NCAA March Madness 2005 (2004, PS2 Version)

[JohnBM01]

The previous NCAA March Madness game looked and played pretty dull. In fact, it was told to be the best college hoops game versus the offerings from 989 Sports and ESPN Videogames. Paying $29.99 (plus tax) will get you NCAA March Madness 2005, where you get to play teams from Air Force all the way to Youngstown State. If you follow college football, you'll see a whole slew of teams you may have never heard of. For example, University of Texas-San Antonio, Oakland (in Michigan), San Francisco, Campbell, La Salle, Lamar, Pacific, Gonzaga, and Marquette to name a few. The key feature of this installment is the Floor General. The Floor General brings football strategy in the sense of calling plays. You can still run the ball down the hardwood and pass to whomever you like, but it's more effective if you call a play beforehand. How does this college hoops game stand out?

PROS: Many, many universities to choose from; unlock classic teams and replay classic games; unlock a lot of gear such as shoes, headbands, socks, classic teams, and more; more realistic and more exciting action on court than the last game; Floor General can be highly effective in winning games; stylish menus; nice licensed songs redone by college bands; nicely detailed arenas and field houses; Arena Pulse can be quite deafaning- some arenas are worse than some college football stadiums! Just play at Duke University and you'll see what I mean

CONS: Requires over 7,751 KBs of your PS2 Memory Card to save everything; I don't really know, but you may not be able to create your own school, which is a BIG letdown because you would have been able to create your own team and completely customize their abilities. BIG disappointment; few glitches in 3D modelling on the court;

FINAL VERDICT: The biggest letdown is not being able to create your own school, other than that, the action is much better and much more intense than MM2004. Sell March Madness 2004 if you have it. This is a much better buy. (Score: 9.00/10.00)

 

[Calibretto]

dang, so your basically spending $20 to save everything for that game. That blows. but it sounds cool to create your own school.

 

[JohnBM01]

As an update on this thread, I noted that you don't seem to be able to create your own team. I come to learn that you indeed CANNOT make your own team. I think if EA Sports is going to make NCAA March Madness 2006, making your own team should be as in depth as its college football counterpart, NCAA Football 2005. I still think that NCAA March Madness 2005 is still a big improvement over March Madness 2004. I'll admit that as a football guy, I'm kind of hooked to college basketball with this game. You get teams you've probably heard of Division 1-A football colleges in this game such as Louisville, Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech, Washington, Houston, Auburn, LSU, Michigan, and Ohio State. You get teams you've probably heard of in Division 1-AA football such as Southern, Texas Southern, Tennessee Tech, Murray State, Cornell, Columbia, Brown, Maine, and such. What you may not have heard of are colleges and universities that do not have a known football team such as the University of San Francisco, the University of the Pacific, the University of Texas-San Antonio, Loyola Marymount, Lamar (university I used to attend), Detroit, Denver, Vermont, and one of the worst mascot names in history- the Camels of Campbell.

If you love college sports and want to see a few more colleges in America, look to all of the 300 or so teams in this game. But, there is no option to make your own team. Instead, you can edit the names of the teammates. And if you save your rosters, perhaps Brad Nessler will call your player by name. If the last name is common like Williams, Brown, Marshall, or whatever, you'll be called by last name instead of number ##. Well, that's all. Still a good game, but still wished I could create my own team.