Tag Archives: PlayStation

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 secret courts that can be unlocked using cheats in various basketball video games.

Wasn’t it way more fun unlocking content in basketball video games by completing tasks or entering secret codes, than buying it with microtransaction-based in-game currency? I know, I know, more Grumpy Old Man griping about the Good Old Days, but come on, am I wrong? I mean, not everything was better “back in the day”, but bonus content that we could all enjoy without pumping more money into the game, or mindlessly grinding, was a far superior and way fairer approach. If you disagree, then I’m sorry, but you might just be too far gone as a shill!

Alright, alright, enough with the antagonistic commentary about microtransactions! That issue aside, basketball video games have had some cool secrets over the years, and it was always entertaining punching in codes to access them. Those secrets also gave rise to a number of urban legends and hoaxes, but some were legit, allowing us to change things up on the virtual hardwood. Indeed, some of those secrets and bonus content directly involved the virtual hardwood, as basketball games have included some secret courts that can only be unlocked via cheats. It was a fun way to alter the setting and atmosphere, and with that in mind, here are five of the best secret courts.

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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 it’s better to play retro basketball games on original hardware, or via emulation.

My first foray into emulation actually happened around 1994, though I wasn’t too familiar with the term or concept back then. I was trying to get Commander Keen – a legendary platformer and true classic of vintage PC gaming – to run on an Archimedes Acorn desktop, using an official DOS emulator. I wasn’t nearly as computer savvy as I’d later become, so I failed in the attempt. I had more success a few years later when I was checking out one of the early Super Nintendo emulators for PC, which was also DOS-based. I recall feeling underwhelmed though, especially with the lack of audio.

These days, emulation has come a long way, to the point where the emulators for many consoles can mimic original hardware near-perfectly. Not only that, but they also have other enhancements including save states, media capture, visual filters, and so on. That’s led to some debate among retro gamers as to whether it’s preferable to play on original hardware or simply rely on emulation. Needless to say, the latter does raise some ethical and indeed legal questions, but assuming that you can play a game you own on the original hardware or an emulator, which method is superior? As far as the virtual hardwood is concerned, for me, it depends on my needs at any given time.

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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 some of the crazy accessories that were once available in Create-a-Player.

It’s stating the extremely obvious to say that basketball video games have become far more realistic over the years. From graphics and animations to AI and content, the advances in tech have facilitated sim games that resemble real life far more closely. That’s not to say that older games didn’t do their best, and sim titles were definitely aimed at hardcore hoop heads more so than arcade games such as NBA Jam. They were still video games at the end of the day though, and as such, sometimes featured elements that weren’t so serious.

A great example is the crazy accessories that were often available in Create-a-Player. I’m talking about the accessories that you’d never see an NBA player wearing during a game, but were nevertheless available to assign in Create-a-Player in many old sim games, such as the early NBA Live releases. They’re something that we don’t see today; at least in traditional gameplay. They’re a relic of 90s basketball gaming, and looking back, their phasing out heralded a shift towards a more realistic approach. It was the right move, but they did serve a purpose. 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 some of the fun cheat codes that can be found in NBA Live 98.

For those of us who grew up in a time long before premium downloadable content and microtransactions, cheat codes are incredibly nostalgic. Whether they helped us to beat a difficult level, unlocked bonus content, or altered the gameplay in some way, cheat codes were fun and empowering. When you discovered a code or other secret, whether it was via word of mouth or printed in a gaming magazine, you couldn’t wait to try it out! Of course, there were also countless urban legends and hoaxes, as well as erroneous listings that weren’t properly vetted.

Indeed, I’ve previously debunked a handful of fake codes for NBA Live 2002. As I said at the time, while it was satisfying to do the research and get that confirmation, it’s disappointing that the game didn’t hold any cool secrets. Fortunately, there are other basketball games that have entertaining hidden content to discover! This does include sim titles, and one game with a number of fun cheat codes is NBA Live 98. Both the PC and PlayStation version of the game include bonus content and features that are hidden behind codes, and if you grew up with either release, you probably have fond memories of unlocking them. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #505 of the NLSC Podcast!

Is Slam ‘N Jam 96 the worst arcade basketball video game that we’ve ever played? After connecting for a co-op session with the PlayStation version this past week, it’s definitely a candidate! We compare it to Konami’s NBA Give ‘n Go, which we remember as a superior take on the sim-arcade hybrid. On the plus side, we had a much better time revisiting NBA Live 16, and continuing our Road Trip in NBA Jam: On Fire Edition. In this week’s mailbag, we join the community in sharing stories about who we most enjoy playing basketball video games with, and also solicit suggestions for basketball shoes.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:09:33 — 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!

Dee and I have been able to line up our schedules and connect more often as of late, which means more virtual hardwood fun on an international scale! This past week, we connected to play NBA 2K13 and Konami’s NBA in the Zone 2, and highlights from our session with the latter are up now on our YouTube channel.

As you can see, we took on the Denver Nuggets using the Seattle SuperSonics. While the Sonics were the much better team at the time, the Nuggets proved to be worthy adversaries here, in no small part thanks to the ferocious rebounding and putbacks of Tom Hammonds! Less unexpected threats such as Antonio McDyess, LaPhonso Ellis, and Mark Jackson also ensured a competitive game. Fortunately, we had the trio of Shawn Kemp, Gary Payton, and Detlef Schrempf at our disposal, but our bench players also came up huge, particularly Craig Ehlo and Jim McIlvaine. Watch how all of the action unfolded in this highlight reel, put together by Dee!

NBA in the Zone 2 is a great sim-arcade hybrid, and in addition to these highlights, Dee and I will be discussing our session with it on the next NLSC Podcast. In the meantime, be sure to subscribe to the NLSC YouTube channel for more basketball gaming content, and as always, feel free to hit us up with any suggestions of games that you’d like to see us play.

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 PS1 version of NBA Jam Tournament Edition.

Although it’s been surpassed by NBA Jam: On Fire Edition as both my personal favourite and my pick for the best game in the NBA Jam series, I still hold NBA Jam Tournament Edition in extremely high regard. It’s a title that I’ve covered several times here on the NLSC, from reflections while watching a game I’d recorded and an in-depth retrospective, to discussing weird ratings and an error that I somehow overlooked for more than twenty years. In short, NBA Jam TE is a release that I’ll eagerly revisit for both content creation purposes, and my own enjoyment.

As I’ve mentioned in previous features, I grew up playing the PC and Super Nintendo versions of NBA Jam Tournament Edition. Since I’ve been expanding my collection of basketball video games in recent years, I’ve sought out the PlayStation version of NBA Jam TE as well. It was the only version that I didn’t own for the platforms at my disposal, but late last year, I finally managed to snag a copy at a reasonable price. I noted that since I now had it as part of my collection, I’d be comparing NBA Jam Tournament Edition PS1 to the releases I grew up with, in a future Wayback Wednesday feature. The time has come, so 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 Part 10 in an ongoing series looking at players who only appeared on certain teams in video games.

When I posted my first list of players who only appeared on certain teams in games – or “phantom stints”, as I really should’ve called it – I didn’t realise that it would turn into a series with ten parts and counting! I thought I’d discovered some rather unique examples while dusting off games for Wayback Wednesday features and my own retro gaming sessions, but the names kept on coming. Once I reached the seventh instalment, I believed that I’d covered all of the examples who were noteworthy names. David L quickly proved me wrong, though!

As such, this series continues, and there are some more examples that I’ll be getting to beyond today’s feature. Once again, these phantom stints occur for the same basic reason: a player’s tenure with a team is more or less on paper only since they never officially tally a minute in real life, but because the stint is represented in at least one video game, it can actually play out on the virtual hardwood. Whether it’s due to leaving soon after a transaction that’s included in the default rosters or an official update, an injury lasting their entire tenure, or a trade or signing that was nullified, a number of players end up only appearing on certain teams in basketball video games.

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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 final few NBA Live games that were released on PS1.

The launch of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S has resulted in an interesting situation as far as multi-generation support is concerned. Obviously, the ninth gen consoles are receiving the flagship version of NBA 2K as far as technical innovation and features. However, the eighth gen version – which is also the one ported to PC – hasn’t been completely left behind. With NBA 2K23 in particular, 2K made a point of trying to implement as many features from the new gen version into the prior gen release. There also continues to be cross-generation support in MyTEAM.

Looking back through decades of console launches and multi-generation releases for basketball video games, outmoded platforms haven’t always received this kind of love and attention. It helps that nowadays the gap isn’t quite so wide, and the architecture is far more similar to the previous gen. The limited availability of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S has also left many gamers stuck on the previous generation longer than planned. When it comes to the final NBA Live games for PS1 back in the day, they didn’t stack up to their new gen successors quite as impressively. At the same time, they had some strong points of their own. 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 90s classics that needed the official updates that today’s basketball games receive.

Official updates for basketball video games are something we’re both wary of, and take for granted. After all, they can break aspects of a game while trying to fix others, and leave a title in a worse state than it was before. On the bright side, over the years we’ve seen official updates make fixes that would’ve once had to wait until the next game came out. For all the controversy that comes with day one patches, they have had their benefits. This wasn’t possible before consoles had hard drives, and even PC patches were rare and small back in the day. Many 90s classics stand as proof of this.

The fact that I’m referring to these basketball games as 90s classics should indicate that I still think very highly of them. Even without official updates, these were some of the best hoops titles of the decade, and still have replay value today. However, whether it’s a quality-of-life fix, a gameplay tweak, or updated rosters, these games definitely would’ve benefited from the official updates that are now commonplace. Obviously, the modding community was able to step up in some cases, but there are some fixes that only the developers can make. Again, it’s not my intention to dump on these 90s classics, but as far as receiving useful fixes, they sadly came along too early.

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #449 of the NLSC Podcast!

NBA Live 99 PC is arguably one of the most underrated basketball video games of all-time, and we had a blast revisiting it using a 2002 roster update! In addition to giving NBA Live 99 PC its due, our session also inspired us to reflect on the Boston Celtics and Michael Jordan-led Washington Wizards of the 2002 season. We also discuss the latest NBA 2K23 patch, which thankfully appears to have done more good than harm. There’s also some recent retro basketball game pickups to share, including Arch Rivals for the NES, the later NBA 2K titles for PlayStation 2, and a few other classics and rarities that will undoubtedly appeal to our fellow enthusiastic collectors and retro gamers.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:06:32 — 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!

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #436 of the NLSC Podcast!

Revisiting Fox Sports NBA Basketball 2000 reminded us of how hilariously bad it is, but it also found a new way to mess with us. Not surprisingly, NBA Live 2004 holds up much better, especially with a broadcast camera mod and the 1996 season roster. We received a couple of responses to last week’s show asking about acquiring copies of NBA Live PC and other older releases, so this week, we dive into how to get into retro basketball gaming/collecting. It needn’t be expensive, nor do you need to be the crazy collectors that we are! In this week’s mailbag, we circle back to the question of what counts as retro in basketball gaming, with our listeners sharing some interesting and differing opinions on the matter.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:17:27 — 53.5MB)

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!

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 a look at my basketball video game collection, as of 2022.

Back in March, I tweeted out a photo of my entire physical basketball video game collection, with some follow-up screenshots of the digital releases I own. I’m proud of my collection and satisfied in how I’ve been able to amass it, so I was pleased with the reception. While collecting is something that I do for my own enjoyment – and create content for the NLSC, of course – I was naturally hoping that my fellow hoops gamers would be impressed and get a kick out of the photo. I wanted it to inspire nostalgia, intrigue, and yes, a slight touch of good-natured envy. I’d say mission accomplished!

Given the old maxim of a picture being worth a thousand words, I could just leave it at those Tweets. However, I would like to talk a little more about my basketball video game collection, and provide a comprehensive listing as it’s impossible to get every title to be clearly visible in one photo. There are also a few digital releases that I didn’t display in my follow-up screenshots, including a couple I neglected to mention since they’re standalone releases and not on a digital platform such as Steam, Xbox Live, or the PSN Store. Finally, it’s been almost seven years since I wrote about my basketball video game collection, and I’ve been able to make some exciting additions since then.

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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 taking a look back at the truly glorious menus found in the PC version of NBA Live 97.

The nostalgic rush you get from a beloved old basketball video game begins long before you hit the virtual hardwood. It’s there upon the first glimpse of the boot-up screens and introduction videos. The first notes of the soundtrack will take you back to all the hours you spent with a game when it was brand new. And then, there are the menus. For many of us, our memories of our favourite basketball games also include spending a sizeable chunk of time in the menus: setting up games, creating players, updating the rosters, and sometimes just enjoying listening to the music.

As such, there are some frontends that stick in our minds. If we vividly remember the menu from a particular game, it’s either because it was visually appealing and easy to navigate, or incredibly ugly and clunky. When it comes to the menus in NBA Live 97, I’d definitely describe them as the former. I know I’ve touched on the menus in NBA Live 97 PC in my retrospective of the game, but I believe that they’re worthy of their own article. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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Episode #402 of the NLSC Podcast is out now! Derek (aka Dee4Three) and I are your hosts for this weekly podcast that’s all about basketball gaming.

NBA Live 19 still has an active online scene, but sadly it displays similar toxicity to NBA 2K’s community. We dissect the issue of poor online sportsmanship, and lack of competitiveness in what is supposedly a competitive environment. While we’re in the mood for callouts, we also respond to some recent comments that were unnecessarily snarky. On a brighter note, our second attempt at a co-op game in NBA Live 06 for Xbox 360 over Parsec has us pumped to dive into a Season. Elsewhere, Take Two’s attitude towards Grand Theft Auto modders has us wondering if we should be worried about our own modding community, especially with 2K understandably cracking down on MyCAREER hackers. In this week’s mailbag, we’re reflecting on games that we wish we could’ve personally modded, or downloaded mods for.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:20:41 — 55.8MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Join in the conversation in the comments below, or here in the Forum! Additionally, feel free to hit us up with any feedback on the episode, as well as mailbag questions and topic suggestions for future shows. For more information on the NLSC Podcast including episode guides, check out this page in our Wiki. The show also comes out on our YouTube channel, so be sure to subscribe for future episodes and other video content.