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Back to Gaming: Sports Games

Not only am I home with the flu, but I'm incredibly busy updating Command Post at a feverish rate.

I have not forgotten about the series on gaming. We will get back to that tonight, if not today.

I thought we'd move away from console-specific talk today and bring on some game-genre awards. I've gotten a lot of email in support of covering the more modern consoles, so we will open this category up to all games, but break them down. Cast your nominations for:

Best Sports Game for console or PC.

Please make nominations for pre-Playstation and post Playstation eras and, if you so desire, coin-op games.

Comments

Best Console Sports Game Ever: NHL 95 for the Sega Genesis. I mean, really, has ever a sports game been so much fun to play with your friends?

Also nominate Madden '03, which is one of the only new sports games worth playing. Most of the new games do nothing for me. Sure they're good, but in reality they're nothing more than minor updates to last year's versions.

Super TechmoBowl

SNK Baseball All-Stars, hands down. The more games you win, the more money you spend to improve your team. Unless you use the cheat codes, this forces you to decide between a power hitter at third, or somebody who can actually make the throw to first without bouncing two or three times. Not only fun to play the game, but great to strategize how to improve your team.

Tecmo was awesome, too. For a little nostalgia, you can play it here: http://web.utanet.at/nkehrer/ONE_Play.html

Forgot to mention that this was an original NES game. And it's Baseball Stars, not All-Stars. But it still rocks.

tecmo bowl for nintendo, somewhere in the early 90's. i sat thru many battles between my husband and his pals. actually, that's how i learned the rules of football and can spot offsides a mile away!

Get well soon! Apparently this year's flu takes one look at the flu shot and it's all like, "You ain't shit, byetch."

Anyway, you should get some rest. You won't be able to post at all if you make yourself sick.

Signed,
Your Mother

Super Tecmo Bowl, hands down.

I could yell and rant about this game but all I need to say is : Jay Schroeder to Bo Jackson, 99-yard pass, touchdown.

Next play, Jay Schroeder to Bo Jackson, 99-yard pass, touchdown.

Next play, Jay Schroeder to Bo Jackson...

You have been robbed!foosl!heathens!!WTF happened?You should have won at least three of the categories in the Blogger Awards!They're all oput of order!!!!

"I could yell and rant about this game but all I need to say is : Jay Schroeder to Bo Jackson, 99-yard pass, touchdown. "

Also do not attempt kicks against the Ny Giants (LT) or KC Chiefs (Derrick Thomas).

For the PC:

Star-League Baseball - Little stick figures that looked like ducks. One view. So much goddamned fun.

Micro-League Baseball - An early sim that allowed you keep all kinds of stats and had loads of expansion packs. Graphics were cheesy but it always had the graphic commentary like, "A bloop single" etc.

Console:

NHLPA 93 - One of the most fun hockey games ever and immortalized in the movie 'Swingers.' "Make Gretky bleed!"

Madden 2003.

Ice Hockey for the original NES. Of course, I could just be getting nostalgic.

Console Pre-Playstation : Tecmo Superbowl
Console Post-Playstation : SSX3
Coin-Op - Cyber-ball

Ooooh dang! Forgot a great one for the Genesis :

MUTANT LEAGUE FOOTBALL!!

Love SSX3, but I have been absolutely hooked on Tiger Woods golf for the Xbox lately. And I don't even like golf (drink carts excepted).

I can only think of one sports game that I've every particularly even liked playing:
Olympic Decathalon, for Apple ][+. A fairly interesting (although oftimes ludicrous) set of challenges for the limited controls of the time, too... (Two-joystick-button running and, in the 110 meter hurdles, jumping. A version of the 1000 meter race where the main challenge is steering the runner, since those olympic runners are always colliding with fences around the track in endurance races. And some good, multi-part timing and angling challenges for the jumping and throwing stuff parts of the decathalon.)
Plus, you got to hear passible 1-voice versions of your athlete's national anthem when you win an event, and a longer one at the end of the game...

I second the SNK Baseball Stars. If I remember correctly, there was a pre-programmed team made up of TV and movie monsters. Lurch batting clean-up was a guaranteed homerun.

Of course, if I'm thinking of a different game, I may have to try googling a little harder.

NES: Baseball Stars, Baseball Simulator 3000, Techmo Super Bowl
Genesis: Greatest Heavyweights
N64: Ken Griffy Baseball
PS: The NBA Live Series
PS2: NCAA Football 2004
Gamecube: Rocky

I had Olympic Decathalon! That game rocked! I liked the 400 meters, where you had to steer a cursor around the track as it picked up speed. Or the pole vault, which was relatively impossible. Or the discus, where you either set a record or clanged the blip into the side of the cage.

But, obviously, Super TecmoBowl.

Bo Jackson was unbeatable.

Derrick Thomas and LT were indeed capable (?!!) of blocking extra points.

Christian Okoye and Barry Word were an unstoppable power combo.

On a breakaway, you could ensure a touchdown by breaking out the SIN curve up/down running style.

Houston had the best vertical attack.

ALSO: Special props to Larry Bird & Dr. J Go One-on-One for the Apple ][+.

I have to go with Hyper Olympic

God, the feeling of releasing the hammer at just the right instant...(you know, the game came out just before the end of virginity)

Blades of Steel for the original NES. And there was a robot baseball game (Base Wars?) for the NES, too. Extra points since I don't generally like sports games.

Major League Baseball for the Intellivision. It was a good, playable game, it even had crowd cheering noises, and it had an umpire who sounded kinda like Satan -- "YER OUT!" :)

console: i'm torn. what about Mike Tyson's PuunchOut? that was awesome!! The whole Madden series was awesome too.

coin-op: c'mon people, you mean nobody else liked "10 Yard Fight"???

Madden 2004. Gotta love the Playmaker and improved hot routes. Can't wait for 2005 to come out, so the Cowboys are better.

NES Tecmo Super Bowl

"On a breakaway, you could ensure a touchdown by breaking out the SIN curve up/down running style." "AB"

Gee, and I was running cosine curves! ::smacks forehead:: No wonder.

;-)

/math geek mode

NHL 2001 for PSOne. As far as hockey games go, it's da bomb. I play that all the time, over NHL 2003 for GameCube. Damn controller.

There was a perverse football/rugby arcade game I remember where you had essentially killed the other team players as you went about scoring. You could spear a guy, set them on fire etc.

Damn...I can't remember it name.

anyone know where to get the codes for Baseball Stars?