NFL2K1 Appreciation Thread....

[Rocky]

People want to talk about Tecmo Super Bowl, Gameday 98, Madden 03, and NFL2K5 pushing the genre foward......this game REALLY pushed the football gaming forward.

It took a barebones game in NFL2K and polished it tremendously. More than any game ever....and yes that includes NFL2K5 and Madden 09, teams played to their proper play styles. The Vikings and Rams were monsters in the air and threw the ball constantly. Pittsburgh and Tampa had a great D and Denver had a monsterous running game.

Also, the first game that I can really remember online gaming being really big. I can recall playing some active posters here even back then (wwharton comes to mind).

There were some big flaws (throwing animations, unstoppable out route, etc.) but it was a truly awesome game.

Any other memories for this game?

[stiffarmleft]

Probably one of my most anticipated games ever. I remember it being impossible to run on 2k but 2K1 addressed that problem and others. Great game, great series.

[dal_hawk]

What made NFL2k so memorable to me was it being my first game for Dreamcast. I also remember how much more complex the game announcers were in comparison to any other games that were out at the time. There was that brief time where Sega owned the best machine on the market... just sad that it wasn't designed to compete in the longer run vs. PS2.

[DaveDQ]

NFL 2K1 was my first online sports gaming experience with the DC and the attachable keyboard to type "GG" (good game) at the end of a game.

From there I got involved in Dricas, which wasn't spectacular but I did meet some good guys. We went on to form a league and had some fun. We still game together to this day.

[spankdatazz22]

NFL2K1 was a great game; it was the last non-Madden game I think my friends really got into. While I acknowledge it's pushing the football genre forward, I think that the primary reason was it was the first online football game. I think Madden '03 took that formula and factored it x10. That was right when Madden's popularity was at a fever-pitch, with weekend tournaments sprouting everywhere and people playing the game non-stop, either at all night parties or online. If the Tiburon crew didn't completely screw up the formula with Madden '04 who knows where the title would've gone.

Imo NFL2K5 really became the game that was ahead of it's time because it excelled in so many areas that are still benchmarks today - in part because of the ineptness of Tiburon, but also in part because the 2K crew seemed to have a grasp of where football titles needed to go. Presentation, OL/DL interaction, DB/WR interaction, QB play, etc. were just a few of the areas where the game was way ahead of it's time. Some of those ideas were refined some in APF, and of course APF plays better but don't think it had the impact 2K5 had across the board. If 2K5 had been able to progress naturally instead of being cut off at the knees by exclusivity, I can only imagine where the title would be now. Think about the things that would be more refined now:

- like VIP which was ideal for football games/scouting opponents. If they could've grew in a way to replicate offensive/defensive player placement it would've been like playing a human opponent
- maximum tackling; Madden's STILL playing catch up
- all team uniforms and the years the teams wore them. At default

There's a lot I'm not thinking of, but think those are some of the reasons I think 2K5 was the more impactful football game, and perhaps the one game that impacted every other sports game across the board

[PantherBeast_OS]

Well 2k1 was a good football game in that day. But that is the past and this is the present.

[sb24]

Quote: Originally Posted by Pantherbeast

Well 2k1 was a good football game in that day. But that is the past and this is the present.

Its a shame the present is poor quality. Look at madden 09.

[bukktown]

2k1 was great. I had a roomate that year who loved it as much as I did and we would play every day. Another thing that was fun about 2k1 was that you could create your own defensive plays and save them to your playbook.