Tag Archives: NBA Live 2005

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.

NBA 2K27 is officially out for everyone, and unsurprisingly, it’s heavily featured in this week’s NLSC Top 10 Plays after debuting in last week’s countdown. Indeed, it’s taken the top two spots thanks to some clutch shooting from Tyrese Haliburton and Caitlin Clark, which lifted their respective Indiana teams to thrilling victories. The old favourites aren’t forgotten though, as NBA Live 2005, NBA Live 06, and NBA 2K14 also provided some exciting plays, including a timely use of Freestyle Superstars. Need some inspiration to hit the virtual hardwood this weekend? 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.

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #639 of the NLSC Podcast!

Gaming in 2026 – basketball or otherwise – is certainly a mixed bag! There are definitely some things that we’re greatly enjoying about our hobby right now, but with that being said, there are also various issues that are really bugging us! To that end, this week we present Dee’s Dislikes and Andrew’s Delights! In these two segments, we get some criticisms off our chest from issues with NBA The Run to anti-consumer practices, while also celebrating what’s bringing us joy at the moment, such as retro gaming and exciting modding discoveries. In response to this week’s community question, our listeners also share some of their recent delights and dislikes, on the virtual hardwood and beyond.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:02:08 — 43.0MB)

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!

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #630 of the NLSC Podcast!

Entering 2026, we had some plans and goals for the virtual hardwood. Since we’re rapidly approaching the middle of the year – no, don’t ask us where the time went – we decided to check in on how those plans are going! To that end, this week we’re joining the community in discussing our basketball gaming habits so far in 2026, from the selection of titles that we’re playing to the modes that have kept us hooked. We also recap a fun Parsec session with the Snes9x Super Nintendo emulator featuring a five-player co-op game of NBA Live 95 that was an absolute blast, and an intense four-player head-to-head showdown in NBA Hangtime that was ultimately decided in overtime.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 52:14 — 36.2MB)

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 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 and other issues that have bothered me while basketball gaming.

Even the best basketball video games have had issues and inaccuracies. Perfection is basically an impossible bar to reach, and coding a sophisticated video game of any genre is hardly as simple as typing plain English into a word processor! Also, some ideas simply just don’t pan out. And so, we accept that our favourite hoops titles will have imperfections. In the best case scenario, it doesn’t stop us from enjoying them. Mind you, because we’re passionate about basketball and basketball gaming alike, any major inaccuracies and technical issues are naturally difficult to ignore.

Of course, these issues and inaccuracies don’t always ruin basketball video games. As I said, even our favourite games have them, and we all have different standards and expectations besides. With that being said, while technical problems, inaccuracies, and other issues may not completely spoil a game, they can still end up bothering us. The good ultimately outweighs the bad, but they’re still the finer points that we can’t help but notice, and would like to see fixed and improved upon for an even better experience. To that end, while the following five issues and inaccuracies didn’t stop me from having fun on the virtual hardwood, they were nevertheless a bit annoying!

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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.

Every entry in the NLSC Top 10 Plays represents a joyful moment playing basketball video games. This has perhaps never been more apparent than in this week’s top play, where you’ll see the Live 01 Legends reacting to an absolutely awesome alley-oop from their showdown in NBA Live 2005! Some minimalist modding is also on display in that highlight, which is always great to see. The rest of the countdown is packed with great dunks, slick moves, and other exciting moments from eight different games ranging from NBA Hangtime to NBA 2K26. 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.

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #626 of the NLSC Podcast!

We’ve recently been connecting to play Konami’s NBA Starting Five 2005, which was released exclusively in Japan for the PlayStation 2. Unsurprisingly, that has inspired us to take an in-depth look at the game on this week’s show! After breaking down its assortment of classic teams and other historical squads, we share our impressions of its gameplay, modes, presentation, and other features. While the game can be rough, it definitely has its strong points, including some that were ahead of its time. We also join the community in discussing whether we would’ve bought NBA Starting Five 2005 instead of or in addition to NBA Live 2005 and/or ESPN NBA 2K5, had it been made available in our region.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:06:28 — 46.0MB)

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!

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 how the battle between passion and burnout can make it tough to walk away from modding.

Like thousands of others over the weekend, I watched Norman Caruso’s farewell video for The Gaming Historian. After some 15 years and so many wonderful gaming documentaries, Norman is officially ending the channel, though all of the videos will remain available. In his farewell, he reflects on he felt burned out after releasing his video on The Oregon Trail, and how that made it difficult to find the passion to begin work on the next project. After initially planning on a part time schedule in the hopes of reigniting his enthusiasm, he’s ultimately realised that it’s time to move on.

His candid and understandable explanation really resonated with me. While I won’t compare my dabbling with video content to what he and other fulltime YouTubers do, I’ve experienced similar feelings as I approach 25 years of running the NLSC. No, this isn’t me announcing my retirement! However, it did get me reminiscing about how I stopped creating roster updates for NBA Live, and my unsuccessful attempts to make similar mods for NBA 2K. Burnout is a roadblock for creative endeavours, but your lingering passion and sense of dedication encourages you to persist. At some point though, you’ll come to realise that it’s time to channel your energy into a new venture.

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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.

As is often the case, the Legends are out and strutting their stuff in this week’s NLSC Top 10 Plays! Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant both make multiple appearances in the countdown, with MJ getting a little fancy in the Jordan Challenge and Kobe pulling out a truly wild slam for the top spot. From poster dunks to a swat off the glass to an alley-oop thrown from midcourt, there’s a little bit of everything on display this week. Highlights from seven different hoops titles are ready to hype you up for a weekend on the virtual hardwood, 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.

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.

The WNBA and its players recently came to a new agreement, so it’s only appropriate that there’s a WNBA highlight in this week’s NLSC Top 10 Plays! It’s joined by a selection of spectacular plays from current NBA players, stars from the recent past, and all-time greats alike. Indeed, with this week marking the 31st anniversary of Michael Jordan declaring “I’m Back“, you’ll also find a signature Air Jordan move performed in NBA 2K11’s Jordan Challenge. Ten entertaining plays from seven different titles are ready to get you hyped for a weekend on the virtual hardwood, 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 memorable roster mod complaints that I’ve received over the years.

One of the annoying things about creative endeavours – especially online content creation – is the way that negative remarks stick in your mind. You can read nine glowingly positive things from people who enjoyed what you did, and one bluntly harsh comment from someone who didn’t, and somehow it’s the latter that sticks in your mind. Even though the takeaway should be that nine out of ten people liked your work, somehow you focus on the fact that one person wasn’t a fan. While negativity bias may have evolutionary importance, it’s not conducive to creative satisfaction!

After all, when you create something that you hope will be enjoyed, it’s dismaying to hear that someone didn’t like it. Of course, when it comes to a project such as a roster mod for a basketball video game, the complaints can feel rather disproportionate. To that point, some feedback is just entertainingly ridiculous, so it’s not necessarily a case of being hurt by what was said. Indeed, even negative comments that stung a little at the time end up being amusing to look back upon! And so, while negativity bias may have helped commit the following roster mod complaints to memory – and some are examples of how not to provide constructive feedback – I can laugh about them now.

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #622 of the NLSC Podcast!

There’s a lot of fun to be had taking on the CPU solo or co-operatively in basketball video games, especially with the range of modes at our disposal. However, head-to-head play is also a blast, and we have countless memories of epic battles with friends, family, and online opponents. This week, we join the community in recalling the best players that we’ve ever faced on the virtual hardwood, and some of the lessons that we took from those showdowns. We also recap a fun game of NBA Live 2000 PC that demonstrated just how superbly it holds up more than 25 years later, and touch on some of the downsides of skill-based mechanics when it comes to realism and lucky plays.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 54:12 — 37.6MB)

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 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 weird roster glitches that I’ve encountered in basketball video games over the years.

The harsh reality of video game design is that no release is ever going to be absolutely perfect. Of course, absolute perfection is an impossible goal in just about any creative endeavour, and you’ll also never be able to please everyone with your design choices. On top of that, bugs are basically inevitable. They were present in classic games, and we certainly see them in modern titles. Whether it’s Super Mario Bros. 3, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, or NBA 2K26, it’s just not feasible to code a game that has absolutely no technical issues or imperfections.

Ideally, bugs and glitches will be rare, or have minimal impact on the experience. The best video games – basketball or otherwise – tend to be extremely stable for the most part. There have been some frustrating bugs in basketball video games over the years though, including glitches related to roster editing. They can be particularly nasty, causing us to lose saved data and in turn countless hours of work customising a game. As someone who has enjoyed tinkering with games and creating roster mods since the 90s, I’ve encountered several weird glitches and badly-designed editing functions. These five are among the strangest and most annoying that I’ve experienced to date.

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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 whether a franchise mode game can ever truly be failed.

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: completion is what we make it in basketball video games. There are also different reasons to play video games in general, with completion being but one of them. For example, our NLSC THRILLHO squad played over 500 games of 2K Pro-Am in NBA 2K17. We didn’t win any tournaments, snare any prizes for a top ranking, or reach a definitive end point. However, we were having so much fun that we kept meeting up to play all those games, and in doing so, created many fond memories. Competition and camaraderie were the point, not completion.

Traditional NBA season play, whether in the form of a single season, franchise, or career mode, is obviously a little different. Sure, it’s also about competing and having fun along the way, but the format provides a long-term goal: finish at least one season and ideally cap it off with a championship. Franchise modes have also grown deeper over the years, inviting us to customise the experience to our liking and take on more responsibilities. It’s all too easy to get impatient and bored during a long season, or find that setting up the board was more fun than playing the game. Completion is what we make it, but even so, is it ever fair to say that a franchise game has “failed”?

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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 finding basketball gaming’s answer to Tecmo Super Bowl.

Tecmo Super Bowl is undoubtedly an iconic video game. Fully-licensed NFL teams and players, well-designed gameplay, stat tracking, and the dominance of virtual Bo Jackson, all helped cement it as a legendary release. That legend has only grown over time, thanks to emulation facilitating a modding scene that has kept the game dutifully updated and enthusiastically played right through to today. When it comes to a cult following in the retro gaming and modding scene, Tecmo Super Bowl is right up there with the original Doom games.

Basketball is my sport however, so I’m left wondering: is there an equivalent retro hoops title to Tecmo Super Bowl? For that matter, could there be? Obviously, there are a handful of old favourites still being updated, but these days those titles rarely approach the same vintage as Tecmo Super Bowl. It stands to reason. It could be argued that sim basketball games that hold up decades later didn’t come along until the mid 90s, or even the mid 2000s. Once they evolved to that point, we ended up with several great releases that remained moddable and playable years later. With that in mind, which titles could potentially be basketball gaming’s Tecmo Super Bowl?

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It’s great to still see NBA Live 2005 being kept alive with new mod releases after all these years, and to that end, Lo55yboy has uploaded a 2026 season roster. Check it out at the link below!

Lo55yboy
2025/26 Roster

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