Final Four: Baseball Stars vs. NFL 2k5

[BlyGilmore]

Final Four

#2 Baseball Stars

vs.

#2 NFL 2k5

Road to the Final Four

#2 Baseball Stars beat Madden 2000 (PSX), NHL 2004, NCAA Football 2004 and Hardball III to reach the Final Four.

#2 NFL 2k5 beat NHL 95, Joe Montana's Sports Talk Football, Blades of Steel and Mike Tyson's Punchout to reach the Final Four.

The Argument for Baseball Stars
By BlyGilmore
Hi. My name is BlyGilmore. And I'm a Baseball Stars addict.

Baseball Stars was simply the baseball game others were compared to on the Nintendo. Sure other games came before it - MLB, RBI Baseball, Bases Loaded - but Baseball Stars took what those games did and brought baseball games to another level.

For starters it was the first sports game where you could create your own team and players before putting them in a league of your choosing. You could also change the names of all the players on created teams. The game had a number of great default teams you could put in the league, or you could put several created teams into the league instead.

This great feature actually lead to myself and my friends forming a Baseball Stars league when I was in high school - well after the Nintendo had come and gone as the dominant gaming system and a good six or seven years after Baseball Stars was originally released.

Even at that time - a full generation ahead of Baseball Stars - no other baseball game had the same create features or customization options.

It was also the first game that let you trade players and bring money into the equation. After every game you won you earned money based on your prestige and the prestige of your opponents. You could use this money to buy brand new players or upgrade the stats of your current team.

All the while having as good of an on the field experience as any of the other games of the era.

The Argument for NFL 2k5
By Noles_ACC
This now seemingly forgotten football series (I'm staring at EA's Napoleon-esque griphold on the NFL genre) hit its full stride with the 2005 version. Not only was the game extremely economical - it retailed for just $20 - it got the oomph of having the ESPN name and presentation, bringing it a certain "Yes, we deserve to be a Big Boy on the Block" feel that the previous incarnations lacked.

Since the game originally launched on the Sega Dreamcast and was slow to come to PS2 or Xbox, this precious football gaming gem was like the trendy Indie rock band you found on MySpace that MTV had yet to serve to the masses. If you played this game, consistently acclaimed by the critics, you were not only avant garde by not drinking the Madden Koolaid but also you were, in fact at that time, playing the best game the genre had to offer.

The main reason for this is NFL 2k5's complete commitment to realistic gameplay. A simple contrast in the version's Right analog stick innovations highlight this philosophical difference with Madden. In 2k5, the right analog stick was used to among other things: quarterbacks evading on-coming rushers, running backs lowering their head to bruise forward, and adjusting linebacker and secondary coverage. Madden? This was the year they added the "Hit Stick," which for all its popularity, added nothing other than the entertainment value of laying Pro Wrestling-esque piledrivers on other players.

And in its own version of the "Hit Stick," 2k5 added its own tackling innovation: you press the square button (on PS2) hard and you get an aggressive tackle; you press lightly, you get a more accurate, wrap-them-up one. Not only is this a more natural process for gamers than ramming the righth analog stick with your thumb while simultaneously moving with your left thumb on the left analog stick...it makes sense.

Now, as time passed, Madden has added numerous innovations and gameplay tweaks that have brought it more and more to realistic gameplay, but 2k5 was perhaps the most accurate representation of NFL football we've ever seen. Couple the realistic gameplay with the ESPN in-game presentation (still ranks as one of the best ever), and you get a game for the ages. I think 2k5 is the only game, in any given year, to best the overall power of Madden, and for that reason alone, it should be considered as a classic.

According to the Community

[Baseball Stars] was my favorite baseball game of alltime until MVP 2005 came out ... I never owned Baseball Stars, but I rented so much that I probably could have bought it fifty times over. This brings back memories of my brother and I playing this well into the night when we were kids. (madscientist)

2K5 had everything you could ask for in a sports game. The one word I would use to describe it, that you pretty much can't say for the majority of sports game out there is ... AUTHENTIC! (ausar72)

[boomhauertjs]

First vote!!

[bkrich83]

I went with 2k5, my favorite football game of all-time.

[yamabushi]

"All too easy" 2K5

[TJdaSportsGuy]

Quote: Originally Posted by yamabushi

'All too easy' 2K5

Baseball Stars all the way!

[SidVish]

2k5 FTW!

[Dislimb]

Quote: Originally Posted by TJdaSportsGuy

Baseball Stars all the way!

Yep.

[ehh]

Baseball Stars, 2K5 is absurdly overrated, IMO. I can't believe that game made it further than MVP '05 on the PC.

[ausar72]

2K5

F...
T...
W...

It's pretty close though at the time of this post (19-13)

[TheShizNo1]

Ok.....I've tried to get this on my own, but could someone tell me what exactly QFT and WTF means