NLSC 2023 Year-in-Review

Posted by: Andrew in Community, NLSC Rewind, Site News December 31, 2023 0

And so, we’ve come to the end of another year here at the NLSC! I’d like to thank everyone for supporting the NLSC throughout 2023, from the modders and frequent Forum users to everyone who checks out our original content, and of course our Patrons on Patreon for helping us to keep the lights on. We’ve been around since 1996 when our founders tipped everything off with their tools and mods for NBA Live 95 and NBA Live 96 PC, and as we’re still passionate about basketball video games, we intend to be around for some time yet! Obviously the internet has changed a lot since we were founded, but we’re grateful that so many people still see us as a destination for basketball gaming.

To that end, it was our pleasure to provide extensive coverage of the virtual hardwood here on the NLSC throughout 2023. In addition to covering any news and previews regarding the latest and upcoming iterations of NBA 2K, Dee and I produced a plethora of original content about basketball gaming. If I do say so myself, we make a great duo in that regard! We obviously co-hosted the NLSC Podcast, I continued to write multiple articles a week and try my hand at some more videos, and Dee produced a huge amount of videos for the NLSC YouTube channel, from highlight reels to the weekly Top 10 Plays. I can speak for both of us when I say that we had a blast creating that content!

Thus, as we get ready to enter 2024, we’re presenting our Year-in-Review here at the NLSC. Dee and I have made our editors’ picks of my weekly features, our podcast, our videos, and the Top 10 Plays, choosing our favourite ten of each to spotlight. Needless to say, we encourage you to browse the entire NLSC archives, but this is the content from 2023 that we’re most proud of. I’d like to thank Dee for being my co-pilot for another year, and I look forward to what we’ll be doing with basketball games in 2024. I’ll touch on that again at the end of the wrap-up, but before we get to that, here are both of our picks for our favourite articles, videos, Top 10 Plays, and podcasts throughout 2023!

Monday Tip-Off

Since 2015, I’ve been tipping off the week here at the NLSC with a flexible feature about basketball gaming. Quite often it’s a written editorial, but I’ve also tried branching out with video essays, and the occasional fun feature that concerns a lighter topic. I do try to change things up, but with Wayback Wednesday covering nostalgic retrospectives and The Friday Five being a listicle format, I do tend to default to editorials for Monday Tip-Off. With that being said, I believe I covered a good variety of topics throughout 2023, combining criticism and commentary with reflections on the fun I was having on the virtual hardwood. Here are the Monday Tip-Off features that Dee and I recommend!

Andrew’s Picks

Dee’s Picks

NLSC Podcast

In 2023, the NLSC Podcast moved to Tuesdays, and outside of the first week of the year and a week in December when I was without a desktop, we didn’t miss a beat! Indeed, Dee and I produced a year of shows that we’re immensely proud of. I have to give Dee a ton of credit for spearheading the mailbag and community segments once again, and it’s always a blast getting on the mics with him. We covered some fun and important topics, had some great guests, and again, really enjoyed talking about a hobby that we’re both so passionate about. We’re eager to keep the show going through 2024, and encourage you to catch any episodes you’ve missed, but here are ten from 2023 that we know you’ll love.

Dee’s Picks

Andrew’s Picks

Wayback Wednesday

Admittedly, I’ve been leaning more towards playing older titles in recent years, which means more of my content has had some throwback motifs! Wayback Wednesday is still specifically for basketball gaming history though, from full game retrospectives to deep dives into features and content from yesteryear. I was able to produce a couple of features in 2023 that have been on my list for a long time, which was highly gratifying. I aim to cross even more of those ideas off the list in 2024, as there are still plenty of old school and more modern classics to cover, as well as other retro-themed content. Here are the Wayback Wednesday features from 2023 that Dee and I would suggest checking out first.

Andrew’s Picks

Dee’s Picks

The Friday Five

2023 marked the ten year anniversary of The Friday Five being a feature here at the NLSC. Not bad for something that was definitely – shall we say – “heavily inspired” by the format over at Cracked! Despite numbering in the hundreds now, I still haven’t run out of topics to cover in listicle format, and my list of ideas for future articles is still quite long to say the least. It was fun having a running theme for the last Friday of every month this year – the Certain Teams/Phantom Stints series – and I’d like to shout out David L once again for his help in finding examples. Those twelve articles are worth a look, but aside from that, here are ten Friday Fives from 2023 that Dee and I have handpicked.

Dee’s Picks

Andrew’s Picks

NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week

Every Saturday, Dee presents the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week! The feature is in its third year and counting, and Dee hasn’t missed a week in all that time. The community has of course come through here as well, delivering spectacular highlights all year. In fact, I’d say that 2023 has been the best year for the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the clips keep getting even better in 2024! As such, I know that I speak for both of us when I say it was incredibly difficult choosing just ten countdowns to spotlight. Honestly, I’ll echo last year’s advice and suggest that you should start at the beginning of 2023 and watch them all, but here are the NLSC Top 10s you mustn’t miss!

Andrew’s Picks

Dee’s Picks

Dee’s Videos

From the NLSC Top 10 Plays to highlight reels featuring an assortment of games, Dee has spent the last few years resurrecting and building up our YouTube channel. He had so many great videos throughout 2023 that it was very tough to pick just ten, but we both managed to choose our favourites. As with the NLSC Podcast – which is obviously also available on our YouTube channel – I’d encourage you to go back to anything you’ve missed or would like to watch again, and binge as much of our video content as possible! If you’re looking for a place to start when it comes to Dee’s videos though, here are the ones that he and I would suggest, as they represent a great cross-section of his content.

Dee’s Picks

Andrew’s Picks

Andrew’s Videos

Dee has certainly inspired me to get into more video content, pointing me in the right direction as far as a new Elgato capture card, Movavi for editing, and Action for video capture on PC. I’ve already mentioned some of my video essays/retrospectives earlier on in the recap, so these picks are focusing on highlight reels and other such videos. I had a lot of fun continuing the NBA 2K14 Retro Series, and there’ll be more of that coming in 2024. I also dabbled with other games during the year, which I ended up recording and producing reels for; again, Dee has been a great influence here! Once again, we’ve both picked a selection of videos we liked best, but we encourage you to binge the channel!

Andrew’s Picks

Dee’s Picks

Wrapping Up 2023 Here at the NLSC

So, that’s some of our favourite content that we produced here at the NLSC throughout 2023. We hope you enjoyed it, and that like us, you’re looking forward to more fun with basketball gaming in 2024! Our original content will of course continue, and we’re also open to suggestions for podcast and article topics, as well as games that you’d like to see us play. As far as other content is concerned, with it being the 30th Anniversary of NBA Live, we’ll see what we can do to mark the occasion. It remains to be seen whether the series will ever return – Dee is a bit more optimistic than I am these days – but whatever happens, we’ll celebrate the milestone here at the NLSC (even if EA Sports doesn’t!).

I’d like to get a bit more involved with modding, and was happy to release a couple of mods in 2023. In particular, I was proud of the fixed official roster for NBA 2K10, and the Freestyle Superstars pop-up remover for NBA Live 06. I’ll continue to dabble with smaller projects here and there for a variety of games, though if I attempt anything much bigger in scope, I’ll need to make some important decisions about which games to focus on. We’ll of course have another celebration of modding with March Modness 2024, and we encourage everyone to make use of our hosting facilities. We remain dedicated to free and readily available mods for basketball video games, whether they’re old or new.

Unfortunately we have had some technical issues in recent months that I’m still trying to troubleshoot and permanently fix. My PC crash in December set me back as far as some work I’ve been trying to do, but I’ll do my best to get everything resolved early in 2024. Thank you for your patience and understanding while I get that sorted! Once again, I’d also like to thank everyone who has helped out with hosting costs via Patreon or once-off donations. We’re a non-profit site that’s dedicated to free content, for basketball gamers, by basketball gamers. To that end, we greatly appreciate the generosity, as well as all of our regulars who make use of the Forum, and support us by enjoying our original content.

Another initiative that Dee continues to champion is connecting via Parsec to play games that no longer have online support (or indeed, never had it). It’s something that he and I have been doing for a couple of years now, and it never gets old. More and more people in our community are doing the same, and it’s safe to say that everyone who’s connected to play over Parsec has loved the experience! A reminder that Dee has put together a guide to getting Parsec set up with the optimal settings. He’s also connected with so many members of the community, and you can be sure that those Parsec sessions will continue in 2024. It’s become such a large part of enjoying basketball gaming here at the NLSC.

In closing, 2023 wasn’t without its challenges, but we’ll always strive to overcome them. We had a blast covering basketball video games and supporting the basketball gaming community however, and we’re keen to keep doing that for a while to come. I’ll finish up by plugging our Discord – an overdue companion to our Forum – and thank Dee for both spearheading and taking care of it. Once again, thanks to Dee for being my enthusiastic co-pilot and co-content creator here at the NLSC; you can expect to see plenty more from us in 2024. In the meantime, thank you so much for your support, for engaging with our content, and enjoying our facilities. It’s a labour of love that we really enjoy doing.

And with that, let’s close 2023 here at the NLSC with Lutz’s traditional words of wisdom:

Remember the safest order of things on New Year’s Eve: 1. Fireworks, 2. Drink, and not vice versa!

See you on the virtual hardwood in 2024!

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