Why sports video games suck
by Chris 2 comments Leave a comment July 22nd, 2008
<Nerd Rant>
I love sports video games. I’ve got no trouble admitting it.
I don’t doubt that I’ve spent more time playing sports video games than watching the Real Deal on TV (Although as I’m getting older and lazier, that’s probably going change). After more than eight years of playing the NBA 2K series, I often find myself cheering for players on TV merely because they helped destroy one of my brothers in our digital skirmishes.
But sports games are far from perfect. The move from last-gen to current-gen consoles smoothed out some problems and made the games look more real, but major issues still linger. I chalk that up to the increasing cost and complexity of making video games and the rigid yearly release schedule for sports games. Hey game publishers,what if you charged a little more, released roster updates and patches, and released updates every two years? Please!
Anywho, this dude at ESPN’s Page 2 has a pretty extensive list of his continuing gripes with sports games, including:
- Crappy basketball defensive controls
- CPU cheating
- Scary faces
- Inaccurate rosters (Despite game console’s internet connections)
- Lack of accurate playing styles for players and teams
- Superstar bench players
- Unstoppable and exploitable “money” plays
- Weak AI
This guy clearly knows his stuff, and there isn’t much to add to his list. But here goes anyways…
Superstar Juggernaut
The flipside of the superstar bench player. I know Kobe Bryant is awesome at scoring. I know Peyton Manning is a great passer, but the former shouldn’t be able to score 75 points every game, and the latter shouldn’t be able to pass for 500 yard every game. Dial it back!
Massacre the color commentators
If you can’t pay enough $$$ to get your color commentator to record more than a dozen stories, then LEAVE HIM OUT OF THE GAME. (If you ever played NBA 2K7, you were likely regaled by the amazing story of how Jerry Stackhouse’s went back to UNC and got his degree during the offseason. You likely heard this story every single time you played with Dallas Mavericks.)
If you’re gonna cheat, do it better
The computer often cheats to get itself back into the game to make things more exciting. That sucks. But what sucks even more is when the computer cheats to help your human opponent come back. Usually that comes in the form of your superstar missing ridiculously easy shots or screwing up insane open passes. If you’re gonna cheat, don’t make it so obvious!
Pause THIS
Don’t let me opponent pause the game during the game. Make everyone wait for dead balls or timeouts. That goes for online and local play.
</Nerd Rant>
There is a lot about sports games that bugs me. They are far too arcadey for my tastes. How come I can rack up like 60 points in a 10 minute Madden game? All while just using 3 plays. I feel like they should have arcade modes and simulation modes. I know not everyone wants to play one game for more than a half hour, but you should have the option. If you were to play such a long game though you would have ridiculous scores. They should make it so the computer plays intelligent defense and that you have to as well. You should have to play smart offense too. It should let you learn about the game and understand it at a deeper level than “Brady to Moss ROCKS!” or “Kobe drives repeatedly”.
Also, I hate how fake the movements look. They could work a little on how your character moves when you switch their direction. I’ve seen games execute this properly in other genres.
I bet I could beat all the guys in the photo at real football.