the computer backing up when you pass in I Form, call a run audible, they automatically scoot up and over to the right side. No fooling them. "Miracle drives" are frequent. Fumbles on your part seem to greatly outnumber the computer's, even when you're ranked #1. It just feels like the game works in their favor 100% of the time. You may call that "evening it out," but I just call it poor programming. What could have been something beautiful seems unsatisfying and frustrating. A worthy purchase, but expect to yell at the screen frequently. #1 Clemson (9-0): 35 DUKE (0-10): 38 I rest my case.
