Tag Archives: Oklahoma City Thunder

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #583 of the NLSC Podcast!

With only a few games left before a team hoists the Larry O’Brien trophy once more, we’re inclined to share some thoughts on the year that was in the NBA! To that point, this week we join the community in discussing our level of interest in the 2025 NBA Finals and whether we’ll be watching the rest of the way, as well as rating the 2025 season as a whole. This includes our thoughts on the way that the NBA is being covered right now, and the lacklustre promotion of the Finals by ABC. We also touch on whether or not parity is better for the league than the dominance of a dynasty, and Mike Breen’s recent comments regarding the philosophy behind what merits a “BANG!” from him on the mic.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 55:41 — 38.6MB)

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!

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 New Orleans Hornets’ Valentine’s Day jersey, and its rare video game appearances.

Happy Valentine’s Day, basketball gamers! Obviously, today is generally all about spending time with a significant other rather than hitting the virtual hardwood, unless of course that’s an activity that you enjoy together! For the people in our community who are doing something romantic today, all the best wishes to you and your partner. For anyone who doesn’t have a special someone today – and would like one – chin up, and don’t stress! These things happen in their own time. In the meantime, if you don’t have any plans today, by all means indulge in one of your hobbies.

Basketball gaming is the hobby that we focus on in our community, but since this week’s Wayback Wednesday has fallen on Valentine’s Day, it’s only appropriate that I cover a topic that’s related to both. No, this isn’t a profile of Derrick Rose, Kevin Love, or even Denzel Valentine! As I said, I’m taking a look back at a special jersey that New Orleans once wore – albeit when they were the Hornets and briefly playing in another city entirely – that celebrated matters of the heart, in more ways than one. 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 is a list of five things that you’ll see in games that are unpatched.

Patches are a contentious issue among gamers, and basketball video games are no exception. No game is perfect, and some issues are bound to slip by QA and won’t be discovered until a game is in the public’s hands. Naturally, we want to see those problems resolved via official patches, especially when there’s no viable unofficial fix. At the same time, we’re wary of undesirable changes being made to games that we’re enjoying, as we have seen games ruined by their updates. Day one patches are also the subject of scorn, being seen as an excuse to release unfinished games.

As such, many of us have mixed feelings whenever we receive a notification that a new update is waiting to be downloaded. With that being said, I’d much rather see regular updates than have to beg for them as we used to, or not get them at all. When you look back at certain titles in their unpatched state, you’ll see missing content, features, and functionality that really needed to be there, as in these five examples. Please note that I’m intentionally excluding the 1998 rosters in NBA Live 99. While it’s a notable example of the phenomenon, all games inevitably launch with outdated rosters. These five examples are more unique side effects of a game being unpatched.

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NBA Live 06 PC is one of my all-time favourite games, and one of the highlights of the NBA Live series. As such, it was a blast to connect with Dee on Parsec yesterday, and play a co-op game using rosters from the old NBA Live PC Project. Specifically, we used the 2012 season roster to replay the NBA Finals matchup between the Miami Heat and Oklahoma City Thunder.

Dee and I took control of the Thunder on this occasion, challenging ourselves to beat the Heat’s Big Three with OKC’s dynamic duo. What followed was an exciting game filled with big shots, emphatic dunks, impressive swats, and a win that wasn’t decided until the final minutes. Dee put together a reel of the best highlights, demonstrating just how fun NBA Live 06 PC can be in 2023. Check it out!

The roster that we were using is still available to download here. We were also using the Freestyle Superstars Replay Pop-Up remover that I released earlier this year for March Modness. You can pick that up here if you’d like to enhance the presentation of NBA Live 06 PC. As always, I encourage you to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more great basketball gaming videos, and invite you to hit us up with any suggestions of games that you’d like to see us play.

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 jerseys appearing only once in basketball video games.

We’re accustomed to seeing a wide variety of jerseys in the 5v5 sim titles. Ever since the introduction of retro uniforms and the jersey selection screen, we expect to have plenty of choices to outfit the team we’re controlling on the virtual hardwood. The variety has fluctuated throughout the years, and recently, NBA Live and NBA 2K have taken very different approaches. NBA Live only includes the selection of current jerseys and specific throwbacks that will be worn during a season, whereas NBA 2K – in part thanks to its bevy of retro content – features a more comprehensive selection.

Of course, there are some jerseys that you won’t find among the retro uniforms in the recent NBA 2K titles. A few teams have gaps in their selection of historical primary uniforms, but there are also some alternate and special jerseys that can’t be found. This isn’t necessarily surprising though, especially when some of those jerseys have only ever appeared in games once over the years. Indeed, to the best of my research, the jerseys I’m listing here have only ever appeared in one game. Note that I’m talking about official appearances, which excludes mods and unused files. With that being said, let’s take a look at some of the rarest uniforms on the virtual hardwood!

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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 times that various basketball video games featured incorrect jerseys.

In sim basketball titles, accuracy down to the last detail is the name of the game. An arcade title usually has more wiggle room for inaccurate, exaggerated, and stylised details, but we still expect a certain degree of faithfulness in NBA-licensed products. Some inaccuracies are admittedly only apparent to the most eagle-eyed gamers who are particularly attuned to minute details on jerseys, courts, and shoes. However, other inaccuracies are blatantly obvious to everyone, leaving one to wonder just what the developers and artists were thinking (or what sources they were working from).

Case in point: the five incorrect jerseys that I’ll be spotlighting today. Now, I’ve decided not to include any jerseys with incorrect colour palettes, such as the Chicago Bulls jerseys that were more pink than red for so many years. My reason is that they tend to be well-known examples too numerous to mention, and we can assume that they’re the result of developers working from official colour palettes that didn’t yield the proper results in-game. Instead, I’m focusing on jerseys that were incorrect due to weird mistakes in their design, or some other oddity. Some of these incorrect jerseys are noticeable right away, while others do require being something of a uniform buff.

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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 things in various basketball games that you’re too late to get, if you don’t already have them.

Happy New Year, basketball gamers! Welcome to the start of another year here at the NLSC, and another twelve months of basketball gaming. With another nine months before we see the next NBA 2K game, we can expect to see plenty of content for both the Next Gen and Current Gen versions of NBA 2K21; especially in MyTEAM, as there’s cross-generation progression. Of course, with the new Seasons approach, some rewards are already off the table. If you didn’t level up or finish the challenges by the time the previous Seasons ended, you’re now too late to get those goodies.

That’s not uncommon these days, what with the “games as a service” model that more and more developers are gravitating towards, including Visual Concepts. We’ve seen similar tactics in NBA Live too, albeit mostly with cosmetic items in LIVE Events. Developers are looking to capitalise on FOMO whenever they can, and as much as we may hate to admit it, it’s a highly effective tactic. With that being said, it’s not just new games where we can feel as though we’ve missed out. Certain content, and even full games that were digital-only releases, are now gone forever. These five things are no longer available, so if you want them, then that’s too bad; it’s now far too late.

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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 jerseys that we didn’t expect to see included among the selection in basketball video games.

We’ve grown accustomed to a wide selection of alternate and retro jerseys to choose from in basketball video games. This wasn’t always the case, however. It wasn’t until NBA Live 2003 that EA Sports’ long-running series added both the ability to select jerseys in-game, and a single retro uniform for every team. Over the years, more and more jerseys were added, though they were briefly removed when the series made the jump to seventh generation. NBA 2K has also come to feature a wide selection of jerseys, with NBA 2K20 including just about every major jersey each team has worn.

However, not only have there been some noteworthy omissions over the years, we’ve also seen some unexpected uniforms make the cut. The context that makes a uniform an unexpected inclusion varies from example to example, but suffice to say, we’ve sometimes been left surprised upon scrolling through all of the options on the jersey selection screen. In some cases, rare and even fictional jerseys have found their way into the game, increasing our choices and letting us hold our own theme nights in the various franchise modes. Looking back, I would suggest that these five rank amongst the most unexpected jerseys to have been featured on the virtual hardwood.

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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 more outdated details in basketball games.

Developers tend to do a great job of updating basketball video games for the season they’re set in. As I noted in my previous Friday Five covering this topic, they have the benefit of being sent updated artwork from the NBA, so they’re able to account for branding changes that aren’t yet officially announced. To that end, apart from missing transactions that occur after the cut-off date, and the absence of rookies and other players who haven’t signed in time, most games don’t have too many outdated details. These days, official updates are also far more comprehensive.

With that being said, sometimes games end up shipping with a variety of outdated details. Perhaps a change was announced too late for it to be included, and in the case of older games especially, it may not be something that can be patched. Oversights happen, and inaccuracies can be caused by strange circumstances. I’ve come up with another five examples, which I’m sharing with you all today. Please note that once again, I’m avoiding the obvious examples related to cut-off dates or the old practice of releasing games with a previous season’s roster, and only noting things that were or became outdated details when a game was new and current. Let’s begin with…

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Episode #326 of the NLSC Podcast is out now! Dee4Three and I are your hosts for this week’s show.

This week, we’re letting it all out as we discuss a variety of topics! We begin with the impending return of the NBA, and our thoughts on the format to finish out the season. On that note, is this really the end of Vince Carter’s career? Elsewhere, a long-lost spin-off of SimCity has us wondering whether any more forgotten and unreleased basketball games will make it out into the wild. The rare version of NBA Jam with Michael Jordan springs to mind. Recent events also lead us to share some strong opinions on the use of Patreon in the modding community, and the focus on making money through the hobby. With EA Play on the horizon, we wonder once more about the future of NBA Live, and express some frustration. We also touch on representing the ABA on the virtual hardwood, and what would make for acceptable downloadable content in basketball games. Oh, and there’s a potentially divisive opinion about the Oklahoma City Thunder’s branding.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 2:19:54 — 96.1MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

What’s your take on this week’s topics? Sound off in the comments section below, or join in the discussion here in the Forum! Additionally, feel free to hit us up with any feedback on the episode, as well as suggestions for topics that you’d like to hear us discuss in future episodes. For more information on the NLSC Podcast including episode guides, check out this page in our Wiki.

This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m reflecting on how video games mark different NBA milestones, and how it dates them.

On several occasions, I’ve mentioned that video games serve as wonderful time capsules for the NBA. They’re a snapshot of the league at the time they’re released, preserving the rosters, team branding, and the rules and formats of the era. When you revisit an old NBA video game, you’re often reminded of players’ brief and forgotten tenures with certain teams, “What If” scenarios and lineups that never lived up to the hype, and the jerseys and logos that you both loved and hated. In a way, old games can act as interactive almanacs, and are a fun way to revisit NBA history.

With that in mind, basketball video games preserve different eras and milestones in the real NBA as much as they’re a timeline of gaming and technology. In many of my Wayback Wednesday features, as well as my 25th Anniversary of NBA Live articles, I’ve reflected on how various titles have represented an evolution in the genre, and the improvements that are noticeable from year to year. On this occasion, I’m looking at how they represent NBA milestones and significant changes in the league, as well as the way those events make them dated. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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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 errors in various basketball video games that were never fixed.

Post-release support for basketball video games has come a long way. Official roster updates are now the norm, and while there are complaints about their quality, they at least add new content to the game, and update modes where custom rosters can’t be used. We no longer have to petition the developers to create bug fixes, and it’s much easier to provide feedback about errors that arise. Modern NBA Live and NBA 2K titles do have their problems, but we’re more likely to see resolutions, as well as content updates that keep them fresh throughout the year.

This wasn’t always the case, especially on consoles. Before the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 era, patches and updates were mostly a perk of PC releases. Even then, they weren’t as plentiful or detailed as they are now. There were a lot of errors that we just had to put up with, as there was no way that they were going to be fixed until the next game came out; assuming they didn’t become legacy issues, of course! Mind you, even when games did receive official patches, they would sometimes introduce new errors that were never followed up on with further fixes. Some of these errors were just cosmetic, some we could fix ourselves, but all were annoying in their own way.

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Here are the latest file additions for NBA Live 06 PC! magiciangirl06 has released two new and two updated courts for the 2017 season, bringing the home floors for the Minnesota Timberwolves, Toronto Raptors, Chicago Bulls, and Oklahoma City Thunder up to date. Download them all at the links below!

magiciangirl06
2016/2017 Minnesota Timberwolves Court
2016/2017 Toronto Raptors Court
2016/2017 Chicago Bulls Court (Updated to v2.0)
2016/2017 Oklahoma City Thunder Court (Updated to v2.0)

Catching up on another file addition I’m a little late in posting, magiciangirl06 has released a new Oklahoma City Thunder court update for NBA Live 06. Check it out at the link below!

magiciangirl06
2016/2017 Oklahoma City Thunder Court

Check out the latest file additions for NBA 2K16 PC, which include Miami Vice jerseys for the Miami Heat, two arena updates for the Cleveland Cavaliers, and an arena update for the Oklahoma City Thunder. Please see below for all the download links.

Brent aka Onegreatrace
Miami Vice Jerseys (Home and Away)

MJ23LB
Oklahoma City Thunder Chesapeake Energy Arena
Cleveland Cavaliers Quicken Loans Arena V2 (Local Broadcast)
Cleveland Cavaliers Quicken Loans Arena V2 (NBA Finals)