Author Archive
  • The best NBA 2K17 ‘Start Today’ teams for different challenges with the new year
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    Posted January 3rd, 2017 at 12:30 pm 1 Comment »
    Many look at Christmas Day as the unofficial start to the NBA season. It's an excessively long 82 game season after all with a great number of them being perceived as largely, if not completely meaningless. That has especially been the case in the age of "super teams" with fans just waiting for the Playoffs when those few teams will inevitably go head-to-head. That however is something that can be played out differently in video games and the new 'Start Today' feature for MyLeague Mode in...
  • End of Year Community Awards: Best Post-Release Support of 2016
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    Posted January 2nd, 2017 at 1:45 pm 3 Comments »
    The next category to open in the annual Community Awards is for Best Post-Release Support. EA Sports has undoubtedly provided the gold standard of post-release support for many of their licensed games over the years. The recent winners for the award are Madden NFL 16 and EA Sports UFC and both series are up for nomination again for the work done in 2016. They face a returning challenger that nearly pulled off an upset win in the category last year. Madden NFL 17 has continued the tren...
  • The Line Drive for January 1
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    Posted January 1st, 2017 at 12:00 pm No Comments »
    The Line Drive is a weekly collection of news, links, deal alerts, and updates that didn’t necessarily warrant their own postings. ♦Summarized all the biggest sports gaming stories of 2016 for Sporting News. ♦Continue voting in all the various categories in the annual Community Awards. ♦Still to come: Best New Feature, Post-Release Support, New/Non-Yearly, and SGOTY. ♦The second Park After Dark event was another utter failure for NBA 2K17. ♦The NCAA Football 14 CFP semifinal s...
  • End of Year Community Awards: Best Racing Game of 2016
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    Posted December 31st, 2016 at 1:45 pm 2 Comments »
    The next category in the annual Pastapadre Community Awards is one that was warranted as a new addition for 2016. This was an especially great year for racing games, and the three nominees stood above the rest as favorites of both critics and fans, each one appealing to a somewhat different type of racing aficionado and yet satisfying most everyone who played them. Forza Horizon 3 straddles the line between sim and arcade and provided great variety of racing through it's various event ty...
  • The biggest sports gaming stories of 2016
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    Posted December 30th, 2016 at 11:15 am 3 Comments »
    Every year it’s important to look back on developments within the sports gaming genre, not just as a reminder of what has happened, but as insight into the direction individual franchises are going and the trends within the industry that will impact them all. 2016 was a year that saw strong efforts across the board from major publishers and more independent developers making their way in to cover the abandoned arcade-style games and various niche sports. The broken release schedule rema...
  • Press Row Podcast: College Football Playoff
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    Posted December 29th, 2016 at 4:15 pm 5 Comments »
    The College Football Playoff is almost here and, as it so happens, Bryan Wiedey and Rich Grisham both have their teams involved and going head-to-head in the semifinal. The two discuss Washington vs Alabama and NCAA Football 14 simulations of the games before turning to topics such as the Blizzard Mountain expansion for Forza Horizon 3 and a rundown of the annual Pastapadre Community Awards categories and nominees for 2016. Check out the podcast through iTunes for iOS, on Android with t...
  • NCAA Football 14 likes the underdogs in College Football Playoff semifinals
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    Posted December 29th, 2016 at 11:00 am 4 Comments »
    The College Football Playoff is almost here, with Washington vs Alabama and Ohio State vs Clemson on Saturday. NCAA Football 14 was perfect on its Conference Championship predictions early this month and now it returns to give its picks for the CFP semifinals. Somewhat surprisingly, the game likes the two underdogs to advance, with Washington prevailing in OT and Clemson cruising despite Deshaun Watson being knocked out of the game due to injury. Check out the full results of the simula...
  • End of Year Community Awards: Best Franchise Mode of 2016
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    Posted December 28th, 2016 at 3:15 pm 1 Comment »
    The voting is now open for Best Franchise Mode of 2016 in the annual Pastapadre Community Awards. This category was originally controlled by EA Sports with NCAA Football and Madden winning the first four years. The last two however have been taken by NBA 2K after the creation of a highly customizable offline franchise to pair with the online-connected one. NBA 2K17 looks to make it a three-peat with the offline MyLeague and online MyGM both contributing as unique franchise experiences. Th...