Now that us sports gamers have politely sat down at the sports gaming dinner table, allow me to introduce our guests of honor.

Electronic Arts have Madden and FIFA, football and soccer respectively. 2K has the NBA, and Sony subsidiary SIE San Diego has major league baseball. History lesson: 2K used to be on the baseball market until 2013 when they seceded to SIE. What would’ve been an EA Sports vs. 2K argument split to thirds when SIE became a mainstay.

Let’s also live in the real world where nobody plays NBA Live. It’s not 2005 anymore. But let’s do appreciate the intro sequence in a game that actually appreciates the dunk contest.

When 2K dropped baseball they picked up the WWE license and have been gradually trying to bring a passable wrestling game to the market. RANT: Unfortunately for 2K, their writing can be summed up asking Tommy Wiseau to write a sports equivalent of The Room. In fact, I’d be willing to bet Wiseau could craft a more unintentionally funny dialogue in WWE or the NBA 2K games that could surpass the current product. My sincerest apologies to Spike Lee but I don’t think anyone in NBA 2K16 was Livin Da’ Dream.

(back on topic…)

There’s a minimum level of decency throughout the four major sports franchises. As an owner of all four games, three of them the most recent releases (I declined to buy FIFA ‘19 since I already own ‘18), I enjoy all four games to an extent. The mechanics of each game are done well enough that it creates player vs CPU drama at the least.

Alas, that’s the bare minimum that’s to be expected from studios that have years of experience and yacht-loads of money.

Card collecting modes are a major detraction

from Andriod Central

The trouble starts to rear its ugly head when the intent of the game publishers serves to drive gamers away from purely having fun playing the game. Madden and NBA 2K are the biggest abusers of the, “Let’s advertise the ever living shit out of our card collecting modes so that we can influence players to spend real-world cash on virtual money.” MyTeam or Ultimate Team, or even Diamond Dynasty in The Show are modes that have become obsessive compulsive for gamers to collect the best players and play against other teams who also typically have the best players. You can either collect said players the hard way by sinking hundreds of hours into the game or the more convenient way by buying them with your credit card (or mommy or daddy’s for the younger audience).

Of all the four card collecting modes I’ve played, The Show’s Diamond Dynasty mode made the most sense to me. The loot box mentality is still a hefty obtrusive presence, but the in-game economy isn’t as brutal as NBA 2K’s VC system.

Card game modes wouldn’t piss me off as much if it wasn’t such a driven focus from the game publishers. In the case of Madden 19, it’s an absolute sham. The first menu screen you get is an advertisement for whatever Ultimate Team promotion is going on that particular week. It’s a damn full-screen advertisement that you have to click dismiss to get rid of. Let me repeat for emphasis: Before you can enter any mode of the game, you have look at an advertisement.

The Show’s first menu contains Diamond Dynasty promotions so it’s mostly 2K that gets away with not throwing the card game mode in your face. 2K is in the more cynical category for how it drains its user's pockets with its Virtual Currency system.

If it seems like I’m making a big deal about the virtual economies of sports video games, I am well within my right to do so. Every minute a developer of these games spends on a card game mode is time that could’ve been better spent making the single player or multiplayer modes more intrinsic, dynamic, or better to play. Instead, all four of these games have decided to put a premium on building their games around virtual economies and card collecting modes. While it’s easy to tell I’m no fan of them, I can see the appeal and there’s quite obviously a population of sports gaming fans that are addicted and are pouring out their wallets for these modes. I rather see it as a novelty mode that loses its appeal after some playing time.

Franchise mode is the definitive experience

from Sports Gamers Online

There are two modes that are important to me in sports gaming. The franchise mode, where you own and operate a team, or the single player mode, where you play as one player amongst a team. These are the key merits I judge these games on.

In both avenues, 2K and SIE are further along than the stagnant approach to these modes that EA Sports has taken. It could be argued that EA Sports developed the formula for making a time consuming enjoyable career mode in the mid-2000s. Features that existed in Madden in the late 2000s are removed in today’s iteration.

RANT: There’s nothing that pisses me off more than Madden and FIFA’s sinister lack of not tracking historical data in their games. The most egregious example in Madden is that the game doesn’t track what teams a player played on when looking at career stats. There’s no one in game design that can tell me that this isn’t just pure sinister lack of giving a shit by EA Sports.

I can hear a forum comment in my head that’s going to roast me for putting so much emphasis on the stats sheet in Madden for missing a simple feature, but I’m the same guy who was sad when Madden took out the 4th quarter comeback stat which they had in Madden ’07. What makes it so ridiculous for Madden to shortchange their statistical menus, and FIFA should get just as much gripe because they don’t even track past season stats, is that 2K and MLB The Show do the stat menus so well.

MLB The Show and NBA 2K throw a meaty bone to its franchise players. NBA 2K does the advanced analytics so well, they have a whole separate graph to compare statistics from all players across the league. If you’re a hardcore invested franchise fan, you have data that you can sink your teeth into. I personally don’t dive into it myself, frankly, I barely understand how to use the graphs let alone the advanced rotation screen, but I appreciate the fact that they’re there.

When it comes to franchise customization, NBA 2K has the upper hand. They have so many different editable settings. The offseason allows you to participate in owners meetings and decide if you want goofy ridiculous rules like overtime being ended with whoever makes the first shot. There was a moment I actually considered how preposterous yet how exciting that would be.

NBA 2K fans have a real argument with The Show when it comes to side by side comparing the franchise experience. Once 2K decided to allow expansion teams, they took a leap forward. I even appreciate that they’re attempting to make a MyGM mode despite how terribly scripted the cutscenes are.

The Show is slightly more traditional in how it presents its franchise mode, but it’s an unbeaten formula. There’s still some room to tweak and better the dramatics and storylines, and SIE tried to do that with March to October, but I think their efforts would be better focused on trying to tweak franchise rather than make a whole new mode.

FIFA’s franchise mode is quite traditional as well and it relishes in that unbeaten formula where it’s enjoyable to play games and make transfers to improve your roster. Despite not being as customizable or as fleshed out as its competitors, FIFA has the quickest games that produce lifelike results. Before the recent The Show release, I was nearly even in my time between FIFA and 2K. FIFA ‘18 is a game I should be able to enjoy for some time to come on its franchise mode alone.

The one franchise mode that I have trouble sticking with is Madden. I’ve struggled to find a challenging balance in gameplay and the roster construction side is neither cerebral or compelling. I know I’ve trashed Madden a fair bit in this breakdown, but I’ve put playing time into it, and I’ve still had a fun time playing it. There’s just too many gameplay issues I’ve come across in comparison to the bugs or faults of the other three titles.

Madden is really the only franchise experience that’s hard to enjoy for a length of time. 2K and FIFA have proven to me to be worthwhile. FIFA’s lack is in extra features that 2K has. 2K’s gameplay engine, while good, still isn’t as smooth as FIFA or The Show. I can’t speak on The Show’s depth yet, because I’ve been taking my first season nice and slow. I'm deeply invested already which is a good sign. More on investment in a moment.

Quick Online Gameplay Notes

from VG247.com

I know I’m likely doing injustice to a portion of sports gaming fans that love testing their wills and wits online in head to head matchups. I’ve competed against friends and strangers alike in each of the four titles. Playing online in sports games has never been a go-to for me. The precision with which offline play tracks your button and control stick inputs versus the imperfections of an online delay have steered me away. It’s also hard to tell if it’s an internet issue on my end, the person I’m playing against, or the game has bad servers.

All I know is this, of the four, FIFA and The Show have been the most reliable. Madden and 2K are borderline unplayable online. Timing throws, catches, and moves in Madden is so important that when it’s thrown off by a half second it greatly hinders the gameplay. 2K is more troublesome because shot timing is vastly different offline versus online. To 2K’s credit, I noticed the controller rumbles to aid shot release timing, but I figured this out on a whim while I was struggling with figuring out the online timing in MyPlayer. I have a steaming hot take later to fix this.

FIFA just didn’t have too many connection issues for me and when it is a quarter of a second slow on button prompts I play soccer with a chess mindset so I typically know where I’m going with the ball anyway. Madden and 2K have more read and instant react involved.

The Show online is harder to tell if the button prompts are off because reacting to pitches is a one-second skill regardless. To establish my skill level as a sports gamer, I’m probably average in all four with a slightly above average skill level in FIFA. In other words, I win some and I lose some.

There’s an adaptive playstyle I associate with playing sports games online because human players tend to find exploits that AI isn’t programmed to do. I encountered this issue in The Show where a player was able to steal on me because there’s an awful lag when trying to get your catcher to throw down the runner.

Single player career modes

from MobyGames

Madden was cavalier for its introduction of the ‘superstar’ concept in Madden ’06. Fast forward to today and EA Sports and 2K have each gone off the deep end trying to create single-player story modes for their games on top of having a Superstar or MyCareer mode.

2K tied its story mode together in NBA 2K15 with MyCareer mode having more of a storyline focus. NBA 2K16 entered in a Spike Lee joint and completely ruined the rookie season of MyCareer, and Visual Concepts, who has developed MyCareer, has been trying to find a balance ever since. I broke this down in another long article I did, so these are the cliff notes.

More importantly, when it comes to single player career modes, the ideal is to have a focus on gameplay while integrating story elements seamlessly. It’s a tough task admittedly when a game has to account for the dynamics of a player’s performance. 2K is of the mindset where it forgets about your in-game performance and train tracks you on the story path its set out for you.

EA Sports said forget about what made a vast amount of our audience love our games a decade ago, we’re going to stitch together the franchise and superstar mode in a connected career. I thought the concept was a refreshing take at first in Madden 25, but EA Sports continued to show a lack of effort when adding detail and story aspects to the game.

from Polygon

FIFA is just a hard game to enjoy when playing as one player. Unless there is a story to rope you in, I’d rather control everyone on the field. EA Sports decided they wanted a copy pasted story experience in both Madden and FIFA where you play as a character they’ve created for you which absolutely sucks. EA Sports hasn’t fared any better than 2K in the category of writing sports dramas. No one from Friday Night Lights is available? Remember the Titans?

I’ve sunk the most hours into MyCareer for NBA 2K. Basketball and baseball are easy sports to be an individual star in. Football should be fairly easy too but we’ve established that EA Sports couldn’t really give a shit.

The gaping wound that exists in the legacy of 2K is that its VC economy is a drip feed that forces players to grind and grind and grind and grind obsessively to unlock anything. 2K then has the unmitigated gall to joke that at least they don’t make you pay to change our hairstyle. Improving your player once you get to a 90 rating is ludicrous when you start storing up a healthy amount of VC. It’s at this point the game isn’t as fun anymore as your hard work in the game isn’t translating to any reward.

MyCareer also has a lot of PvP options I’ve started to frequent as my player improved. Playing 5 on 5 with strangers shows you all the exploitative trash that I wish could be designed out of the game.

HOT TAKE: GET RID OF THE SHOT METER (at the very least discontinue the perfect shot meter)

Once online players have upgraded their players to a certain level, everyone can be Steph Curry if they have perfect release timings. There’ll be rare occasions when 5 on 5 and 3 on 3’s can result in something resembling competitive basketball but that’s the outlier as compared to the norm.

from Forbes

The Show has it right. Minimal cutscenes. The dialogue isn’t campy unfunny garbage. The Show makes the most valiant attempt to simulate a sports experience and does it as well as any game can in Road to the Show. There’s actual strain and effort involved in trying to get your created player an MLB contract. Once I got my call up, I felt joy and elation. Two years of scratching and clawing to begin carving my legacy in the big leagues.

This is the leg up MLB The Show has a gaming experience. Let’s discuss accomplishment and immersion.

Why MLB The Show is the standard bearer of the sports gaming experience

from YouTube

Gameplay balance is such a crucial element in sports game design. It’s easily the most important quality. An underrated but massively important quality is graphical presentation.

A balanced game where I can set the difficulty to a level where the AI and I are on level terms is a key component to gameplay. Consider though, everyone is different. All of these games have differing levels of difficulty and sliders to adjust all sorts of minute aspects.

The Show offers a dynamic difficulty that can adjust to your level of success and failures, which I used at the start. Once I got comfortable with the game, I decided to challenge myself and play on Legend difficulty (yea, I know I’m a scrub, go ahead and tell me to ‘get good’). Legend is the second highest difficulty in the game behind Hall of Fame. In most of the games I play, I set the difficulty either on normal or something below the hardest. I find the hardest difficulty modes of games to be either unrealistic or unfair.

Once I set my difficulty settings and began playing games in Franchise mode, I was met with heavy resistance as the AI was kicking my ass when I was at the plate. They often still do if I’m not being patient or reading, reacting, and predicting what is likely going to be the next pitch. I started off winning my first series against the hapless San Francisco Giants before the Diamondbacks and Cardinals began whooping my ass. I encountered a quandary. I can beat a poor team, but these better teams are making my offense look paltry. I’m forced to make adjustments to my playstyle, who I’m playing, and ultimately search for a solution.

This is what sports gaming immersion is all about. I found myself heated at my own performance knowing I can do better. I’ve established that I and my San Diego Padres are fallible, but there’s also hope. There was a game I entered in the bottom of the 9th where the Cardinals hit a walk off. I was devastated, but I remained motivated to get my payback.

from PlayStation

I entered the top of the 9th against the Giants in a 4–4 tie a week after giving up that walk off and on the first pitch I got Eric Hosmer to hit an opposite field bomb.

A few days later I had a 3-run deficit against the Dbacks going into the 8th. I got one run in the 8th. 2 runs in the 9th, and I completed the comeback with a run in the top of the 10th. Cue Rocky music and me running around my room like an idiot.

It’s much more fulfilling to celebrate success when you’ve experienced crushing failure. When the games feel lifelike and are comparable to the real-life product, the immersion and investment are passionate. That’s the essence of what makes a sports video game great.

I’ve had many competitive games, comebacks, dramatic moments in all four of these games, but MLB The Show has a presence of the moment. The gameplay balance is sensible, the presentation is top notch, and beating your opponent feels so damn rewarding.

A dip into the presentation pool

from YouTube

I’ll stay in the shallow waters since this piece is already way too long and I could spend another 2,000 words detailing graphical details of each game.

When I talk about graphical presentation, I’m specifically talking about how the game does its broadcasts. This goes back into the immersion conversation. If you want these video games to simulate the real-life sport, you want the broadcast to have the sound, look, and feel of those broadcasts.

from YouTube; look at this trash

So let’s bring out Madden to be our perennial punching bag again. I’m sorry Madden fans, but EA deserves a beating for this and I would hope most fans would agree with this message. Bringing in Jonathan Coachman to do the most utterly pointless and boring halftime show is a waste of everyone’s time.

All the little things that 2K and MLB The Show do with their presentation, is exactly what EA Sports neglects to do with FIFA and Madden. FIFA is barebones in the presentation department. Madden gives a deflated effort.

2K puts the most money and effort into the presentation of their games. It’s the redeeming quality of NBA 2K’s development. It’s a game made by people who give a shit about basketball. The same can be said for SIE and The Show. 2K likely has a bigger budget, actually, they definitely do. 2K could pay Shaq. They don’t have Barkley money, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see that day come. 2K has several commentary teams in their games now. It’s not good commentary, but it’s the thought that counts. Clark Kellogg’s 2K13 commentary still has the best bites. I could go for a Doris Burke mute button.

MLB The Show’s broadcast has options for setting a dynamic quicker broadcast and a broadcast mode where you get to see the cutaways and presentation like you would when watching a real game. It’s well done. The commentary still isn’t The Show ’10, but that’s asking a lot.

Oh… what about NHL? Couldn’t tell you. Haven’t played an NHL title in years. I may get around to picking one up eventually but it is produced by the most incompetent company on our list so I have my reservations.

Soundtrack?

Just kidding. I’m done. For now.