Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is a list of five teams that were fun to use in video games, despite being unsuccessful in real life.
Unless you’re a diehard fan of them – or looking for a challenge – you’re probably not going to choose to play with a bad team in a video game. Mediocre teams can be more enjoyable as long as they have some talent at their disposal, but they’re generally not our first choice either. We tend to gravitate towards the teams with the top stars and talent, with whom we can win games and make spectacular plays. They’re far more appealing choices in franchise modes as well, since their deeper lineups facilitate a wider variety of trades, without having to completely gut the rotation.
Of course, many unsuccessful teams throughout the years have been much better on paper. Injuries may have derailed their season, or their players might’ve been a poor fit with no chemistry. Some years the competition is particularly tough, or they’re a young team that’s still developing. Whatever the case, these teams are actually fun and interesting to play with in video games, despite their lack of success in real life. In the hands of gamers, they can overachieve well beyond the most optimistic predictions. Here are five unsuccessful teams – which for the purposes of this list, means missing the Playoffs – that were exciting and intriguing options to play with in video games.
We’re at midcourt, and the ball is about to go up…it’s Monday Tip-Off! Join me as I begin the week here at the NLSC with my opinions and commentary on basketball gaming topics, as well as tales of the fun I’ve been having on the virtual hardwood. This week, I’m tipping things off with some reflections on the role that humour plays in basketball gaming.
So, a quick note before we get into this week’s topic: yes, I do mean “humor”. I’m spelling it “humour” because Australian English, like British English, tosses the letter “u” into a bunch of words that American English doesn’t. I know it’s not an issue for most people, but I have received the occasional comment about supposed “mistakes” and “typos” in my articles because I’m not using American spelling. It’s a subject that’s bound to come up from time to time on a site discussing basketball, thanks to “centre” and “center”! In any case, humour, humor…I’m talking about the same thing.
With that out of way, humour is something that we do find in basketball video games, both sim and arcade. It obviously has its place in the genre, though the tone of a game tends to influence how heavily it leans into being humorous. Needless to say, personal preference is also a factor here. In a sim game, too much humour may have a negative effect on the atmosphere, making it feel too silly. Then again, how much is too much depends on how seriously you’re taking your virtual hoops! Conversely, arcade titles invite more humour in their presentation and gameplay, and can seem dry without it. When a game is able to strike the right balance, it adds fun to the virtual hardwood.
Get ready for more fantastic highlights from the basketball gaming community in the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week, curated by Dee4Three! New and old games alike are featured in this celebration of spectacular moments on the virtual hardwood. To submit your clips, post them in this topic, or hit up Dee on Twitter.
I know what you’re thinking. Of course we have poster dunks in this week’s NLSC Top 10 Plays, but that isn’t all! You’ll also see players making uncanny no-look passes, breaking ankles, spinning into crazy finishes, and taking advantage of a wild sequence off of a missed free throw to slam home the putback. Retro rosters are on display, reminding us that young Ray Allen was more than just a shooter, and that Kobe Bryant was simply incredible. On top of that, six different games are represented in the countdown, spanning a decade from NBA 2K13 to NBA 2K23. Let’s get to the action!
What was your favourite highlight this week? Sound off in the comments below, and once again, get in on the fun by sending us your best plays! Remember, as long as it’s a basketball game, it’s eligible for the countdown. Also, don’t forget to subscribe to us on YouTube for more basketball gaming videos.
Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is reflecting upon five types of basketball memorabilia that I’ve collected over the years.
Although I’m still passionate about basketball, there’s nothing quite like your first foray into a new hobby or interest. When I first got hooked on hoops, I couldn’t get enough! I needed to read every magazine and learn everything I could about the NBA and its history. I eagerly devoured highlights and any full games that I was able to watch. If I saw a basketball player on a cover or poster, heard their name on the news, or simply caught mention of the word “basketball”, it grabbed my attention. I can’t imagine how much it must have bugged my parents, but they supported my interest.
Needless to say, there’s a ton of basketball and basketball-related memorabilia that one can collect. Over many years of following the sport, I’ve indulged my passion with a variety of collectibles and keepsakes. Of course, I haven’t sought to get my hands on absolutely every bit of basketball memorabilia that I can find. I’ve never been to an NBA game, so I don’t have any ticket stubs or programs, and I’m not looking to buy anyone else’s. I’ve also never been into figurines or pop vinyls, so they’re not in my collection. There are other things that I’ve enthusiastically collected though, and they represent many fond memories as a long-time hardcore hoop head.
This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! From retrospectives of basketball games and their interesting features, to republished articles and looking at NBA history through the lens of the virtual hardwood, Wednesdays at the NLSC are for going back in time. This week, I’m reminiscing about playing with the Baby Bulls teams in basketball video games.
My nostalgia for the NBA and basketball video games doesn’t end with the 90s; far from it! Many of my favourite titles were released in the 2000s through to the early 2010s, and I’ve remained an avid NBA and basketball junkie long after Michael Jordan called it a career. Of course, playing with His Airness on the virtual hardwood required some modding back in the day, owing to his absence from the official roster. When it came to running with Bulls teams in the years that followed, I (usually) didn’t have to worry about them missing a prominent player.
Mind you, while all the names might’ve been accounted for, the talent was certainly lacking. I’ve previously reflected on the challenges that came with assuming control of my favourite team in the early 2000s; an extraordinarily tough time to be a Bulls fan after experiencing the glory days of MJ! I mentioned in passing that they became far more appealing to play with as the decade wore on, and their rebuilding efforts began to yield better results. Those teams came to be known as the Baby Bulls due to their youth, and while they didn’t reach the top of the mountain once more, I did enjoy putting them on the virtual hardwood. Let’s take a look back…way back…
Get ready for more fantastic highlights from the basketball gaming community in the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week, curated by Dee4Three! New and old games alike are featured in this celebration of spectacular moments on the virtual hardwood. To submit your clips, post them in this topic, or hit up Dee on Twitter.
I don’t envy the task of choosing just ten plays and then ranking them to boot, because the community keeps taking things to a new level with their submissions! Dee has an eye for highlights and a talent for video production though, and with basketball gamers bringing the goods once again, the NLSC Top 10 Plays is the best three minutes of virtual hardwood action you’ll find this week. And no, I’m not just saying that because I’m in there with a play from my NBA 2K14 MyCAREER! Prepare to be enthralled by ankle breakers, alley-oops, and clutch plays from seven different games…and also be ready to pick up a controller soon afterwards. Let’s get to the action!
What was your favourite highlight this week? Sound off in the comments below, and once again, get in on the fun by sending us your best plays! Remember, as long as it’s a basketball game, it’s eligible for the countdown. Also, don’t forget to subscribe to us on YouTube for more basketball gaming videos.
Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is Part 12 in an ongoing series looking at players who only appeared on certain teams in video games.
As I noted in Part 11 last month, in addition to bigger names, there are some lesser-known and remembered role players, journeymen, and bench warmers who ended up with phantom stints. I’ve gone back and forth on whether they’re worth profiling or not, since the prominent players that we all remember tend to be more interesting examples. Not only is there usually more to say about them, but as I also pointed out in Part 11, players who move around a lot and aren’t locks to be retained beyond training camp are more likely to have phantom stints captured in video game rosters.
Still, why should that disqualify them from being profiled? Besides, when you’re an NBA junkie, you’ll find that you remember some obscure names, even several years later! Video games undoubtedly help with that, from updating the rosters to making your own trades and signings in franchise modes. Indeed, my own memories of these players are definitely more closely tied to video games than the real NBA, with the exception of the one noteworthy name. Even then however, he’s been present in several of my franchise and career mode games over the years. Enjoy this list of role players, journeymen, and a notable name, whose phantom stints were made tangible!
Get ready for more fantastic highlights from the basketball gaming community in the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week, curated by Dee4Three! New and old games alike are featured in this celebration of spectacular moments on the virtual hardwood. To submit your clips, post them in this topic, or hit up Dee on Twitter.
Can you believe we’re tipping off the third year of the NLSC Top 10 Plays? Dee has done an incredible job curating the countdown since bringing it back, and of course, the community has been consistently delivering the goods with highlights from a variety of basketball video games. To mark the occasion, we’ve got Kobe Bryant showing off the Mamba Mentality, AND1 Mixtape Tour legends strutting their stuff, stars getting it done at both ends of the floor, and yes, huge dunks. It’s still the perfect way to begin a weekend of basketball gaming, so let’s get to the action!
What was your favourite highlight this week? Sound off in the comments below, and once again, get in on the fun by sending us your best plays! Remember, as long as it’s a basketball game, it’s eligible for the countdown. Also, don’t forget to subscribe to us on YouTube for more basketball gaming videos.
Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is a list of five times that basketball games featured fictional content.
Authenticity is the name of the game when it comes to sim basketball titles. There are acceptable breaks from reality, of course. MyTEAM allows us to construct lineups that span multiple eras, with everyone in their prime and ignoring that some players have passed away. It’s a fantasy mode, after all. We can also choose to have classic teams from different eras square off, play with teams featuring all of the best players in club history, or even have a team face itself. Even in a sim game, there’s fun to be had doing things that can’t be done in real life.
Fictional content is something else altogether. It’s usually the mark of an arcade game, such as the Stickmen and other bonus teams in NBA Jam: On Fire Edition, or the inclusion of Mortal Kombat characters in the arcade version of NBA Jam Tournament Edition. Most of the fictional content in sim titles comes from our own modding and roster customisation. With that being said, there are some times when fictional content appeared in sim basketball games, beyond the obvious examples of Roster Players filling in for unlicensed names. From placeholders and bonus content to questionable design choices, here are five times that sim basketball games had fictional elements.
From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #477 of the NLSC Podcast!
When we connected on Parsec to play NBA Inside Drive 2003, we weren’t anticipating having one of the most exciting games we’ve ever experienced on the virtual hardwood. One epic comeback later, and it was definitely a contest to remember! To that point, we’re recapping our showdown between the Toronto Raptors and Philadelphia 76ers for posterity, and to emphasise the fun that can be had when you don’t give up on a game after falling behind. We also compare it to some famous comeback victories in real NBA history, to which it bears some uncanny similarities. In this week’s mailbag, we join the community in discussing basketball video game series that would make a welcome return.
Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:02:12 — 43.1MB)
To get involved with the mailbag or to provide any feedback on the show, hit us up in the comments, reach out on social media, or post here in the NLSC Forum! For more information on the NLSC Podcast including episode guides, check out this page in our Wiki. You can also find the show on our YouTube channel, along with the rest of our video content. As always, thanks for tuning in, and go get buckets!
We’re at midcourt, and the ball is about to go up…it’s Monday Tip-Off! Join me as I begin the week here at the NLSC with my opinions and commentary on basketball gaming topics, as well as tales of the fun I’ve been having on the virtual hardwood. This week, I’m tipping things off with some thoughts on taking great screenshots of basketball video games; or, if you prefer, virtual hardwood photography.
When it comes my original content related to basketball video games, I’ve been drawn to writing over more visual mediums. This goes back to what I was passionate about (and generally good at) in school. I enjoyed creative writing far more than arts and crafts, which I wasn’t particularly skilled at. I’ve enjoyed dabbling with some video content over the years, and that will continue, especially as I can combine it with writing through video essays and the like. However, outside of modding, my content has largely consisted of articles.
With that being said, feature articles have a visual aspect to them as well. Besides neatly formatting the text, images are essential as they provide aesthetically-pleasing breaks, and further illustrate the topic being discussed. To that point, I not only take pride in my writing and self-editing to the best of my ability, but also including relevant and appealing screenshots. If I’ve prepared a topic then I’ll go out of my way to get relevant screenshots, but the screenshots and gameplay videos that I’ve captured for posterity have also provided me with a handy media library spanning my entire collection of games. Either way, I take pride in my virtual hardwood photography.
Get ready for more fantastic highlights from the basketball gaming community in the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week, curated by Dee4Three! New and old games alike are featured in this celebration of spectacular moments on the virtual hardwood. To submit your clips, post them in this topic, or hit up Dee on Twitter.
It’s always fun when a particular theme emerges in an instalment of the NLSC Top 10 Plays, and this week, it’s tip dunks! Putbacks can be rare and challenging to pull off on the virtual hardwood, but we have some people in the community that are adept at them, as you’ll see in the countdown. Of course, dunks are spectacular in general, so there’s the usual array of posters – preceded by great moves and defensive stops – and a slick play in NBA Live 19. Finally, six different games are featured this week, ranging from Team USA Basketball to NBA 2K23. Let’s get to the action!
What was your favourite highlight this week? Sound off in the comments below, and once again, get in on the fun by sending us your best plays! Remember, as long as it’s a basketball game, it’s eligible for the countdown. Also, don’t forget to subscribe to us on YouTube for more basketball gaming videos.
Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is a list of five concepts that must never return in future basketball games.
One of the benefits of revisiting older basketball games is rediscovering features that have since disappeared, and would make a welcome return in new releases. Over the years, we’ve seen a number of features and mechanics brought back due to popular demand, which has always been a cause for celebration. To that end, I’m sure we all have further suggestions for aspects we’d like to see again. Of course, there’s no guarantee that all of those concepts will return at some point. Some of them just aren’t feasible, while others are outdated ideas and no longer relevant to modern design.
And then, you have the concepts that must never return in a future basketball game. These are the bewildering ideas and design choices that didn’t just fail to make their games better, but in many cases made them actively worse. Even if those concepts didn’t entirely ruin a game, they unquestionably impacted the fun, or displayed a complete lack of goodwill. Some of the concepts that I’m discussing here do seem unlikely to return, but we can never be completely sure of that, as some games have revisited undesirable ideas that we hoped were gone for good. You may disagree with one of the below examples, but for the most part, I think we’ll all be on the same page.
This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! From retrospectives of basketball games and their interesting features, to republished articles and looking at NBA history through the lens of the virtual hardwood, Wednesdays at the NLSC are for going back in time. This week, I’m taking a look back at loading screens in basketball video games.
While catching up on some Zero Punctuation and Extra Punctuation videos, the one in which Yahtzee is reminiscing about loading screens really spoke to me. And so, once again, I’m shamelessly jumping on a topic that was brought up by a far, far more well-known content creator! It’s a topic that I undoubtedly relate to, though. In the video, Yahtzee notes the nostalgia at play here, acknowledging that faster loading times are obviously an improvement. However, for gamers of our generation, they’re not just a reminder of youthful excitement, but also examples of creative design.
In particular, Yahtzee notes the use of mini-games and interactive elements on loading screens. This got me thinking about how basketball games have tried to keep us entertained while they load, notably the approach that NBA Live took during the seventh generation. Needless to say, lengthy loading times are not something I want to see return, and they can be an annoyance while retro gaming. There’s nevertheless nostalgia there however, and it’s interesting that some ideas were dropped before loading times were shortened. Let’s take a look back…way back…
From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #476 of the NLSC Podcast!
If you go could back and play any basketball video game for the first time, which one would it be? This week, we join the community in reminiscing about the hoops titles that we wish we could experience anew, because of how much we were floored by our first impressions of them. A couple of other games that we’ve since changed our minds about, and would’ve liked to have had a better first impression of, likewise get a mention! After playing it over Parsec, we also take a look back at NBA Inside Drive 2004, an Xbox exclusive from Microsoft that more than held its own against stiff competition from the other 2004 season releases.
Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:11:40 — 49.6MB)
To get involved with the mailbag or to provide any feedback on the show, hit us up in the comments, reach out on social media, or post here in the NLSC Forum! For more information on the NLSC Podcast including episode guides, check out this page in our Wiki. You can also find the show on our YouTube channel, along with the rest of our video content. As always, thanks for tuning in, and go get buckets!
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