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[DMczaf]

http://www.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=412834

The biggest change to recruiting in the latest version of the game will be the addition of in-season recruiting. Users will now recruit high school prospects during the season, which will include official visits on the weekends of home games or bye weeks.

Users will begin to target players during the summer and then develop a recruiting strategy, determining the number of points they'd be willing to devote to each prospect. Bonus points will be awarded for having official visitors in for big home victories, with added points being awarded for a win against a major rival, helping users in their efforts to secure commitments from the top prospects.

Each prospect will start with interest in eight schools before limiting his list to five schools and then ultimately three. Prospects also can make "soft verbals" to schools, but then they still have the option to change their mind should they not continue to be actively recruited by that school.

As prospects begin limiting their choices, headlines reflecting those decisions will be generated, just as can be seen daily on Rivals.com throughout the year

Changes also have been made to offseason recruiting, where a school's academic reputation will play a factor in recruiting. Certain prospects will place a higher value on academics, making it difficult for some institutions to make the cut for those players' services.

Schools also run the risk of seeing their academic reputation slip if they only recruit the most talented players available, and there will be prospects who ultimately won't qualify academically. These are added features that make recruiting strategy a bigger part of the game.

Additionally, the ability to create recruiting pipelines has been established, enabling a school to increase its likelihood of recruiting success in areas where it has fared well in the past.

The "Race for the Heisman" mode is among the biggest changes. The game begins with a user picking a position for a potential college standout and then navigating that player through a series of drills to determine their ranking as a college prospect.

The player then gets recruited by various schools. But do not fear, if the player's favorite school does not recruit him, he always has the option to walk on at that school.

From there, that player will head off to school as a freshman, complete with a dorm room assignment. His career path will take off from there, guided by the user with the hope of that player becoming one of the top players in college football before the end of his career.

A major change in gameplay is the Impact Player system, a new feature that allows each team to have a couple of players who will have the ability to make big plays in crucial situations. Those players, at certain times in the game where they would be expected to excel, will get a ratings boost that will allow them to deliver in the clutch.

Also improved this year are the game's presentation, which includes an ESPN-like studio, complete with hosts Brad Nessler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit.

Additionally, gang tackling was added, on-field mismatches will be easier to identify and the ball physics of the game have been dramatically improved to a more realistic look.

And with all of these updates, will WRs catch wide open lobs?! Stay tuned!

 

[Revolver]

Also improved this year are the game's presentation, which includes an ESPN-like studio, complete with hosts Brad Nessler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit.

I don't really care to see any more animated hosts in my sports games, but I sure hope they do a better job with the lipsyncing than VC did.

 

[Dsal]

Call me nuts but I think the enhanced recruiting thing can be really fun if done right. As long as there's strategy to it and you can make decisions based on information your scouts find out instead of it just being luck-based.

But yeah, first things first, if people could catch the ball that'd be great.