Running video games (and consoles) thread

There were a lot of things the 2K sports games did better than EA. That's why I was sad to see the competition between the two all but die out.

 

A source at EA has already told ESPN the series will continue.

 

Well, the 2K hoops games were better. Can't speak to football or baseball. Never played MLB 2K.

 

It's been so long since I've played a 2K football game. So, I don't recall specifically what I liked better. But I remember that there were areas that beat the heck out of Madden. Just can't remember what they were.

 

Football is the sport that would least be affected by an NCAA pullout, because other than the title and a few logos, there's very little NCAA branding in the game. So long as the teams, conferences and bowls are free to continue licensing their marks to video game makers, most everything else stays the same. It might hurt a little more for a basketball game because they wouldn't be able to include the Final Four brand, but that in and of itself wouldn't drive sales -- so long as you can have a big tournament at the end of the season to determine a champion, who in hell cares what it's called?

The O'Bannon case is a potential problem, but even then, how can they prohibit a school or conference from licensing its own marks? Or how can they legally mandate that DE#7 or AUTOFIRSTNAME AUTOLASTNAME for South Carolina doesn't play an awful lot like Jadeveon Clowney? The only way out of that is random numbers and automated names that can't be changed by users. And modders always find exploits -- the collective mind that gave us 2012 names and stats for Tecmo Super Bowl can navigate whatever roadblocks a legal finding would throw at it -- presuming any could be built at all.

Could the NCAA pressure schools and conferences not to license to video games? Obviously right now they're saying that the schools can market as they see fit, but I tend to doubt that's the end of that conversation.

 

And that's 121 (or whatever the Number of D-1 teams it is these days) different legal offices who have to sign off on it instead of 1. I imagine that'd be the biggest hurdle.

 

2K's NFL series was freaking sweet. At the time, it was much better than anything Madden brought to the table.

As far as its baseball series goes, the first couple of years it was pretty good. Then the franchise fell apart after 2K promised to update several things in the game and didn't follow through.

 

They've made Madden so detailed now, it's not fun to play.

To me, video games shouldn't add to the aggravation of life.

 

I don't know that I have this qualm with Madden yet, but I definitely do with baseball games (at least the 2K). There's so much going on, that it annoys me. Maybe I sound like a grumpy old man, but IMO Ken Griffey Jr. Baseball for the N64 was the most entertaining baseball game I played (IIRC the only thing that kept it form perfection was the lack of a franchise mode). Pitching/hitting/fielding is too complex for me these days.

 

Have invites been sent out for our league yet?

 

I'm the opposite when it comes to baseball. I love that The Show has made everything as realistic as possible. 2K failed -- terribly -- in that aspect.

 

I have never played The Show. But every time I play 2K, I just miss the days when all I had to do was put a circle in the right spot and hit A to hit.