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by Ruff Ryder on Tue Jun 06, 2006 5:14 am
When I think about this, it's kinda funny actually. Call me backwards, but from reading all of you guys's responses, I'm the only one who started with the 2k series and went to Live. Don't get me wrong, I've played almost all of the NBA Live games but I never owned any other than for PS2. I played 97 at my cousins house alot, and I had 99 demo for PC but never really got into it other than that even though I played it for hours on end. Anyway, I had always been too poor to own a console. I remember begging my parents for a playstation or n64, but we just couldn't do it. I finally found a deal in this newspaper like thing called "the bulletin boards". Inside of it was a bunch of people selling used stuff from cars, beds, skateboards to videogames, china(plates and stuff), and cabinets. Anyway, I would look in the "Toys & Games" section everytime we got it and one day I found a deal on a Sega Dreamcast. This was in 2001 or 2002 I think. Anyway, it was the DC, 22 games (I think), 2 controllers, stearing wheel+pedals, all for like $150. I showed it to my mom and dad and begged them daily. Heck, I even found a pic of a dreamcast on my dad's pc and set it as the wallpaper to keep reminding him, because he was such a procrastinator. Well I had heard tons of good things about the 2k series, so I was really eager to see if it was one of the available games. And what do ya know? Yep, NBA 2k1!
But I played alot of NBA Jam 99 at my friends house but I was never a serious gamer because I couldn't afford a console or games.
So when we got the console finally I was ecstatic. I played 2k1 to death. I was also pissed off at the lack of options in it though. Number one, you couldn't edit players or their ratings. Number two, in the gameplay the only crossover guys like AI could do was the behind the back. No between the legs crossover, heck, only bad ball handlers had a normal crossover. So I was really looking for some kind of alternative to this game, but there were no other bball games available on Dreamcast.
Well, I was at Youth Camp in Florida, my first year I did it. I think I was about 12. Well, we brought a PS2 (I was hyped! A couple of my friends had one but I never really got a good chance to play it. Plus NBA Street!). During my freetime I would come back to the cabin and just play videogames all the time. Then I discovered this game called "NBA Live 2002". I had always wanted to play a game of the NBA Live series, but I never could. I remember looking up reviews, screenshots, and movies for the Live series, which even brought me here to the black and white site. I remember reading Andrew's reviews (I think) and he didn't have one for 2002 because it didn't launch on PC.
Anyway, this game was pretty sharp graphically. It had alot of dunks, Vince Carter doing windmills, and crossover moves! Behind the backs, between the legs, wow! Now the animations weren't as fluid as 2k, but I could definately work with this.
That's how I got attached to the Live series. I had always held an optimistic view for the following years version because I really wanted it to be better than 2k. I eventually got a PS2 and Live 2003 which I played the hell out of lol.
But most of you guys never played the 2k series in between and I did but IMO it just wasn't good enough. I remember renting 2k4 for PS2 and hit had really good graphics but there were bugs and stuff I hated. Guys like Gilbert Arenas could jump from the FT line and dunk it like LeBron. They added an animation where a player juggles a pass and tries to tip it to themself but it often made them step out of bounds and that really made me mad. Live had just debuted the freestyle dribble deal but 2k couldn't match it so they added a "Pivot mode" which was just gay and pointless.
And this year I've found some of the gameplay in 2k6 really boring compared to Live. Number one, it's severely limited in dunks. I was really impressed when I went into practice mode with a highflyer and found all of these crazy dunks. Then I decided to test out other dunkpacks and I practiced with Amare and OMG! He dunks like himself! Power slams! Wow, I swear I saw Amare do that dunk in a game! 2Ks dunks are just boring, the game isn't quite as exciting. But I traded Live 06 in for 2k6 and got Live for PC. I thought all of this freestyle superstar stuff was great.
But I guess you can say I've favored EAs game over Segas for the same reasons you favor 2k over Live. You guys all started with Live and looked for an alternative and were very impressed with what you got. Vice-versa for me, and I'll continue buying Live as well as 2k. 
I wanted to add something else that actually had something to do with this thread in this post, but I made it too long and I doubt you guys would read all of it. I'll just post it later.
"You can’t drive a knife into a man’s back nine inches, pull it out six inches, and call it progress."-Malcolm X
'Retired'
