![]() ![]() Like Track & Field before it, Wii Sports found a new way to recreate boxing, bowling, golf, tennis, and baseball that proved so compelling even non-gamers had to get involved. That was the transcendental genius of Nintendo’s unit shifter. Their mum would poke their head in to say hello, and then - “Oh! What’s this? And you control it just by moving that thing around, do you?”Īnd suddenly you’re in an impromptu boxing match with your close friend’s mother, defending from a flurry of uppercuts and wondering if she’s wearing the wrist guard as instructed. There you’d be, over at a friends’ place, checking out their new Wii. Wii Sports, as you’ll remember, was catnip to parents. But by Madden 2005 the controls were that bit more lithe, the passages of play easier to understand, the opportunities to break the lines that bit more thrilling. Some say Madden NFL 2003 was the best from this era. It took the Madden series longer to find the joy in throwing, running, catching and steamrolling than its stablemates NHL and FIFA took to capture the essences of their sports, but when it did, throwing and catching a Hail Mary felt like hearing the Beatles for the first time. Madden NFL 2005 (PS2, Xbox, PC, Gamecube, 2004)ĮA Tiburon really hit on something in the early 2000s. So that QWOP could… whatever that QWOP chap does. But Track & Field walked so FIFA could run. Yes, it’s been rendered slightly primitive in the intervening 37 years of innovation. How quickly can you hammer the buttons on your Atari 2600 pad? What if you try the tea towel trick, is that cheating? These might seem like misty-eyed musings now, but it’s no exaggeration to say that in the early 80s they were the most pertinent questions on the global agenda. And arcade legend Track & Field decided on an irresistible way to capture athletic discipline in 1983: bash the ever-loving heck out of some buttons. Plus, well, we just like the way it moved.Īs much as the genre’s about capturing the glamour and the passion of the worlds we build around sport, it’s also about the physical discipline. What elevated this one was an element of swagger to its presentation, a rich and involving career mode, and a character creator that seemed to be visiting from the Tony Hawk’s franchise. But golf games had been giving us that for years prior. Sure, you had all the famous courses to stroll around in Nike slacks and a sweater vest, and a whole trading park worth of clubs to unlock, customize, and deliberate over. Using a precarious alchemy of Tiger Woods’ star power, a R&B-infused soundtrack, and simple but subtle controls, for a moment there, golf was cool. That’s just how deep Tiger Woods ’04 hit. Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2004 (PS2, Xbox, PC, 2003)Ĭhances are that Outkast song is already playing in your head after reading the header. In short, slapshots feel like they could rupture a tectonic plate, but the player movement and game speed are still convincing. The surreal, unhinged commentary from Jim Hughson and Don Taylor lives long and fondly in the memory of all who played it, as do the collectible celebrations and game modifiers that you unlocked through a prototypical Ultimate Team-like sticker book.īut above all else, NHL 2002 pitched its action perfectly, just the right side of NHL ’94-style cartoon violence without losing touch with the sport’s fundamentals. Firstly, it depicts a hockey season which actually took place, and one that featured a roster full of future Hall of Famers. We’re going to be dealing with quite a lot of long-running sports franchises that begin with that deep-voiced man telling us it’s in the game, and the first of those is NHL 2002. Ladies and gentlemen, the sports game GOATs. They’re the titles we dedicated ourselves to, and were richly rewarded for doing so. Sports games are about engines simulating and imitating life, and, above all else, making you feel like you’re performing a real sport at a top-level.īelow are the releases people still talk about, though their polygons might have wilted and their licenses expired because they took a leap forward toward perfect simulation and immersion of the stuff we shout at on TV. It’s numbers, face scans, animations, and forensically accurate kits that matter here. And yes, that is a sick stiffy, Tony Hawk’s 2, but right now we don’t care. You can keep your blue shells, Mario Kart. ![]() ![]() Competitive Starcraft is athletic as heck, and the rosters of certain Nintendo karting titles and era-defining skating games would argue strongly for their inclusion here. Sport is a broad term in gaming, of course. (Don’t worry if you can’t smell anything, this is just a webpage.) A virtual hall of fame where only the 10 absolute finest specimens of sports gaming are allowed in. ![]()
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