The Blog for the Sports Gamer

This morning, like every morning, I check out the news headlines. I see this article on the front page of CNN.

No big surprise here, as we all knew this was coming, but read the article. An 85 year old grammy goes to EB to say, hey my grandson likes the game with the drugs and the hos and even though he’s 12, I’m going to buy him a Mature game. Now it’s AO and oh my god I can’t believe I did that.

Hmm, I smell a $3.00 off your next Rockstar game coupon and $3 billion for the lawyer type settlement, don’t you. Shit like this is what should be in tort reform.

In other news, Sammy with the spikes up sliding into home. I don’t know if it was a good baseball move or a horrid attempt to knock the guy out. Either way the O’s lost after leaving the bases loaded in pretty much every inning, so they kinda deserve it. I hate baseball at the moment, btw.

One of the websites that I write for has undergone a massive site redesign. I like it. I also like the letter grades over the “star” system. I think it’s obvious what a “C” game means compared to 2.5 stars or 73%. Personally, I like the thumbs up/down system but that’s just me.

Today my review of Hot Shots Golf for the PSP is now live. Check it out here.

Grey Dog Software has released some new screens for this text based college game. They’re about to start beta testing so development is moving right along.

1. The latest FIFA rankings are out and USA is #6. That’s ahead of some big European names — France, Italy, Germany and England to name a few. Pretty impressive stuff!

2. The Orioles continue to suck. Bases loaded TWICE and zero runs? How much more can you blow? You suck so bad that a player vetoed a trade to you! It’s really starting to get depressing.

3. Courtney “Yoko” Love is at it again with Dave Grohl. Yeah, Dave is taking money out of your kids mouth. Luckily Courtney never spends her money on drugs, right?

Check out this research analysis editorial about IGN and Gamespot sports reviews over at Glen Haag’s website. It’ sa good read and got me thinking about my own flow chart.

In digging up my arhcived reviews in ky hard drive I found thi:

Madden:
2005: 3/5 stars
2004: 82%
2003: 4.5 stars (I really did love this version)
2002: 3/5 stars
2001: 3.5/5 stars
2000: 4/5 stars (I was wrong. This should not have been given that high a score)

NBA Live:
2005: 4/5
2004: 3/5
2003: 76%
2002: 2.5/5
2001: 3/5
2000: 88%

NHL:
2005: 2/5
2004: 3.5/5
2003: 78%
2002: 3/5
2001: 4/5
2000: 3/5

I have no idea what this says, but I do find it interesting. I need to dig up the Sega reviews, too.

The first of my trifecta of sports reviews is now showing up over at Gameshark. Today, it’s MLB for the PSP. I love the game, what can I say. I’m also happy to say, I don’t have to use fucking sliders all day to enjoy the game, unlike some other turd..hmm what could I be talking about…

Next up is Hot Shots Golf and then the biggie — NCAA 2006. I just know that frequent poster NCAA 2004 will just LOVE my review. Love it.

Speaking of comments, Bill has a good one in the comments section of Todd’s post. I guess I’m in the minority on this game as well. But, just becuase you’re in the minority doesn’t mean you’re wrong. :).

For the life of me, regardless of your thoughts on the game; how this game could receive 9’s on certain websites just boggles my mind. The GamePro review is quite simply 8 paragraphs of fact sheet and one paragraph of analysis. Every year, I see the same thing: in the rush to get out the review, glaring issues are ignored. Of course everyone is looking for that first review. (Madden’s is in GamePro as well, but I’ll give them some slack as the game went gold in 1840. Or June, your mileage may vary).

Let me get one thing out there in my typical unbiased way: RACE FOR THE HEISMAN IS A TERRIFIC TURD. IT IS A HUGE PIECE OF SHIT AND BEARS NO ACTUAL RESEMBLANCE TO COLLEGE FOOTBALL. IF YOU SAID IT’S A GREAT NEW FEATURE IN YOUR REVIEW, YOU ARE A COMPLETE FUCKING MORON.

There. I don’t think my blood pressure has ever elevated that much from a review.

Here’s some tasty morsels from the first game of season 2 of my RftH. It was Michigan vs. Central Michigan at The Big House. While I eventually won 21-7, it was a joke of a game and by halftime I was too steamed to even try to playing the “right” way.

• Six interceptions by each QB (I got some frustrated I just started flinging the ball, maybe the AI QB did the same)
• I was 12/42; the AI QB was 10/42 thanks in part to…
• With the catching slider maxed out at 99, I still had eight wide open drops by Michigan receivers, with two each credited to my top two wide receivers (with 89 and 91 Catching ratings respectively). The sliders in this game are bullshit. There’s just no other way to say it. I can’t even blame HFA or the composure features of the game since I had Michigan at home against lowly Central Michigan. What the hell?
• The AI QB would not stop throwing the deep ball to whichever receiver had lined up on the left side. I mean it did throw elsewhere, but I basically just called my defense, took control of the safety and doubled whomever lined up on that side the entire game. The Chippewas were completely helpless after I did that.

If I continue to have games like this it’s getting shelved as soon as I finish up my RftH. I hate WR drops on short open routes. Hate ‘em. It’s why I passed on NCAA 2005 altogether. If I max out the catching slider there should *never* be a drop by a wide open receiver. Never. That’s the whole goddam point of having the slider and it makes me nuts that it basically has no effect on the game whatsoever.

• Appleton is a wonderful town. I think I saw two mom & pop bookstores while driving down the College Ave. in the downtown area. That’s two more than I’ve seen in the last fifteen years (at least it feels like it). If you have cause to visit, be sure to grab a bite at Good Eats, which has some tasty steak dinners (among many other things, but being at a wedding rehearsal dinner our menu was limited).
• You know you’re a parent when -after cutting your finger- you find yourself applying a Care Bears band-aid to it. Ugh.
• Trying to keep your 19-month old off the dance floor at a wedding reception is impossible.
• Trying to keep your 19-month old from running around in the rain at the outdoor day-after get together is impossible. (30% chance of rain my ass)
• Trying to get your 3 or 19-month old to do anything you want them to do (say sit still or stop crying) in potentially embarrassing social situation is beyond impossible. Nothing like trying to calm a crying baby and make an antsy toddler sit still during the dinner blessing and the various toasts when your wife is part of the wedding party and unable to help.
• Depth perception may not be an attribute my daughter is blessed with. At an “Oasis” rest stop outside Chicago we were having lunch. Little Ana stood up on her chair, took one step forward (like she was walking the plank) and promptly face-planted on the hard floor. That is a scream I’d like to never hear again. (I’m not sure if it was Ana’s or mine, because that scared the ever-living shit out of me.) I’m absolutely stunned that she came away with her face intact, aside from a rather nasty bruise just above her eye. I still can’t fathom what sequence of firing (or misfiring) synapses in that child’s head made her think it was a good idea to just step off a chair.
• Untold Legends for the PSP is fun for the first six hours and mindlessly repetitive after that.
• Driving for seven hours straight with two kids under the age of two is a mistake (no shock there).
• Never stay at the hotel closest to the wedding reception. Drunk ass f#!$ers all end up staying on the same floor and not shutting up until your third complaint call to the front desk at 2am gets the asshats thrown out. (True story. Though it did save us $80 on the room for that night.)
• Coming home is nice. Having to clean up cat droppings all over the bathroom and living room floor not so much (something’s wrong with that cat) . The dozen tiny ants I found crawling around in our kitchen didn’t help.
• Having your 3-month old sleep from 9:30 to 4:30 (by far shattering his prior record) is awesome.

It’s been a very rough week but I’m starting to get back in the swing of things. Right now we’re going through that, “We just lost a dog so let’s get a new one” phase. I think that’s pretty common. The problem is that we have a ten year old dog, who lost her daily companion, so she seems just as depressed as the rest of us. Do we get a puppy now and house train it before we move in April? We’re also going on a week’s vacation to Florida in January and who do we get to watch a new pup? Should we wait until we move so that we can keep this house relatively clean and not ‘puppied”? I think we’re just going to wait until we move. I have been given the green light by Mary to get another dog at some point, which is nice because I know she’s not really a pet person. I need to find breeds that are “low shed”. Any advice? Mutts scare me because you never know how they will shed, being mixed and all. Pure breds scare me because they tend to be in bred to the point of insanity. So I’m open to to ideas.

It’s times like this when writing is very theraputic for me. I was only given 300 words for my NCAA review for CGM which is really unfortunate because I could write a 20 page book chapter on the game. Dan has the Gameshark review so he can talk a lot more about it in ‘print’. Monday my best friend, who has finally moved back to Columbus from Philly, comes over so we can start our multiplayer hot seat Dynasty. I enjoy NCAA 06 as a head to head, same machine game. As a solo game, I think it’s average at best. This is after 3 weeks playing the game nearly every day, I just cannot get past some of its solo play problems. I know I am in the minority on this as most of the folks at DSP and Operation Sports love the game, but I’d by lying to you if I said I was hooked on this like I was NCAA 2004. I’m just not. I hope that when EA moves on to the next gen consoles that someone writes in big block letters on a whiteboard that it should be easier to complete a 7 yard square out than it is to complete a 40 yard bomb.

Anyway, I watched a really bad movie last night. Anyone seen The Village? I missed it in the theater and never did hear the “twist” so I was in fresh. Holy cow what a bad movie.

I’m off to play my Sunday basketball at the rec center. On that front my ankles have been holding up very well of late. Someone that I play with on Tuesday nights gave me a couple of “Sport” ankle braces that are lightweight and work extremely well. Of course, as I say that my ankles are doomed.

Just got the latest GamePro, and there’s a 2 page spread for Burnout: Revenge due out Sept 20th. The good news is that there’s a demo on the Madden 2006 game (for Xbox and PS2 only)…well, you know, since GameCube sucks :).

Other gamepro tidbits:
* System Shock 2 is a good game (duh).
* there’s a scantily clad babe poster.
* there’s an Xbox 360 article that is total marketing hype
* 24 the game doesn’t look great
* Blockbuster charges $7 per rental? Why would you use that and not Gamefly? Holy crap.
* They give Madden a 5. EA whores. No i haven’t read the review, but it’s fun to say.

Today I can’t seem to get to msn.com, microsoft.com or hotmail.com. My Verizon MSN Premium isn’t working either. Anyone else having this problem? Verizon thinks I’m clueless.

So Sony killed Road to Sunday. All I can say is, glad I got paid for writing that preview. Next time, maybe I’ll just make shit up for that one (joke…I keeed). No one knows the real reason but I’m guessing “too much like the GTA crap to really be cutting edge” or “no actual football content”. I was curious but skeptical…now we will never know.

Of course, maybe they have already sold it to Rockstar for some special mod. Have you seen the mod? Damn. Their stock price should be going up for all the news they just made. I mean come on, this is an old game. Do gamers really care at this point? Probably not.

I had to put my 12 year old dog to sleep on Tuesday. Driving to the vet that day was one of the most difficult things I have ever had to do in my entire life. I’ll spare you the details. I bought Paden from the pound back in the summer of 1993 for the grand total of $19 when I was in college. When I got him he was approximately 3-4 months old and had 5 days left before he was going to be destroyed. The way I look at it I gave him an extra 12 years. He defined the term mutt. He was also a fantastic dog. Going through this is part of being a pet owner, but it doesn’t change the fact that it really, really sucks. It’s like losing a member of your family.

Because of that I haven’t really felt like blogging or playing games the past few days. I’ll try to get back into the swing of things soon. I did hear on DSP that Sony has cancelled its Road to Sunday football game for reasons unknown so there goes another option.

Well, another 9th inning f’up by the Orioles. What a surprise. And they aren’t going to pull the trigger on Burnett. Grreeat. Well that follows the brilliant move of designating James “1.50 ERA” Baldwin for assignment and keeping Steve “Fat ass” Kline. They apparently have no interest in winning the AL this year. Congrats to the Red Sox and Yankees.

In other more depressing news, Tedy Bruschi has announced he will not play for the Patriots this year. From a humane standpoint, I absolutely think this is the right decision. You don’t have a stroke and then start playing unless you like death. From a Patriots fan standpoint, this is a real crushing blow for the team.

Guess I’m really going to focus my sports watching on the Revolution…and hey, the Bruins start soon, right?

Tomorrow I’m off for a luxurious trip to Appleton, Wisconsin, also known as my wife is in a wedding on Friday and I get to be mother and father to our kids for a couple days. Why she can’t go and leave the kids with me isn’t quite clear, but I think it has something to do with showing them off while I stand quietly nearby and try not to look too bored/miserable. So my posting will be sparse to non-existent until next week.

On the NCAA front I did have two enjoyable games over the past two days. I upped the pass protect and hands sliders to max and in games against Ohio State and Nebraska the result was fewer than five sacks and closer to five drops than ten (per game). That may be coincidence, but at least it’s a nod in the right direction as I actually had time to see routes develop before passing the ball. I do however find that it’s hard not to rely on a fly route or two in desperate situations. Against Nebraska I was trailing 10-3 in the 3rd quarter, in a third and long situation from the goalline. On the next play I got Breaston in one-on-one coverage on a fly route down the right sideline. Just tap the pass button and bam: 100-yard TD play. True, I really didn’t know it would work since I’ve been actively trying not to exploit the deep ball A.I., but it felt like cheating all the same.

Anyway, that completed my first season in RftH. This mode continues to underwhelm. Every fan letter the entire season talked about how so-and-so heard how good I was in high school and how much they were looking forward to seeing me play. Every single one. Nothing about us getting our brains beat in against Iowa. Nothing about beating Ohio State or winning a bowl game. Just, “I’m looking forward to seeing you play.” I mean did EA even try to do a decent job implementing this worthless feature? On the upside, I get a new and nicer dorm room for season 2. Weeeeee!

The other big news (well, for me), is that my new TV arrived yesterday (ordered from Crutchfield.com). Last year we went the home theater route with a projector, and as much as it is the best money I’ve ever spent, it’s really only useful in the evening when you can sit down and really watch something, as opposed to using it for casual viewing in the mornings or after work. I had my Xbox hooked up to it, but I don’t like wasting its lamp hours managing rosters in Xbox sports games so I moved it back to our old tube TV. That would be fine, but the projector has me hooked on widescreen/480p gaming and HDTV, so I’ve been dying to get just a smallish HDTV for the main room. Enter Sony’s 30″ XS tube. It may have a huge footprint. It may not be the largest screen. It may be heavier than my car. But damn does this thing look fine (DVDs in particular). Passing in NCAA is particularly nice, what with the widescreen format giving a better view of the field. On Monday Insight comes to install a cable card so I can get their HD lineup without the need for a cable box. My senses are all aflutter.