There's a discussion on the forums every year about what difficulty level is the best one to play on -- there's no right answer since it comes down to the individual. It's a matter of preference: does he or she want to tweak the sliders on the All-American level to get a challenge, or deal with the seemingly tweaked-out computer players on Heisman level? Perhaps this decision would be made easier if the CPU limited its own negative plays. I say this because if you've played a lot of NCAA football over the years, you know there's one simple change that would really improve the computer's ability to sustain drives: figuring out a way to limit the negative passing plays to the running back.

Let me give a recent example. Actually, the game is paused right now and it literally just happened.  

Missouri, my opponent, received the kickoff to start the game. On the team's first play from scrimmage the offense had a 12-yard run against my dime defense. Nice.

The offense then completed a couple of quick passes for seven and nine yards respectively. First down number two, ball on my 48-yard line. Looks like I could be in trouble.

Next play, the QB hands off to the running back who breaks a tackle and goes 15 yards to the 33-yard line. At this point it appears I'm hemorrhaging yards and the CPU looks unstoppable on this drive. But I have a secret weapon that I'm about to deploy without even trying: the negative yardage pass to the running back.

The next two passes turn out to be swing passes to the running back on the short side of the field. The plays were nearly identical, and each lost three yards. Now the computer faces a third down and 16-to-go play in which the conversion rate is typically going to be very low, and right on queue the QB throws an incompletion. To boot, the team is out of field goal range so the punt team comes on to the field.

And, the most interesting part of the whole drive was my defense never was forced to make a play until third and long, when our coverage played well. What a way to go!

NCAA Football's AI Can best be described as backwards at times

Now, this isn't to say that there haven't been improvements to the swing pass or even the way the computer uses it. The running back typically will break up the field at the sideline and this can be a great weapon for the CPU -- especially to the short side -- at certain times.

Still, this whole situation should not be overlooked because for years and years it's been one of the biggest reasons why the NCAA AI isn't quite as competitive as it should be on the All-American level. Stalled drives are fine, but they should be accomplished with penalties and inaccurate passes (as they often are now) rather than due to something that affects only the computer.

The CPU should consider flipping the play if it might need the runner as an outlet, or have the route turn up the field more quickly, or have the CPU passer avoid the routes that are likely to go out of bounds, as a real player would do.

Any way you look at it, fixing this somewhat vexing problem would be a great way to increase the competency and difficulty of the computer AI.