Full Season Basketball Replays (2024)

Ihave just started playing a lot of Replay basketball and have really been enjoying that. I was hesitant to play a full play basketball game at first for the time requirement you stated but I had also tried Regular Season basketball once upon a time but switched games since it just generates stats with no input from the gamer.

PC games are a great way to cut down on the bookkeeping for basketball statistics. Replay Basketball PC is very easy to use and a straight translation of the tabletop game, Hoops PC is similar in that regard. Strat-o-matic, as they usually do, does some additional work under the hood with their PC game so it's not a direct version of the tabletop game. I was going to use Strat-o-matic as my game of choice but I really struggled with a solitaire way to choose shot type, which Hoops figures out for you.

Basketball doesn't have the big exciting single play, but watching the ebb and flow of a game has been very exciting. Seeing a team claw back from a large deficit and hit a timely shot is a lot of fun.

Unfortunately with basketball games, game of preference may come down to available seasons as some games lean into the retro seasons and not so much recent seasons or vice versa. There has also been a spirited discourse on the Hoops delphi about number of players per team and gamers' preferences for that. For a full season replay or project, I would assume most would prefer more players carded; Strat at least has an electronic card for all players.

I have always wanted to play more play-by-play basketball games (hockey and football as well) my entire life. I have played baseball games since I was 10 (Statis-Pro) and I also purchased Statis-Pro Basketball and Statis-Pro Football not long after getting baseball because I wanted to play all of the major four sports. I eventually purchased Strat Hockey as well (for some reason, I don't ever remember seeing a Statis-Pro Hockey game back in the day, or I would've tried that game). With those other three sports, it's always been impossible for me to get beyond a handful of games. I liked Statis-Pro Basketball, but with four quarters, substitutions and all that is involved in a basketball game it just took too darned long to play. The same was true for football and hockey. I don't think these issues are the fault of any play-by-play game created for these sports. It's just how those sports are played and trying to make a play-by-play game that doesn't allow for detailed stat keeping, substitutions, power plays and all that crazy stuff wouldn't be those sports without them. So I've been stuck in limbo land, usually buying a new game and playing a few games. Each, I always thought they were well designed, but it was the nature of the actual sport itself that kept me from really playing more than 20 games with any of these board games. So, what did I do - went back to baseball. And eventually started playing a decent amount of soccer as well. While soccer games do take time to play in a play-by-play format, there are very few subs so at the very least the flow works well. I've been able to get myself to play plenty of soccer (the second best major sport to play on tabletop after baseball/softball in my opinion).

The last five years (especially since the pandemic), I've been more serious about finding games for those sports, particularly basketball. And I've wondered if I should dabble into games like Regular Season Basketball or Plaay's new game to check out the in-between just a score generator games versus the flushed out play-by-play games. I've been hesitant, but one of these days I think I'm going to break down. Plaay has a history of creating solid games "in the middle" with their fans, so I think basketball is the one I may give it a shot with.

I saw the conclusion for a play-by-play guy was a computer game. I can't do that. I spend way too much time on computers as it is. I did try that with SAT and while I enjoyed it and enjoyed making decisions for a bit, I found myself just not wanting to be at a computer and found myself feeling like it was just a clickfest (even though I had to make decisions). I also had an APBA floppy disc baseball game (think the Miller company created them or something like that). I played those for a bit but it didn't last. I don't think I'll ever get beyond that feeling with a computer game. Sometimes I wish I found computer games, or my first card and dice sports game was basketball or hockey. That way my first experiences would've been games that took 90 minutes or more and I would've known no better than to love it. But, instead, my first games were baseball games that took 20 to 30 minutes to play a game. It soured the chances of me enjoying other sports I fear. The same with computers. Maybe if my first games were computers, I'd enjoy them more because that would've been my first experience. Unfortunately, they weren't.

I am playing Pro Tables Games NBA Basketball right now (well, played eight games and now am playing a baseball replay again), and this was the closest thing I have come to that feels like a "faster play" play-by-play style game. Unfortunately, the game stopped making sets in the very early 80s I think, and all I have are 1970s sets. The cool thing is I am learning about another era of NBA basketball I knew nothing about prior to playing the games. I'm more committed than ever to getting myself to play these games because I'm 53 - if I don't do it soon, I never will.

I'm also learning I need to forego my ideas of actual substitution patterns and foul trouble issues. I'm now to a point where I'm not making any real substitutions until about four minutes into the second quarter. I don't care if a starter has three or four fouls during that time. I just keep them in and hope for the best later. And I really keep the substitutions rigid - 8 minutes left in the first half, four left in the half. And in the third quarter at the six-minute mark and maybe subs at the six-minute and two-minute portions (get those starters in for the end) of the fourth quarter. That has created more success and better flow. But, am I getting the true real experience of actual substitutions, and is maybe what I'm doing altering what teams were like during actual seasons? Maybe.

- One thought about your point #2 - Never thought about that. You are right. There is no crazy play in basketball like there can be football, or baseball. Even the idea of a power play in hockey can create emotion. Meanwhile, basketball is plodding at 1, 2 or 3 points at a time. Without the actual play-by-play narrative of a 15-2 run or "Wilt has collected the last 10 rebounds" you don't get those great moments. It's a more "over time" thing with basketball for the true highlights (minus maybe a tight game in the final minutes).