Tag Archives: ESPN NBA 2Night 2002

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 events that are realistic, yet feel unrealistic when they happen to us in basketball video games.

To paraphrase a couple of iconic quotes from literary giants that I mentioned in this week’s Wayback Wednesday, truth is stranger than fiction, in no small part because fiction has to adhere to possibilities that real life doesn’t. We mock events in works of fiction that seem too convenient, yet history is filled with serendipity. In a similar vein, common effects in movies and TV shows that make them more dramatic and entertaining – the sound of a blade being drawn, a bullet ricocheting, and so on – skew our expectations of reality.

In short, we’re not always as accurate as we believe when it comes to gauging whether or not something is realistic. This is certainly true of sim basketball games like NBA 2K, and NBA Live back in its heyday. We wanted to see those games become more and more realistic, and the best releases have achieved commendable results in that regard. With that being said, I’ll be the first to put my hand up and admit that my views of what’s realistic and unrealistic in sim titles have sometimes been rigid or myopic. That’s not to say that realistic moments can’t be represented poorly on the virtual hardwood, but even when they’re done well, they can feel unrealistic to us.

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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 inaccuracies regarding the All-Stars in various basketball video games.

Another All-Star Game will be upon us next week. I admit that I highly doubt I’ll be watching it. What was once a spectacular exhibition of the best players in the NBA competing in the ultimate pick-up game has turned into a boring display that we can’t even call basketball. From the lack of effort by a spoiled generation of players to ridiculous formats under the tournament-obsessed Adam Silver, the All-Star Game absolutely stinks now. It’s a damn shame, as its spits on the legacy of all the great players who paved the way for today’s “stars” to get paid $40 million to load-manage.

Whoops, I went full Grumpy Old Man there! It is tough not to grumble though, as the All-Star Game used to be something I really enjoyed. Sadly, over the past decade or so, it’s completely lost its appeal and competitive spirit. I still have fond memories of what the event used to be of course, and that also carries over to the virtual hardwood. Over the years, it’s been a blast to play with the All-Star teams in games, as well as the Rookie Challenge/Rising Stars squads when they’re available. As with many other aspects of basketball video game rosters though, the virtual All-Star teams have had some rather weird and interesting inaccuracies. Here are five that I’ve encountered!

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Get ready for more fantastic highlights from the basketball gaming community in the NLSC Top 10 Plays of the Week, curated by Dee! 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, send Dee a message, or hit him up on X.

A wild alley-oop from our NBA 2K9 Association, a re-creation of one of the top dunks of the 1998 season in ESPN NBA 2Night 2002, and a modded-in Anthony Edwards doing his best Spider-Man impression in NBA 2K16. That’s just a small sample of the spectacular moments you’ll find in this week’s NLSC Top 10 Plays! A total of six different basketball video games are providing poster dunks, ankle-breakers, big swats, and more, in another countdown that signals it’s time to hit the virtual hardwood. 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.

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 ESPN NBA 2Night 2002 by Konami.

In my retrospective of ESPN NBA 2Night, I described it as one of the absolute worst basketball video games from a Triple-A developer that I’ve ever played. That’s a bold declaration that I don’t make lightly, and I stand by it. From poorly-designed controls to underwhelming AI to unpolished animations and collisions, gameplay was a mess. It could produce a rare fun moment, but on the whole, it was a lacklustre sim-arcade hybrid. As such, some of its impressive features like the ESPN presentation and face editing deserved to be in a much better game.

To that end, there was really nowhere to go but up for its sequel, ESPN NBA 2Night 2002. Released for the PlayStation 2 and original Xbox midway through the 2002 season, ESPN NBA 2Night 2002 definitely made an effort to be an improvement on its predecessor. Right out of the gate, I will say that it was respectably successful in that regard. That may sound like a backhanded compliment, but the game did make a commendable leap from the first ESPN NBA 2Night in some key areas. Does that make it a good or even a great game, though? Let’s take a look back…way back…

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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 players either using renders or real photos for portraits in basketball video games.

When you’re a fan of a specific sport or genre – probably both in the case of basketball video games – it’s easy to get stuck in a bubble. As such, it’s always interesting to take a glance at other fandoms, and observe familiar debates over similar issues. Of course, if you’re part of multiple fandoms, you may have had those discussions many times! Case in point, I happened across a thread in the WWE Games subreddit that raises a question about an issue that I’ve had as a fan of both basketball and wrestling games: in-game renders, or real life photos for portraits?

Reading through that discussion reminded me of my own conflicting thoughts on the matter throughout the years. Like many incompatible preferences, both are reasonable to desire, and both have clear advantages and disadvantages. To that end, it’s hardly surprising that the debate rages on, and that it’s difficult to find common ground. In the grand scheme of things, there are certainly more important issues with basketball and wrestling games than whether their presentation makes use of in-game renders or real portraits. All the same, the little things in gaming definitely do still matter. And so, while I don’t expect to settle the debate here, I’ll throw in my two cents once again.

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #554 of the NLSC Podcast!

What is it that keeps us hooked on the virtual hardwood? This week, we join the community in sharing the reasons why we play basketball video games, ranging from a love of the sport, to bonding experiences with family and friends, to joyful fantasy and escapism. Following on from last week, we and our listeners pick three stars from the 2000s to bring into the modern NBA in their prime. In response to the end of online support for NBA Live 18, we note how the offline version of The One succeeds where MyCAREER fails nowadays. We also share an interesting tidbit about Dr. J vs. Larry Bird, and answer a question about bad basketball video games in another edition of Andrew Asks.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:09:28 — 48.1MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

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!

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #513 of the NLSC Podcast!

If we could bring back just one Triple-A release as an alternative to the NBA 2K series, what type of game would we choose: NBA sim, NBA arcade, street, or college basketball? This week we join the community in answering what is a very tough question! We also recap a session revisiting ESPN NBA 2Night, which despite some interesting features and great presentation, was not one of Konami’s better hoops titles. On the bright side, we played with an interesting New York Knicks team that was definitely in a transitional era. In this week’s mailbag, we’re talking about the players that got us into basketball, and our historical favourites on the virtual hardwood.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:37:13 — 67.1MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

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!

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 a time when certain basketball video games were regional exclusives, and/or had late releases.

The basketball gaming landscape has changed drastically since our choices were whittled down to just NBA Live and NBA 2K, culminating in a virtual monopoly for the latter. When a handful of developers and publishers were throwing their hat into the ring with hoops games, we received a variety of titles of varying quality, but most brought something interesting to the table. Of course, not every game was available worldwide. While NBA Live and NBA 2K stood as examples of global brands, other games were regional exclusives, usually only released in North America.

On top of that, if other regions did receive a particular game, it might not be until several months later. It may seem like a terrible marketing decision to release an NBA game well after the season has tipped off, but there are titles that have come along quite late in a campaign, even with their domestic release. Indeed, not even NBA 2K and NBA Live have been immune to late releases, if only outside North America. It’s an interesting difference in the way that basketball video games used to be handled, so let’s take a look back…way back…

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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 the “No Portrait Available” placeholders that are a staple of old basketball video games.

Beyond obvious examples such as dated graphics, fewer modes, and less bonus content, there are some hallmarks that immediately identify basketball video games as old school. They are the approaches and design choices that modern games eschew, either because they’re no longer necessary, or newer technology facilitates preferable solutions. These days, you’d never see a Free Agents Pool that’s limited to the same number of players as a regular team. No active players will be represented by Roster Players, since the entire league is covered by the current licensing agreement.

That brings us to another staple of old games that we no longer see: a generic portrait for players who are missing a proper one. If you’ve been playing basketball games for a long time, these players with no available portrait will be part of the nostalgia that you feel for old favourites, whether it’s the approach in general or some more specific examples. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look back…way back…

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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 lists five features that didn’t originate in NBA Live or NBA 2K.

From the mid 90s through to today, NBA Live and NBA 2K are the two biggest names as far as sim basketball games are concerned. Obviously NBA Jam and NBA Street were the top dogs in the arcade space, and there have been other series of sim titles that have produced quality releases. However, when we’re talking about the brand leader in NBA licensed sim titles, it’s been NBA Live and NBA 2K for more than a quarter of a century, with the latter taking the crown from the former during the 2000s. Of course, it hasn’t been a competition for quite some time.

Nevertheless, being the two biggest names/brand leaders in sim basketball games has meant that many of the innovations in the genre did originate with either NBA Live or NBA 2K. To that end, they’ve ended up borrowing ideas from each other, which as I’ve long maintained is actually a good thing when it comes to features that should be staples of a sim game. Of course, there are also some great features that we take for granted that didn’t originate in NBA Live or NBA 2K. Some of them are older than we think, appearing in one of their predecessors, while other times it was one of their contemporaries that beat them to the punch. Either way, another game did it first.

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #452 of the NLSC Podcast!

After playing a co-op game of NBA Starting Five 2005 over Parsec, it’s clear why the game wasn’t a worldwide release! The Japanese-exclusive title is still interesting though, and it leads us to reflect on Konami’s history on the virtual hardwood. We also connected for a game of NBA Live 96 PC with work-in-progress Draft Rosters, and had a blast playing with and against stacked lineups. Our eagerness to play older games also points towards a feeling of ennui when it comes to NBA 2K23. After comparing Birthday Lineups, we open up the mailbag to quiz the community on the Top 7 Overall Ratings back in NBA 2K10, which featured a couple of surprises.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 54:09 — 37.5MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

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!

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #413 of the NLSC Podcast!

Catching up on the latest results from our NBA Jam: On Fire Edition Tournament, we reflect on a truly epic comeback! We also recap the fun we had connecting on Parsec to play NBA Live 2004 PC with the 1996 season mod, another exciting countdown with the Top 10 Plays, and recent fun going back to an NBA 2K14 MyCAREER save. This week’s main topic is the variety of NBA video games that we used to enjoy. We open up the mailbag to see which NBA video games the community most wants to see return instead of (or in the best case scenario, in addition to) NBA Live, and discuss our memories of those titles.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:26:50 — 60.0MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

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!

Welcome to this week’s edition of The Friday Five! The Friday Five is a feature that I post every Friday in which I give my thoughts on a topic that’s related to NBA Live, NBA 2K, and other basketball video games, as well as the real NBA, and other areas of interest to our community. The feature is presented as either a list of five items, or in the form of a Top 5 countdown. This week’s Five discusses five retro purchases that didn’t pan out the way that I was hoping.

When I was a young basketball gamer, my parents didn’t quite understand the concept of annual releases. I remember buying NBA Live 97, and my father saying something along the lines of “OK, you don’t need any more basketball games.” It’s funny to look back on now considering how much my collection has grown since then, to the point where acquiring basketball games is as much my hobby as playing them. Given that I’m a content creator, they’re also an investment that helps out with that venture, but I also enjoy searching for bargains and adding some obscure or difficult to find titles.

Expanding my collection beyond the games I bought and played when they were new has allowed me to experience some titles that I missed the first time around. As I’ve said before, some are good, and some are bad. Some I wish I played more of when they were new, and some I can safely say I was right to avoid. Either way, I don’t regret my retro purchases because I enjoy collecting, and checking them out not only creates material for Wayback Wednesday but is also a fun adventure. Unfortunately, not all of my retro purchases have panned out. It’s the risk you take when you hunt down second hand titles, but fortunately none of these busts have broken the bank.

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