Review: AP Top25 College Football 2008
by Jeff Noble
September 16, 2008
Overview
AP Top25 College 2008 was one of the first apps in the endzone this fall. Since then, it's been followed by a plethora of other contenders, many of them free. However, it offers some stunning graphics and fun features that may make a nice "option" for your gameplan.
Functionality
First of all, AP Top25 is visually appealing. It will be sure to draw crowds. It's really stunning.
Second of all, it's got some nice features. which include an app flow chart of the Top 25 teams, game photos, and a chart of a team's season performance, game recaps, and more.
Loading up the app brings you to the current weeks' Top 25 teams in an app-flow-like design. It's really an attractive interface. You can drag your way through the top 25, and clicking on a team's box brings up the performance graph for that team, including the results of their last game.
You can then click on any of the dots in the graph to get information about other games. You'll have the cool option of reading a recap of the game written by an AP Sports Writer and viewing some highlight photos for that particular game.
From the main screen, you can also click on "Podcast" and hear the current week's AP News report on the top 25 teams and other news.
The information button on the main screen gives you the background of the AP Top 25 poll, how it works and the participating sports writers that comprise the poll with their affiliation.
Review
One tradeoff for the graphical eye-candy appears to be speed. It takes the app a while to load, and at times, there is a delay in moving from the app flow screen to other screens. Since the 2.1 update, I've not had any crashes of the app, but it consistently crashed with 2.0.2.
It needs to be more useable. But once it's up and running, it's very nice. For the money, I wish you could access player stats, school information and more. Other (free) apps offer these features, but they also don't have the visual appeal that this app does. For what it's worth though, I think most football fans prefer getting into the game rather than admiring the uniforms, so unless this app updates some of its features, its prettiness may be its demise.
Summary
You'll be impressed with the look of AP Top25 College Football 2008 - for a while. The serious fan will want more than what it currently offers. However, it has some attractive features and especially for the game recaps, it's probably worth the $1 you'll pay for it. More than likely, you'll supplement your purchase with either Sportacular or Scoremobile for the stats.
