123 lines
6.8 KiB
Plaintext
123 lines
6.8 KiB
Plaintext
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TV SPORTS: BASKETBALL
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I'm going to open this review with a bold claim: I dislike games
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that don't work. With TV SPORTS: BASKETBALL (TVSB) by Cinemaware, I
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had trouble even trying to like this game (although for more reasons
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than the fact that it wouldn't run). Unfortunately, it is extremely
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picky about your computer's setup and will not run with any
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RAM-resident programs or drivers that I could find, except for
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MS-DOS 4.01's SHARE.EXE and a mouse driver. Even though memory may
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not be a problem for most people, the program will still freeze
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while loading if almost anything else is resident. So no matter what
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you do, you still have to create a separate boot disk to run TVSB,
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assuming you can even get TVSB to run. (This review is based on the
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IBM-PC version.)
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After I finally convinced TVSB to start up, I was almost pleased,
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at least at first. Although the program only supports the internal
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speaker, it uses something called "ReelSound" to give you a bit more
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than loud squeaks. Of course, ReelSound cannot compare to anything
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you could get out of a sound card. The graphics were fairly good in
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the VGA version, although they were nothing special. For some
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reason, the designers refused to use anything close to 256 colors,
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and it was fairly obvious where they cut the proverbial corners.
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TVSB lets you design your own teams and play a 24-game season, with
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playoffs. Any number of teams can be managed by human players,
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although all the humans have to play their games (or pass and let
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the computer play for them) before the next round of play can
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begin. You are given a certain number of points to allocate to each
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of your players and to your coach in various skills, such as
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shooting and defense, assuming you don't like your team's default
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configuration. You can also set the game length to 3-, 6-, 9-, or
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12-minute quarters, and put anywhere from two to five players on the
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court. Once the season has started, there is no way to make any more
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changes; you will have to end the current season and start over
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again. There is also an exhibition mode where you can select any
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combination of teams.
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Unlike some other sports games, TVSB concentrates almost entirely
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on the arcade action. The only way you can coach your team is by
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calling time-outs and making substitutions. There is not even the
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option to call for a simple play, like a press against the
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computer, although the computer has no trouble pressing against a
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human team. However, Cinemaware created a fairly simple but nice way
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of controlling your players. Unless you choose to play in
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"role-playing" mode (where you always control one particular
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player), you always control the person with the ball on offense. On
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defense, you can switch to the player who is closest to the ball.
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Quite often, however, the person closest to the ball is behind his
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opponent, where he cannot defend.
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I had the definite impression that the computer "cheats" in this
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game, especially during league games. Your computer-controlled
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teammates almost never slam-dunk and have a hard time bringing the
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ball down-court. The computer opponent, on the other hand, often
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gets fast breaks. Your players always set themselves up in the same
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position on defense, even if there is someone going for a fast break
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right in front of them. They will just stand around, even under
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computer control, and let the other team score. And even when your
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players are running down-court far ahead of the other team (either
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on offense or defense), the computer opponent will always manage to
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run ahead of them, no matter how quick your players are. The
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computer also usually has a much higher shooting average, no matter
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how good your shooters are, or how well you defend against the other
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team.
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The worst part of this game, though, is the amazing fourth-quarter
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miracle, which is much worse in league games than in exhibition
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mode. The computer's already high shooting percentage increases,
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even under the pressure of good defense. The fourth quarter is also
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when the computer team starts using a press, keeping your team from
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getting the ball across the half-line, and costing you possession.
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However, as I mentioned before, there is no way to return the
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favor, and often there is no way to break the press. I have also
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found that no matter how large your lead in earlier quarters, the
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computer usually ends up winning by the end of the game. Often,
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you'll need a ten-point lead (even for 3-minute quarters) just to
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squeak by at the end. The computer plays so amazingly (or unfairly)
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well then that it's more than frustrating.
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Supposedly, TVSB lets you play with up to four human players on
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either one or both teams, although you have to play in exhibition
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mode. But you will often have to reconfigure the game to add the
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third or fourth player, which means rebooting your system (since
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TVSB doesn't have a "return to DOS" command) and re-running the
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setup program. If you want to turn off the sound or change its
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volume, you will also have to reboot and reconfigure. I only tried
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playing with a third person a few times, but since there is also no
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way to stop a game mid-point without rebooting when you realize
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you've made a mistake, it soon becomes too much of a pain to even
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bother.
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TVSB comes on four 360K disks. Two of these disks are for the VGA
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version and two for the EGA and Tandy versions. You can install to a
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hard drive, but not to the master disks that came with your game.
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According to the box, the EGA and Tandy versions require 512K of
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RAM, while the VGA version needs 640K. Only a "turbo XT" is
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recommended, and since the game plays in real time, there will
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probably be little difference between XTs and 486 machines. TV
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SPORTS: BASKETBALL has the standard "look up word XXX on line YYY in
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paragraph ZZZ on page NNN" type of copy protection, which means you
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have to type a word from the manual before you can start a game.
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TV SPORTS: BASKETBALL is not all that it could have been. Minor
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things (such as a computer that is too good, and memory conflicts)
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add up to a lot of frustration. If you expect to play against
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another person on a regular basis, you might find TVSB better than I
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did. If you decide that you might like this game, I would advise
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buying it from a store with a generous return policy. You may
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discover that TVSB is just too incompatible. Or you might just have
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to return it before you find yourself throwing heavy objects at your
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monitor. But don't expect too much out of TVSB, no matter how
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patient you are. It might be fun for the first few games, but
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eventually you will probably get too sick of the computer's cheating
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to play any more than the occasional exhibition game. I know that I
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certainly did.
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TV SPORTS: BASKETBALL is published by Cinemaware and distributed by
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Electronic Arts.
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