SportsBlahg

I have one of the greatest jobs in the world: I work with video games. Yesterday at work, we were discussing the great NHL ‘94 hockey and the one move you could make that would nearly guarantee you a score (yes, this is the kind of stuff we discuss in my office). Thinking about this further, I figured I could make a list of the most sure-fire sports gaming moves of all-time:

#5: The One-Timer, NHL Hitz 20-03 (Midway): The return of hockey for barbarian’s sake was a great move by Midway. The only problem? It wasn’t “real hockey,” so it turned away many of the fans of the NHL (all 12 of them, in fact). But this game did turn a lot of people on to hockey: the ones who just like to kick ass. The one secret I noticed in this game was the “one-timer” - simply passing from one player to another, who upon getting the puck promptly fires it at the net. And by fires, I mean that literally… he fires it. No wonder this move almost always guarantees you a goal: I wouldn’t want a flaming puck flung in my face, either.

#4: The Long-Range Jumpshot, NCAA Basketball (Nintendo): Back in 1992, this game was competing with the likes of “Arch-Rivals” and “Bill Lambeer’s Combat Basketball.” But this game was different - it only featured the elite D-1 schools in five conferences (no room for the Ohio Valley Conference here… move along). The best part was where you shot the ball from didn’t matter. You had relatively the same percentage if you shot it from half-court or right on the 3-point line. Not to mention you could play zone defense (as opposed to “punch the guy in the face” defense). There was never any point in getting the ball beyond than half-court; that would just be a waste of time when you can drain it from 3/4 court (and, of course, make it look like a jump shot).

#3: The Loop, NHL ‘94 (EA Games): The loop around was SUCH a cool move - a move that EA eventually fixed - that allowed you to circle around the goaltender and score on the other end. For some reason, superstars like Felix Potvin, Ed Belfour, Chris Osgood, Olaf Kolzid & Martin Brodeur were not quick enough to move to the other end of the net and deflect the shot. This typically led to final scores of 18-16 between my friend and I. Regardless of whether I played it on Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo, the scores were less like a hockey game, and more like a WNBA game.

#2: The Block, NBA Jam (Midway): This arcade classic was the epitome of the flash and pizazz that has since taken over the NBA. It was two-on-two full court basketball! It doesn’t get more showboat than that. The key to this game was timing your jumps on the defensive end. If you had a guy like Shawn Kemp (who had just three kids at the time… and a slimmer 250-pound frame) or Dikembo Mutombo or even Bill Cartwright, all you had to do was jump at the exact right moment and you could block every single shot (3-pointer, jump shot, dunk). It didn’t matter who shot it, Marv Albert’s ”OH! RE-JECTED!” would chime in every time. This game needed this move, since it lacked the one fundamental other thing that would’ve made it sell itself: Michael Jordan.

#1: The Zig-Zag, Tecmo Super Bowl Football (Tecmo): Who could forget the mother of all cheap plays? Simply run the old Bo Jackson to the weak side (that’s to the left for all you non-football fans) and he’s off to the races. Or, just run him, period: 

There was never a challenge in playing as the Raiders in Tecmo. Why? Because Bo knows cheap moves.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 13th, 2007 at 5:33 pm and is filed under College Basketball, Basketball, Hockey, Football. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.