bangtango
04-29-2007, 12:49 AM
I'd like to contribute the following story. It is about my initial purchase of the Sega Dreamcast. This true story is centered during my final year of college in late 2001 between early 2002. Over the next few weeks, I may pick at a few sentences to clean this up a little. Until then, please respond with your thoughts and let me know what alterations may be in order. Any spelling or grammar errors will wait for now, since I wanted this in a post while I still had a little free time and inspiration.
For the record, I didn't embellish anything here so there is no window dressing to make this more (or less) exciting.
BangTango/Will
"Goal Line Defense"
Author: Will Matson, April 2007
From 1984 until 1996, I was a full-time gamer. Around the time that the Sega Saturn and Sony Playstation were released, I quietly drifted out of this lifestyle. Maybe it was the price of these new consoles or I simply hated the idea of starting all over with a new game machine after so many years. I don't remember. I stopped buying games. I let my subscriptions to Game Players, GamePro and EGM expire. I was content to occasionally replay all of the old games which were already in my 8-bit and 16-bit libraries, titles I had previously bested. Throughout the late 1990's, I was in the dark as to what was going on with the Nintendo 64 and Playstation. I didn't even know the Saturn was dead because I stopped paying attention to it. I actually received the N64 for Christmas during this time period but I never used it. A couple of my siblings managed to keep it from collecting dust. Left in my hands alone, it would have.
Early in 2001, I bought a copy of EGM on the newsstand just to catch up with what I had been missing for the past several years in gaming. It happened to be the issue which broke news of Sega exiting the hardware business, news that had already hit the internet weeks before but I was just receiving now in print. Staring at the page, I found myself wondering what had happened to the Sega I grew up with. Having enjoyed Sega's products for years, since the 1980's with the Master System, I decided right then and there that I would buy this system called the Sega Dreamcast. I knew nothing about the system or the library. When I eventually picked one up a few months later, in mid-2001, it was $99 at Walmart. Having two full college semesters ahead of me, in my final year at a private school in Maine, I planned to enjoy a new game system late at night after classes were over. My room was in the newest dormitory on campus and my roommate was a seasoned gamer from the mid-1980's, just like me. Prospects were bright for the fall semester.
My first title came before I even had the system. NFL Quarterback Club 2000 was on clearance and I grabbed it. After purchasing the Dreamcast at Walmart, I bought NFL 2K1 at the same store a few days later. Sonic Adventure I found in a pawn shop. Sega Bass Fishing 1 & 2 followed a short time later during another Walmart run. Power Stone 2, NHL 2K, Sonic Shuffle and Dead or Alive 2 all came from Blockbuster's used game clearance rack. Before I knew it, I had quite a library for this system which I had no experience with. Nobody else in the dorm had a Dreamcast so I was a minor curiosity the minute I brought it back to campus. I didn't wait long to dig in. Quarterback Club 2000 sucked. Bass Fishing 1 and 2 were fun for half an hour to a time. The rest of my early Dreamcast library was fair to middling, save for Sonic Adventure which remains my favorite Sonic game today.
My favorite, of course, was NFL 2K1. My roommate, Frank, couldn't believe how impressive the graphics were and how smooth the gameplay was. Before I knew it, I had a regular opponent and the two of us were evenly matched. Frank had a busier social life than me, though, so he couldn't always be counted on for a game. More often than not, I went toe to toe with the computer AI. Some of my most prized memories from college were playing through a Patriots season as Frank watched most of my matches while doing his homework. In the fall of 2001, the real New England Patriots were in the middle of what would become a championship season, their first of three. I was playing out a season that was just as successful as theirs, albeit in front of a much smaller audience of one and with an outdated roster from last year that was even missing new hero Tom Brady.
A more dedicated football fan than me, Frank was amused by my game, or lack thereof, at the time. Knowing squat about basic football plays, despite watching it regularly with my family, I stuck to a few tried and true "money" plays. No fancy fakes and too lazy to follow the blockers, I ran the ball right up the gut. When I wasn't running, you could find me in deep passing formations which usually meant the Shotgun Bomb or Hail Mary. Screen passes and short lobs to the tight end were all right but I preferred to heavily pad my passing and receiving stats. Even an ignoramus, like myself in 2001, knew to punt the ball on fourth down. Too stubborn to give up, I always went for it on fourth down. If the other guys wanted the football, they'd have to hope my receiver dropped a long pass. I wasn't just going to give it to them. My punter might as well have been on IR.
Frank's preferred method of ribbing me was to pick apart my defense. Not wanting to be bothered with pass coverage, I stuck to plays in the Goal Line Defense category and picked the player on the left or right closest to the opposing quarterback. I wanted nothing more on defense than to sack that bastard before he dropped back and put his passing yards in the negative. When I chose to mix it up, with a different formation, it was just another generic blitz which totally ignored anyone or anything that may be moving deep down the field. I had two choices. Waiting for the pass to be thrown, I didn't know who to rush until the ball was in the air and the receiver caught it. Two, three or four guys may have the ball thrown their way and it was a guessing game for me. Rushing the quarterback, I knew exactly who I had to hit. I liked those odds better. Drop him like a toilet seat and see how he liked coming back from 3rd and 18. Like a western gunfight, it was kill or be killed. My defender was the marshall and the quarterback was the gunslinging outlaw.
Pass protection was not only foreign but it was the enemy. If the QB beat me with the deep ball to the wide receiver for a chunk of yards and a touchdown, so be it. Everytime he did, my college roommate was there to loudly remind me that using Goal Line Defense on nearly every down was crazy. I answered back that it was more or less foolproof because on Rookie level, I would get the sack more often than not and I'm winning the damn game anyway, so what did he know? I'd get those yards back before the game was over, I promised myself. Computer rushing plays were a minor annoyance but since I was chasing the quarterback anyway, I was usually somewhere near the fullback or halfback. My offensive prowess had me in the lead so consistently that those trick plays by the quarterback, like handing the ball off to a running back, were few and far between. "Goal Line Defense never fails," I taunted Frank. His response was to laugh heartily and this became a regular tradition between us.
Almost as soon as these sessions started, they were over far too quickly. A couple of semesters passed and our senior year was over. Frank and I graduated but never saw each other again. NFL 2K1 didn't cause us to bond, we were already friends before then. It simply gave us plenty of conversation and a whole lot of enjoyment, which is what a new release by Sega does so well when they are at their best. Before that year was over, Frank and I were able to watch our beloved Patriots finally end their legacy of futility and win their first Super Bowl against the mighty Rams. We also managed to wear out my first copy of NFL 2K1, due to heavy use, and it was eventually replaced with a fresh copy near the end of our second semester that May. Despite my best efforts, I never did get Frank into the misunderstood and maligned 3D gem that is Sonic Adventure. The dialogue and voice acting in the game caused him the same type of laughing fits as when my Goal Line Defense collapsed and surrendered a 35-yard pass.
As for my first NFL 2K1 Patriots season that started in late 2001 and closed in early 2002, it ended with a 14-2 regular season record and a virtual Super Bowl title. Over the years, I've become a more dedicated sports game fan and actually understand the various play calling formations on offense and defense in football. These days, I only use Goal Line Defense at the goal line like nature intended. I did discover pass protection and a harder difficulty level. I also discovered following the lead blocker and throwing shorter passes. What I haven't discovered since is another stretch of my gaming life that holds a place in my heart like the first few months I spent with NFL 2K1. I don't know what would have saved Sega's bacon leading up to the Playstation 2 launch. Maybe nothing. If it was up to me, I might have tried Goal Line Defense.
For the record, I didn't embellish anything here so there is no window dressing to make this more (or less) exciting.
BangTango/Will
"Goal Line Defense"
Author: Will Matson, April 2007
From 1984 until 1996, I was a full-time gamer. Around the time that the Sega Saturn and Sony Playstation were released, I quietly drifted out of this lifestyle. Maybe it was the price of these new consoles or I simply hated the idea of starting all over with a new game machine after so many years. I don't remember. I stopped buying games. I let my subscriptions to Game Players, GamePro and EGM expire. I was content to occasionally replay all of the old games which were already in my 8-bit and 16-bit libraries, titles I had previously bested. Throughout the late 1990's, I was in the dark as to what was going on with the Nintendo 64 and Playstation. I didn't even know the Saturn was dead because I stopped paying attention to it. I actually received the N64 for Christmas during this time period but I never used it. A couple of my siblings managed to keep it from collecting dust. Left in my hands alone, it would have.
Early in 2001, I bought a copy of EGM on the newsstand just to catch up with what I had been missing for the past several years in gaming. It happened to be the issue which broke news of Sega exiting the hardware business, news that had already hit the internet weeks before but I was just receiving now in print. Staring at the page, I found myself wondering what had happened to the Sega I grew up with. Having enjoyed Sega's products for years, since the 1980's with the Master System, I decided right then and there that I would buy this system called the Sega Dreamcast. I knew nothing about the system or the library. When I eventually picked one up a few months later, in mid-2001, it was $99 at Walmart. Having two full college semesters ahead of me, in my final year at a private school in Maine, I planned to enjoy a new game system late at night after classes were over. My room was in the newest dormitory on campus and my roommate was a seasoned gamer from the mid-1980's, just like me. Prospects were bright for the fall semester.
My first title came before I even had the system. NFL Quarterback Club 2000 was on clearance and I grabbed it. After purchasing the Dreamcast at Walmart, I bought NFL 2K1 at the same store a few days later. Sonic Adventure I found in a pawn shop. Sega Bass Fishing 1 & 2 followed a short time later during another Walmart run. Power Stone 2, NHL 2K, Sonic Shuffle and Dead or Alive 2 all came from Blockbuster's used game clearance rack. Before I knew it, I had quite a library for this system which I had no experience with. Nobody else in the dorm had a Dreamcast so I was a minor curiosity the minute I brought it back to campus. I didn't wait long to dig in. Quarterback Club 2000 sucked. Bass Fishing 1 and 2 were fun for half an hour to a time. The rest of my early Dreamcast library was fair to middling, save for Sonic Adventure which remains my favorite Sonic game today.
My favorite, of course, was NFL 2K1. My roommate, Frank, couldn't believe how impressive the graphics were and how smooth the gameplay was. Before I knew it, I had a regular opponent and the two of us were evenly matched. Frank had a busier social life than me, though, so he couldn't always be counted on for a game. More often than not, I went toe to toe with the computer AI. Some of my most prized memories from college were playing through a Patriots season as Frank watched most of my matches while doing his homework. In the fall of 2001, the real New England Patriots were in the middle of what would become a championship season, their first of three. I was playing out a season that was just as successful as theirs, albeit in front of a much smaller audience of one and with an outdated roster from last year that was even missing new hero Tom Brady.
A more dedicated football fan than me, Frank was amused by my game, or lack thereof, at the time. Knowing squat about basic football plays, despite watching it regularly with my family, I stuck to a few tried and true "money" plays. No fancy fakes and too lazy to follow the blockers, I ran the ball right up the gut. When I wasn't running, you could find me in deep passing formations which usually meant the Shotgun Bomb or Hail Mary. Screen passes and short lobs to the tight end were all right but I preferred to heavily pad my passing and receiving stats. Even an ignoramus, like myself in 2001, knew to punt the ball on fourth down. Too stubborn to give up, I always went for it on fourth down. If the other guys wanted the football, they'd have to hope my receiver dropped a long pass. I wasn't just going to give it to them. My punter might as well have been on IR.
Frank's preferred method of ribbing me was to pick apart my defense. Not wanting to be bothered with pass coverage, I stuck to plays in the Goal Line Defense category and picked the player on the left or right closest to the opposing quarterback. I wanted nothing more on defense than to sack that bastard before he dropped back and put his passing yards in the negative. When I chose to mix it up, with a different formation, it was just another generic blitz which totally ignored anyone or anything that may be moving deep down the field. I had two choices. Waiting for the pass to be thrown, I didn't know who to rush until the ball was in the air and the receiver caught it. Two, three or four guys may have the ball thrown their way and it was a guessing game for me. Rushing the quarterback, I knew exactly who I had to hit. I liked those odds better. Drop him like a toilet seat and see how he liked coming back from 3rd and 18. Like a western gunfight, it was kill or be killed. My defender was the marshall and the quarterback was the gunslinging outlaw.
Pass protection was not only foreign but it was the enemy. If the QB beat me with the deep ball to the wide receiver for a chunk of yards and a touchdown, so be it. Everytime he did, my college roommate was there to loudly remind me that using Goal Line Defense on nearly every down was crazy. I answered back that it was more or less foolproof because on Rookie level, I would get the sack more often than not and I'm winning the damn game anyway, so what did he know? I'd get those yards back before the game was over, I promised myself. Computer rushing plays were a minor annoyance but since I was chasing the quarterback anyway, I was usually somewhere near the fullback or halfback. My offensive prowess had me in the lead so consistently that those trick plays by the quarterback, like handing the ball off to a running back, were few and far between. "Goal Line Defense never fails," I taunted Frank. His response was to laugh heartily and this became a regular tradition between us.
Almost as soon as these sessions started, they were over far too quickly. A couple of semesters passed and our senior year was over. Frank and I graduated but never saw each other again. NFL 2K1 didn't cause us to bond, we were already friends before then. It simply gave us plenty of conversation and a whole lot of enjoyment, which is what a new release by Sega does so well when they are at their best. Before that year was over, Frank and I were able to watch our beloved Patriots finally end their legacy of futility and win their first Super Bowl against the mighty Rams. We also managed to wear out my first copy of NFL 2K1, due to heavy use, and it was eventually replaced with a fresh copy near the end of our second semester that May. Despite my best efforts, I never did get Frank into the misunderstood and maligned 3D gem that is Sonic Adventure. The dialogue and voice acting in the game caused him the same type of laughing fits as when my Goal Line Defense collapsed and surrendered a 35-yard pass.
As for my first NFL 2K1 Patriots season that started in late 2001 and closed in early 2002, it ended with a 14-2 regular season record and a virtual Super Bowl title. Over the years, I've become a more dedicated sports game fan and actually understand the various play calling formations on offense and defense in football. These days, I only use Goal Line Defense at the goal line like nature intended. I did discover pass protection and a harder difficulty level. I also discovered following the lead blocker and throwing shorter passes. What I haven't discovered since is another stretch of my gaming life that holds a place in my heart like the first few months I spent with NFL 2K1. I don't know what would have saved Sega's bacon leading up to the Playstation 2 launch. Maybe nothing. If it was up to me, I might have tried Goal Line Defense.