Front Office Football: The College Years Review

Sports management games have never been given much of a chance in North America. Despite the European success story written by the beloved series of Championship Manager soccer simulations, publishers on this side of the pond won't give the genre the time of day. And while this prejudice might make some sense in light of soccer's continual failure to gain mainstream popularity in the States, it completely ignores a wave of recent games focusing on sports that Americans care about. Football, baseball, basketball, and hockey are all represented by an ever-improving crop of self-published titles that do a remarkable job of depicting the trials and tribulations of running a pro franchise. Perhaps the best current example of this is Front Office Football: The College Years. The latest addition to the award-winning line of pigskin management simulations from Solecismic Software is only be available online from its developer, but it's every bit as challenging and entertaining as you could expect.

The textual play-by-play and a dynamic scoreboard let you "watch" games.

A prequel of sorts to Front Office Football, which focused on the NFL, The College Years is a text-only management sim that lets you take the helm of one of 117 college football programs and guide it to the top of the rankings, all the while building your own reputation to the point where you might be offered more prestigious positions with other schools. Instead of dealing with fussy, spoiled pros and their big-money demands, you're now dealing with fussy, spoiled amateurs and their own particular set of quirks. These changes make a huge difference to how the game plays out, with the action at the stadium fading into the background because of pressing demands involving everything from scouting potential freshmen and hiring staff to making sure that your stars keep their grades up and maintain their eligibility. Your involvement in their virtual lives as a coach and surrogate parent is extraordinarily moving, creating a role-playing environment that's appealing even if you're not a football fan.

The heart of The College Years lies in its superb depiction of player recruiting. You'll spend more time with this aspect of the game than any other, poring over lists of top prospects from more than 14,000 high schools across the country. This list encompasses hundreds of small towns, giving the game a winning regional flavor that allows you to recognize local schools and perhaps even your own alma mater. During the lengthy downtime between games, you're provided with an allotment of 10 phone calls and eight visit requests with which to buzz attractive players and attempt to gauge their interest in your school. All are ranked in the initial viewing screen with a color-coding system that lets you separate those who might welcome your call from those likely to mutter a quick "No thanks" before hanging up. There are four colors denoting a player's eagerness to consider an offer: green, meaning "give me a call;" blue, meaning "I'll think about it;" red, meaning "Gee, thanks, but I've had my heart set on BYU for years;" and black, meaning "Buzz off, I'm waiting for Oklahoma."

Keep an eye on your players, or they might lose their eligibility.

The reactions when you do actually establish contact are diverse and realistic. Individual player preference is rated in all sorts of categories, so you're never really sure what sort of response you're going to receive. A local boy who favors distance over academics might have no problem settling for Bowling Green if that means he's just 30 miles from mom and dad. On the other hand, another local boy with his heart set on playing for the best football program in the country might be willing to move from one coast to the other. The same thing works in regard to academics. If your school doesn't measure up to the player's expectations in his chosen major, he may choose to ply his gridiron talents elsewhere. As an added note, it's good to see that Solecismic played academics for a few laughs. It's often not nearly as important to a player as he initially says it is, and many of the purported majors in the game are laugh-out-loud funny. Random number theory and jurisprudence are a couple of the highlights, along with slightly more down-to-earth options such as hotel management and computer game design.