Tag Archives: Friday the 13th

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 bad omens in basketball gaming.

I don’t believe in omens as a mystical force in the universe. However, I do believe that there are warning signs that we should take notice of, which I’ll colloquially refer to as bad omens. As far as basketball gaming is concerned, there are definitely some bad omens when it comes to an upcoming release, or the future of a series. They’re not exactly mysterious and hard to spot, but it obviously gets easier with experience. We can recognise patterns, acknowledge precedent, and employ some common sense. At the same time, it’s easy to ignore bad omens.

After all, many of us try to remain optimistic about our hobby. We don’t want to jump the gun and assume the worst, especially if our predictions and pessimism have been proven wrong in the past. Things that have seemed like bad omens have turned out to be meaningless, or in rare cases, good news. Still, it pays to err on the side of caution, and there are warning signs that we should probably brace ourselves for bad news; or at the very least, temper our expectations. Once again, experience can usually guide us, as the red flags are much easier to spot after you’ve been through a few preview seasons. To that end, when one of these five events occurs, it tends to be a bad omen.

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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 superstitions that many of us may have succumbed to while basketball gaming.

Video games and sports are interests that invite a lot of superstitions, so it’s hardly surprising that there are superstitions surrounding basketball gaming! While I don’t consider myself a particularly superstitious person, I’ll admit that there are times when I’ve engaged in unusual and illogical rituals under the pretence that they’ll somehow have an impact on the virtual hardwood, or indeed a real game being played on the other side of the world. It’s silly, I know that it’s silly, and even when a superstitious ritual “works”, I’m well aware that it wasn’t actually a factor!

Besides, while superstitions may imply a belief in supernatural forces, there’s also a psychological explanation for them. They can provide us with a sense of control, which is comforting in situations we can’t influence. There’s also evidence that lucky charms and rituals boost confidence. Free throw routines and favourite jersey numbers are good examples of this. It only makes sense that this psychology also applies to basketball gaming, with superstitions both soothing us and pumping us up when we face challenges, from technical issues to moments that test our stick skills. Therefore, there may actually be some merit to a few of these basketball gaming superstitions!

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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 is a list of five of the unluckiest moments that you’ll experience while modding.

With apologies once again to anyone who suffers from paraskevidekatriaphobia, it’s Friday the 13th today, which means it’s time for another Friday Five column talking about unlucky moments! I’ve been writing the Friday Five for a few years now, and in that time, we’ve had more than a couple of Friday the 13ths. In previous columns, I’ve discussed my favourite number thirteens, unlucky moments in basketball games (as well as a few of my own examples in that regard), and unlucky moments from NBA history, including one that actually took place on the date in question.

Of course, a big part of basketball gaming in our community is the hobby of modding, and it certainly has its unlucky moments as well. I’ve previously discussed one of my unluckiest moments in modding, but there are definitely more examples that I could name. I’m sure that a lot of modders have experienced at least one of these moments at one time or another, leading to them kicking themselves and cursing out their bad luck. If there’s one upside to such unfortunate moments though, it’s that they can be learning experiences, albeit very frustrating ones. Without any further ado, here are five unlucky moments in modding!

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