Tag Archives: Retro Teams

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 reasons to play with NBA Legends that are from before your time.

Generally speaking, I’m indulging my nostalgia when I play with Legends and other historical content in basketball video games. I’m an Elder Millennial, so it probably won’t be a shock when I say that the players and teams that I feel the most nostalgic for are from the 90s and 2000s. Even though I’m a keen retro gamer that can readily revisit some early classics, there are benefits to reconnecting with fond memories through more modern titles. The combination of rosters from yesteryear and more advanced graphics and mechanics can provide the best of both worlds.

There’s been a shift in my approach to playing with historical content on the virtual hardwood, though. I’m still revisiting the eras that I watched and am nostalgic for, but over the past year or so, I’ve developed a greater interest in playing with the Legends from before my time. That change has certainly been inspired in some part by Dee’s Legends seasons with his brothers that include players from multiple eras. Some of our Parsec sessions have also involved playing with greats from earlier decades. The more that I’ve hit the virtual hardwood with Legends from before my time, the more I’ve enjoyed doing so. I’d absolutely recommend it, and here are five reasons why.

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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 about whether playing games from the past and enjoying historical rosters is the future of my basketball gaming.

More than a week after NBA 2K27’s release, I still don’t have the game. Thinking back, the last time that I didn’t get a new game at launch would’ve been NBA Live 2002 back in 2001, and that’s only because it was a Christmas present along with my PlayStation 2. To that end, it’s been 25 years since I’ve waited this long post-launch to pick up the latest basketball video game. Even when I had to wait longer for a game to come out here in Australia, I was still getting it on what was Day 1 for us, or within a week or so at the very least.

Funnily enough, I’ve rather enjoyed connecting with Dee to play NBA 2K27 over Parsec. In fact, I’m optimistic that I might like it more than its recent predecessors based on my experiences so far. It’s possible that by taking a break from playing the latest NBA 2K, it finally feels fresh enough to dive back in. At the same time, leaning into my predisposition for retro gaming has also made me extremely comfortable with playing old favourites and developing an appreciation for classics that I overlooked. Indeed, the longer that I delay picking up NBA 2K27, the more that I wonder if I’ve reached a point where the future of my basketball gaming actually lies in the past.

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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 reflecting on some retro modding, namely tinkering with rosters in the Xbox 360 version of NBA 2K6.

When I get hooked on a game – really hooked – it takes a while to get it out of my system. In fact, even then there’s a good chance that it’ll hang around in my rotation, if nothing else becoming a fallback option when I’m not sure what to play. If there’s any way that I can spice up those sessions with some modding – particularly minimalist modding – then that becomes part of my fascination with a game. Whether it’s putting together makeshift retro squads in NBA Live 10’s Fantasy Teams mode, or creating something more substantial, it prolongs my interest in a classic title.

That brings us to the Xbox 360 version of NBA 2K6. It’s a game that I’ve come to love long after it was released, as I noted when I covered it for Wayback Wednesday with a comprehensive retrospective. It’s been in and out of my rotation over the last couple of years, which eventually led me to tinker with its rosters. At first, it was just a way of getting more out of the game by setting up some fun scenarios, but I soon found myself dabbling with projects that I wanted to release publicly. It’s been a fun exercise so far, so let’s see how I’ve been going back…way back…to mod!

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #634 of the NLSC Podcast!

With the preview season and indeed the release of NBA 2K27 looming on the horizon, what are we hoping to see from this year’s sim basketball game from Visual Concepts? This week, we join the community in sharing some of our key Wishlist items, from our most-desired gameplay improvements to ideas for enhancing modes, features, and content. Needless to say, we’re hoping for more authenticity, accessibility, and quality! We also discuss a couple of details about NBA 2K27 that have already leaked, including the release date, Standard Edition cover player, and the end of support for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. On a sad note, we also pay tribute to the late Stacey King, who passed away at the weekend.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 57:35 — 39.9MB)

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 #632 of the NLSC Podcast!

Although we’ve been playing basketball video games for decades now, the hobby is still capable of surprising us. To that end, what are some of the biggest surprises – both positive and negative – in basketball gaming in 2026? This week we’re sharing and discussing what amazes and astonishes us when it comes to the virtual hardwood, from the quality of the games and modern design philosophies, to the lack of competition and changes in community attitudes. That includes touching on the shift in modding culture, and the general discourse when it comes to basketball gaming issues. Our listeners also weigh in with what surprises them the most – for better or worse – with basketball video games today.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 58:50 — 40.8MB)

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 basketball gaming activities that may sound weird, but I definitely have fun partaking in.

Gaming is meant to be fun. That may sound like I’m stating the extremely obvious, but there are times when people seemingly forget that; or perhaps more accurately, refuse to recognise that there are different ways of enjoying gaming, and that they’re all equally valid ways of having fun. To that end, it would be hypocritical of me to say that anyone who enjoys a tedious grind or wants every game to be a brutal test of your stick skills isn’t entitled to their preference. However, it tends to be those gamers who attempt to shame others for not sharing their idea of what makes gaming fun.

Indeed, I sometimes wonder if we’ve come to take gaming too seriously. That is to say, if you’re not playing competitively, levelling and ranking up, or progressing to some kind of goal, it’s considered a waste of time. Now, I certainly enjoy having goals with my basketball gaming – it’s why I aim to play entire seasons – and I’ve also had fun dipping my toe into the competitive scene. With that being said, I also enjoy just messing around and finding other ways to enjoy basketball video games. While that may not seem odd on the surface, I acknowledge that some of my basketball gaming activities are a bit weird! Without any further ado, here are five examples of that.

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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 how MyNBA Eras has made it unlikely that we’ll see any new classic teams added to NBA 2K.

Way back in 2016, I posted a Friday Five listing five classic teams that I’d like to see included in future NBA 2K games. I revisited the topic with a second article in 2018, and it ultimately became an ongoing Friday Five series. Some of those squads have since been added to the games. No, I’m not trying to take credit for that! Many of those additions were very popular and obvious choices, so I highly doubt that I had any influence here. Nevertheless, I’ve enjoyed seeing the selection of classic teams expand, and there’s never any harm in throwing out suggestions.

However, the most recent instalment in that series – Part 13 – was back in 2022. There are a few reasons why I haven’t circled back to that topic for just over four years now. For a start, at this point I’ve already covered many of the teams that I’m interested in. Again, some are already included in the games, while others are unlikely to be added. As I’ve discussed before, this generation of NBA 2K games has left me cold, so I’m less enthusiastic about discussing ideas for future releases in general. On top of that though, the addition of MyNBA Eras makes it seem far less likely that we’ll see new standalone classic teams. Of course, it could be argued that that’s actually for the best.

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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 remnants of missing and removed features in basketball video games.

Features and content are removed from all genres of video games for a variety of reasons, from design changes and technical challenges to deadlines and legal issues. It’s unfortunate even when it’s understandable, but it’s also entertaining to discover the remnants of cut content. They’re intriguing mysteries when we stumble upon them, fascinating What Ifs when we know their back stories, and sometimes even things that can be restored through modding. Our community has definitely been able to make good use of leftover content in NBA Live and NBA 2K!

Of course, the remnants of cut content can also be annoying. Not only are they proof of what we missed out on, but sometimes they’re a sign of anti-consumer design. A feature that would’ve been useful to have – and indeed was in a previous game – may have been removed because it isn’t conducive to recurrent revenue mechanics being as profitable as they could be. That may not be quite as insidious as removing content in order to sell it as downloadable content, but it’s still lacking in goodwill! Whatever the case, there have been some memorable remnants of missing and removed features in basketball video games over the years. Here are five that spring to mind for me.

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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!

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 basketball games that I’d love to add to my retro rotation in 2026.

With such a large collection of basketball video games and a predisposition for retro gaming, I’m not too bothered by my disinterest in more recent releases. Moreover, between a MyCAREER and historical matchups in NBA 2K14, a co-op NBA 2K9 Bulls Association with Dee, and a Bulls Dynasty in NBA Live 16, my retro basketball gaming rotation already has some enjoyable fixtures. There are also a handful of other retro favourites that frequently find their way back into my rotation, including NBA 2K17, NBA 2K6, and NBA Live 10.

Of course, there’s always room for other favourites! Furthermore, as fun as it is to have a retro kick begin unexpectedly and on a whim, there are some games that I’d like to make an effort to bring back into my rotation and enjoy anew. There was a time when I felt that certain games were getting too old to enjoy, but suffice it to say that I’ve changed my mind about that! Indeed, between unfinished business, playing different modes, and adding new content with mods, those old favourites can offer many fresh experiences. It remains to be seen how many of these titles re-enter my retro rotation, but they’re at the top of the list of games I’d love to revisit more often.

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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 classic teams in the College Hoops series.

It’s well-known that EA Sports included a variety of classic teams in their college basketball video games, in no small part because they ended up being the catalyst for Ed O’Bannon’s lawsuit against the NCAA. Their infamy arguably overshadows the inclusion of classic teams in the College Hoops series, but 2K’s games did indeed feature a complement of historical squads as well. Considering my current preference for indulging my nostalgia and passion for basketball history, they’re an incentive to consider spending more time with the two College Hoops titles that I own!

Time will tell if those games will crack my rotation. As far as their NBA counterparts are concerned, I do enjoy NBA 2K7, but I’m not a fan of NBA 2K8. For now though, let’s talk about the historical content in the College Hoops games. As you may expect, there’s a generous selection of retro squads spanning decades of college basketball history, though the array of teams did change slightly every year. So, what were the classic teams in College Hoops like, and why didn’t they lead to the same controversy that befell EA’s NCAA titles? Let’s take a look back…way back…

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #620 of the NLSC Podcast!

The NBA 2K series has been packed full of retro content for over a decade now, but despite some major additions throughout the years, the overall quality still leaves us wanting. After reflecting on the issue of quantity over quality and the general lack of care for classic teams and players, we join the community in discussing how we’d enhance the retro content in future NBA 2K games. From fixes and updates that are absolutely essential to some more ambitious ideas that would make the retro content even more fun to use, there’s plenty that can and should be done. We also touch on how this lack of attention to detail is also already affecting the new collegiate content that recently debuted in NBA 2K.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 52:48 — 36.6MB)

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!

From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #617 of the NLSC Podcast!

The PlayStation 4 and Xbox One generation of NBA 2K games – and their PC ports beginning with NBA 2K15 – saw some fantastic hits, but also a couple of disappointing misses. With that in mind, how would we personally rank the eighth gen NBA 2K releases? That’s the challenge before us this week, as we take a look back and rank NBA 2K14 through NBA 2K20 from worst to best. As you’ll hear, it was tough to separate a couple of the generation’s best NBA 2K titles that have also become some of our all-time favourite basketball video games, but between gameplay, modes, content, and overall vibe, we had ample criteria to devise rankings that we stand behind.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 45:23 — 31.5MB)

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!

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 swansong of the original Roster Player concept in 1999 season releases.

It’s New Year’s Eve, so I’m sure that many of us are ready to party like it’s 1999…or at least, those of us who are old enough to get that reference are, anyway! Ham-fisted pop culture references aside, while I wouldn’t say that 1999 has been on my mind all throughout 2025, it has come up a couple of times in Wayback Wednesday features in the form of NBA Live 99. Granted, the game was actually released in 1998 and only the PC version featured updated rosters via an official patch, but it remains a 1999 season release, albeit one that had to launch with final 1998 rosters due to the lockout.

This meant that NBA Live 99 still included a Roster Player on the Chicago Bulls in place of Michael Jordan, who officially retired in early 1999 as the lockout drew to a close. To that end, while the 1998 season was MJ’s last until his comeback with the Washington Wizards, his Roster Player remained active on the virtual hardwood in 1999 season releases. It marked the final use of a Roster Player, at least as the concept was originally devised. As we prepare to leave 2025 behind, let’s take a look back – way back – at an overlooked milestone in basketball gaming.

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