I've been playing this series for several years now and have wanted to love it from the start. We need a game like this and this is the best I've seen since PS2. That said, it's been plagued with bugs, has been crash-prone, is slightly clunky, and there are issues with both executing your actions and with knowing what action you're even able to take.

Let's talk crashes first. This version feels way more stable to me. The previous versions were so crash prone that I'd regularly just give up on my entire campaign, hoping for more stability next year. I'm about two years into a campaign this time around and have only crashed once. Basically, I hit 'sim games' after I'd already made it to the end of the season. I didn't entirely know I was at the end of the season so it wasn't totally clear why that button was there. Upon clicking it, I got an unhandled exception for an out of range value (likely indicating something with the lists/array handling on the back-end not having a plan in place for dealing with this. Overall, I'd stay stability is hi now.

User interface issues and the general interaction with the user are still somewhat problematic. 'advance' is the primary way you move through time in the off season. Advancing doesn't occur at regular intervals (which is fine) but clicking advance doesn't always lock in your decisions. During the buying of game reports, for instance, I toggled the report I wanted, left the screen, returned, and it was untoggled. Does that mean that it is saved but not displayed or does returning to that screen mean I've 'undid' my choice. Regardless, I toggled my choices again, hit advance. No reports. Maybe that's user error. But that is what I'm reviewing here... Not all of these things are intuitive.

The sim games mechanic is another odd one. You can move to certain weeks, but clicking sim at this point doesn't initiate a sim to that date, it just takes you to another screen where you have to select how far you want to sim. If you choose sim to date, you don't immediately start simming, you just land back on the game view page.

Other UI and interface issues. When you get information about a recruit, it never lists their position, location, or other info that might help keeping them all straight as you're reading through tons of emails. The phone list doesn't sort by amount of interest, it's just alphabetical, meaning I often have to go back to the previous screen to remember what that PF's name was. The drop down notifications fall on the right hand side of the screen, covering up may buttons I need to press. I just have to wait for them to clear before going on with my business. On the recruits page, you can't select multiple players at once, the list options are somewhat limited, and in universe mode, the game doesn't store last filters based on team, but rather overall. So my Florida State headcoach often lands at a screen showing all 2 star recruits from Idaho when it's not relevant to him and takes annoying time to repopulate all the filters for each manager each time. Having to go back to the commissioner page to advance is also frustrating and time consuming. There ought to be a central manager that can track whether each team has taken their actions allowing you to advance from any team's page.

The autosaves also occur at odd and inconsistent times. There are few, if any autosaves during the off-season and recruiting periods despite the fact that I've likely done a ton of work and fear losing it. The autosaves appear to occur most during the season, but not after significant sporting events. It ought to auto save based on how the player is playing. Everyone month, certainly. Every week during the off season absolutely. Every time a recruit signs with you. At the end of the regular season. At the end of the conference tournaments (or after each round of the conference tournament) and same for post season.

There are lots of other small annoyances. I can't tell how to switch my coach's roles, there aren't enough options when phone calling to pitch to a particular domain (must wait for in home visits, which should allow multifocus), and so on.

The universe mode is a massive improvement from past years. The mods are easy to load. The overall bones of the game are solid. And, the annoyances decrease every year.

Basically, this is a good, but clunky game from a small studio that probably makes too many games, doesn't do quite enough bug testing and fixing, but still improves every year delivering a niche product in an underattended to area of sports management games. I believe we should keep buying and playing this to support their team, but it would be great if they would begin to better support the game through obviously needed bug fixes and interface improvements.

I honestly have mixed reviews over this game. The game overall is very good except for the in game simulation itself. First thing I noticed was my team was fouling a lot, so I created more leagues and did testing. I created a total of 23 leagues to test this over 49 games. On 47 of those games, my team committed over 30 fouls. Whether things like defensive intensity was at max or at minimum, my team just seemed to always foul.

Another thing I noticed was the box you can check to shoot 3s. About halfway through game testing about fouling, I noticed that that box was not working anymore. I checked it through about 20 games, and 18 of those games it didn't respond, as my team kept shooting in the mid range or the paint. I hope the game simulation system is just bugged or something, because it really sucks that no matter what I do, the simulation keeps screwing me over.

This is a perfect game for that NCAA Basketball SIM Itch. Great Game Gary and I really love the interface, very easy to navigate around. The Depth Chart matrix is easier to set and the SIM engine is giving great results as always. I like the ability to choose Brutal for recruiting toughness, I always thought it was easy in the other version but not anymore. Anyone wanting a realistic and challenging NCAA basketball SIM is version is about perfect.

What a wonderful game ... if you enjoy watching your game load and nothing happening. I finished my first season, was setting summer travel plans and recruits. Game says this will take longer than usual but ... 7 hours later, the game was still initializing. I enjoy playing games not watching a little buffer wheel spinning for hours on end.
Started the second half of a game playing man to man defense. 5 seconds into the second half, foul...10 seconds later, foul...22 seconds later, foul. I selected to change to a zone defense after the first foul but the game would not allow it until after a possession change. BTW... my defensive intensity was set to minimum, yet still foul after foul is called. There is an option to work the referee. I pressed that button one time and get a technical called against me, almost cost me a game.
So much more I could say ... lets just say, I was really expecting more from this game. A big let down

TL;DR: While this game still carries some of the flaws of previous games, it is definitely the most stable and promising release yet. If you love college basketball and need something to get through the offseason, this game definitely scratches that itch and is the only CBB simulation game at this level of depth and replayability. 7.5/10 (Very Good)

I've played DDSCB since the 2018 version of the game as I was bored with the then 8 year old Fast Break College Basketball 2, which as a whole was very bland and had a dead community. I enjoyed the game, but the UI and game systems were unattractive and super buggy, and I lost my most-played save to corruption and bugs multiple times.

Since then, the series has undergone some massive improvements, starting with the UI. Last year's UI got a complete overhaul, and this year's edition makes it even better. It still needs some touching up in small areas, but overall the game looks great on all of your most visited pages.

Recruiting looks a lot better than it did last year. The only section of the UI I felt was lacking in last year's overhaul was recruiting, and all of my major issues have been resolved on the UI side of things. However, the recruiting page is definitely the slowest page in the whole game; even on my page of the ~30 recruits I have on my list, it still loads like it processes all of the several thousand recruits when I click out of their page. Doesn't take more than a few seconds, but you definitely notice it when you spend 90% of the offseason in the recruiting page.

Another major area of improvement is on the statistical side of things. Polls feel a lot more real than they ever have. In this edition you will shoot up into the top 10 if you beat several top teams in a row at the start of the season - even if you were predicted to be the worst team in the country. Previous games had a lot of issues with positive poll inertia and it was hard to rise up even with that big win you wanted. Poll inertia after a losing streak still needs some work, but overall it has a much improved feel.

NET has also been added to the game which I think is one of the major reasons polls feel more realistic. It has replaced the RPI which was in the 2020 edition of the game and every previous version, despite being outdated by about 15 years. The team sheet page added in the "insights" page is awesome. I do wish there was a kenpom-esque advanced stats system in the game, and then the insights page would be perfect.

The game simulation is much improved over past iterations. While it definitely could use some work on the depth side of things, it finally feels like the things I can control matter. Changing defensive systems mid game changes how the game is played in a much more impactful manner (going from a 2-2-1 press to a man-to-man press slows the game down if you are a pressing team, for example). Homecourt advantage is significantly reduced so your top 10 team doesn't lose to the bottom-50 ranked team you play on the road. These upsets are still possible, but you no longer have to consistently worry about simming through a road game where your team is leagues ahead of the opponent. Not only that, but the speed at which the game sims is definitely faster, and it is DEFINITELY faster as you get deeper into a career. These improvements lead to an overall more pleasant experience, as you can faster sim through seasons that you might consider a write-off, or just spend more time coaching in-game.

To add to the improvements, the community on the WS forums is pretty active and great. Download realism mods to get logos, courts, and IRL coaches, etc. However the biggest flaw of the game is an inability to edit rosters or players, as I have never seen a mod with real life rosters attached since IIRC the game just generates random players at the creation of every league.

There are definitely many areas of the game that can be improved, and I will probably be posting my suggestions to the forums all summer. That said, this is definitely the best version of DDSCBB ever made and I am very please with it! Money well spent.

Love this game!! Get the RealMod, it makes it much better

I have played around with earlier versions of this game (2018 was the last) and always like the game in general but never really played it to it's full potential. I decided to upgrade to the 2021 version and give it another go and although the game is fundamentally the same game, it has undergone some nice improvements through the years.

This time, I am thoroughly enjoying this game and have gone through multiple seasons, finally landing my dream job, and doing my best to bring the team from the bottom to the top.

This game is well done and can be very rewarding once you learn to navigate the recruiting process. I highly recommend this for any College Basketball fan that is looking for a good simulation game on PC.

I like it for the most, 3/5 stars. My only gripe is it's literally impossible to get dinky teams prestige up. I won 5 conference championships, went to the sweet 16 twice all in same 5 years. Next year I get to the finals of the championship and lose. I check my prestige, and the 5 points I worked so hard for are gone and I lose another 5 points... The penalty needs to be way less brutal on small schools, or more than 1 point of prestige rewarded when you take a team ranked 2 from the bottom in the entire game and take them to the sweet 16 twice, and 5 conference championships I should get bumped quite a bit up yet now I'm worse than when I took over the team... Huuuge flaw in the game! I don't go for the big dog teams when I play these types of games, whats the point? I've always liked underdog teams and a challenge, and I did my part to put an unknown school on the map, but in the game they aren't... there is no reward for my hard work, it's almost turned me completely off from continuing to play it. I know people will just say take jobs with higher prestige teams and work your way up, I don't want to. I want to take a Cinderella team and turn them into a contender every year, like VCU and other schools have done in real life, and feel I should have the freedom in a game to do so. In real life cinderella teams that pull insane seasons every year and make it to the dance every year, they get more money to recruit better players In the game I win, get sweet 16 twice, and I've been denied every year all 6 years of getting my funding raised to get better coaches, and better recruits. Without this issue the game is fun, unfortunately for me it's a pretty big deal. Ok my review ended up turning into a rant lol but I still gave it a thumbs up cuz everything else is quite enjoyable.

Exactly what I was looking for. Sure it's not perfect, but what game is? A few annoying glitches once in a while, but nothing game breaking. Definitely recommend to those looking to fill the void created by the lack of college basketball video games.

Very deep simulation of college basketball. Wolverine has developed a good reputation in a very niche market of sports text simulators. Love how they accurately portray the various teams and conferences reflected of the NCAA and have a pretty robust recruiting engine. The great thing about college basketball is you can build up a mid-major team to compete with the big boys and after 3 seasons, I've been able to do so and it has been very satisfying. From a gameplay standpoint I guess the only thing I've noticed is that it appears to be very difficult to come back when down at halftime. Also that sometimes the clock just runs out on a possession and you are unsure if a shot was missed or it was a shot clock violation.

Overall very good product for what you get and a joy for those of us who enjoy this niche genre.