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This is the fourth part in a series looking at the NCAA Football franchise as we enter the seventh year of NCAA Football on the next-gen consoles with the release of NCAA Football 12.

NCAA Football 10 hit store shelves in July of 2009. From the initial press release forward, EA SPORTS promoted one of the game’s big new features, Season Showdown. This feature was a meta-competition that spanned the length of the college football season, allowing fans of each FBS program to compete against each other by earning credits based upon game skills, trivia, and more. While it was met with great resistance from some in the core community for - in their opinion - diverting resources from gameplay improvement, the feature did reward credits for Skills, Strategy, and Sportsmanship. With the Season Showdown ID Card displaying credit levels in online lobbies, these helped to create a basis for determining the style of play for a random user – provided they signed up for the optional Season Showdown feature. ...

First, an introduction. For anyone that does not follow me or The Gaming Tailgate regularly, my name is Tommy and have always gone by the name gschwendt across many different message boards and sites. I've been playing the NCAA Football series since NCAA 2003 and I've ran a league/Online Dynasty that has been running since NCAA 2004. I play true-to-sim style football and utilize a mix of everything from pro-style, shotgun spread option, and air raid style offenses with a sprinkling of under center triple option... just depends on what I feel like running that day. Defensively, I love disguising coverages so I also love to utilize the 3-3-5 and 4-2-5 defenses whenever I can or just stick with the good-old 4-3 defense. I mostly play Online Dynasty mode because I love building up my own team and am currently participating in 3 different ODs using varying levels of teams (Arkansas State, Miami FL, and Oklahoma).

I say all of that because if you don't know me, I want to at least give you some insight as to where I come from so you can see where my focus is while I'm down at EA Tiburon during community events. Along those lines, they bring in guys from all over, with all kinds of different perspectives, and all kinds of different focuses on the same game we all play so that in the end, we can help influence the game as much as possible to improve upon it from year to year. In this write-up, I'll cover my impressions from my time with the game last week. This will only include information that EA has already released but largely focus on the Gameplay side of things.
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The third episode of the Official EA SPORTS NCAA Football Podcast is now available. The primary area of focus is additional gameplay coverage and follow-up questions from the community.

Continue on to view a quick recap of the show. Then after listening, share your thoughts with the community. ...

Tuesday afternoon, EA SPORTS held their NCAA Football 13 Gameplay Webcast in which they announced gameplay features and improvements coming to the game.

Among the areas of focus to gameplay in NCAA Football 13 are a new Total Control Passing Mechanic (including new pass trajectories), a new catching system (including 430+ new catch animations), Read & React Defensive AI, improved punt coverage and return formations, as well as option, playcalling, and custom playbook improvements, among other changes.

Continue on to view the LiveStream archive of the event, a detailed list of announced Gameplay improvements, links to media articles and blogs discussing the improvements, and also thoughts from fellow community members. ...

Announced on Monday's Dan Patrick Show, Barry Sanders has won the 'My Heisman' tournament and will join Robert Griffin III on the cover of NCAA Football 13.

The other Heisman Trophy winners in the voting bracket included: Marcus Allen, Doug Flutie, Eddie George, Desmond Howard, Herschel Walker, Charlie Ward, and Andre Ware. Sanders and the other Heisman winners are expected to be part of the 'Heisman Challenge' mode, which will be detailed May 30:

There are familiar faces on the field in NCAA Football 13, which now features a selection of former Heisman Trophy winners. With the new Heisman Challenge mode, fans have the ability to utilize the skill set of a legendary Heisman Trophy winner in a quest to match his award-winning historical performances and win the Heisman trophy once again. ...

According to a recent article from Game Informer that covered much of the same information we'd heard previously on Sights and Sounds, it appears as though that the NCAA Football 13 development is looking at ways to deliver uniforms to the game throughout the year. Here's a quote from the article:

"Schools use of multiple alternate uniforms (like Nike's Pro Combat unis) are great for the fans, but it creates a moving target for EA Tiburon as it attempts to keep up with an unveiling process shrouded in secrecy by the schools. Although the day-one disc includes some of the alternate uniforms being used in the upcoming season, the development team is still considering the right way to deliver the unannounced jerseys. EA wouldn't clarify whether it plans to sell these as paid-DLC or release them via free updates."

Last year saw a multitude of teams that released new uniforms throughout the season. As pictured above, Maryland surprised everyone with their 'Pride' uniform in week 1. Then, tradition-rich Notre Dame and Michigan, both of whom hadn't updated their helmets in many years, each unveiled new uniforms for their "under-the-lights" matchup. In all of these cases, fans were asking "when can I use those in the game?" and they never received an answer for NCAA Football 12. However it sounds as though EA is working to change that in some manner.

Time will tell how they plan to deliver this and as well what exactly might be updated. What do you think of the idea? Would you pay for uniforms that are unveiled by the schools after the game is launched?
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On last night's GTTV, the show provided the first gameplay information for NCAA Football 13. With a combination of game footage and narration from gameplay designer (and former Florida QB) Larry Richart, first word of improvements to the passing game were revealed.

- There was essentially one type of pass in past, now 25 different trajectories.
- This includes the ability to pass over linebackers and users can lead the pass with the left stick for added control
- There are 20+ new drop backs, based upon proper dropbacks depending on the routes in the play.
- QBs can throw on run without setting up, but throws are more difficult across their body.
- Icons dim at snap, lit up when receivers able to make the catch.
- No more psychic defensive backs.
- Both offensive and defensive players "have to see it before they can make a play on the ball."

Check out the clip here on the GameTrailers website or continue on after the link to see the embedded video. ...

The second episode of EA SPORTS NCAA Football 13 podcast is now available. This episode features host AJ, Community Manager Justin Dewiel, and developers Ben Haumiller and Christian McLeod. In it, they'll help break down some of the news from this week as well as answer questions that were posted at various community sites including The Gaming Tailgate. Continue after the break to listen to the podcast. ...

Today, the EA SPORTS NCAA Football development team streamed the first look at NCAA Football 13 with their Sights and Sounds webcast. If you missed it you can watch the broadcast here via livestream as well as it's embedded after the break. They have also now given us two blogs: one via paakaa10 and one via developer Christian McLeod discussing the audio portions of the game to go along with some of the screenshots seen during today's presentation. Continue after the break to watch the video, see the pictures, and read the blogs from today's news as well as a link to the webcast for those that missed it.

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