News and notes from around the world of sports video gaming:
• The Associated Press and the USA Today Coaches' Poll won't send in their preseason ballots for another few weeks, but that hasn't stopped EA Sports from releasing its first poll—the preseason Top 25 of the 2012-2013 season in NCAA Football 13. This is the ranking the game will use in year one for all of its season-length modes—Dynasty, Road to Glory, and the new Heisman mode.
There are few surprises in the game's Top 25, fewer still in its top 10, led by defending national champion Alabama. It's worth noting these are not rankings based on the teams' personnel or attribute ratings. They're the game's (and its designers') best attempt to guess how the teams would be ranked in real life.
And while the game maintains the figleaf that they're not rating real players because their real names aren't used, roster composition does play a role. Last year, N.C. State was a preseason No. 23 primarily because quarterback Russell Wilson was still with the Wolfpack when the roster was set on April 30. He later transferred to Wisconsin.
Anyway, the top 5 are: 'Bama, USC, LSU, Oregon and Oklahoma. The SEC put four more in the top 25. You can see them all at the link. [EA Sports]
• Sometimes a sports trailer makes the most obvious things seem more profound to me.This one is of Claude Giroux, the recently crowned cover star for NHL 13. It features the Flyers star in action in the upcoming game, so enjoy. But I never really noticed the ads on the boards before. This is not new—it looks like this package has been in the game since NHL 11. But still—no Knobby Tires. No Synthetic. No Colossus Burgers (the fake billboards seen in Madden and NCAA, made at a different EA Sports studio.) Must be some sort of deal cut with the league, because stadium signage in all other simulation games are on a sponsor-by-sponsor basis. The Coke bottle slide in left field at AT&T Park had to be made to look like something else in MLB 2K12.