OS Weekly Wrap Up, Getting You Caught Up on Sports Gaming News (Oct 18 - Oct 24, 2020)

With Dirt 5 finally being confirmed for the launch of the next-gen consoles, Prince takes us through a Dirt 5 buyer’s guide of sorts as we get prepped for its current-gen launch on November 6.

First, before we skate into some of the specific areas I want to highlight, allow me to briefly explain what I mean. Typically, with the NHL series — and sports games in a general sense — a common belief is from year to year games are literally copy and pasted with minimal changeover. We always hear about new features, improved this and enhanced that, but commonly we know it’s just their way of marketing the new game. However, from time to time these games do noticeably improve and, while far from prefect, so far during my time with NHL 21 I can say certain areas have gotten much better.

The most popular set of sliders for the NBA 2K series last year came from schnaidt1, and he’s back this year working on a new set of sliders for those looking to find the sweet spot either in standard CPU games or a deeper MyLeague scenario. 2K is a bit rougher around the edges this year out of the box, especially as it relates to AI. When factoring in the multiple patches, it means honing sliders is a trickier process this year. That being said, schanidt1 is putting in the work, so let’s go over what he’s got so far with these NBA 2K21 sliders.

Vikesfan059 and crew continue to chug along with keeping NCAA Football 14 alive via their long-standing roster edits. The rosters look like they’ve been in a good place for a bit now, so I wanted to share a quick update for those who maybe want to get back into the college football spirit one more time. One note, this includes offline rosters for the PS3 and Xbox 360, and also a “modded” roster download for those who live in the world of the College Football Revamped world.

The WWE 2K19 Attribute Project from DC and Hyperballer is sort of all-encompassing spreadsheet that is (continuously) adding wrestlers and re-balancing ratings to try and create a more realistic wrestling experience. Since we’re not getting a normal WWE 2K game this year, this project has taken on some added importance this cycle. Even if WWE 2K19 is maligned, there’s still flashes of good here if you want to put in the time. One of the best ways to do that is by scoping out the work from DC and Hyperballer. One note, this includes offline rosters for the PS3 and Xbox 360, and also a “modded” roster download for those who live in the world of the College Football Revamped world.

When I play EA’s NHL series, my franchise experience consists of playing every period of all 82 games during a season. However, I always run my franchises by doing a fantasy draft to create my own unique team of talented rookies, blossoming young stars in the making and established stars. But if you are someone who each year looks to begin your franchise experience with a new franchise (and a real roster), this offseason has provided several newly reformed teams that are intriguing options. Whether you decide to start off with an established Stanley Cup contender or rebuild and make a run with an underdog, here are some of my NHL 21 franchise mode team selections.

For this first article, we’re going to tackle the advanced instructions menu. For those unaware of what advanced instructions are, they are a set of preset tactics found on the “gameplan” screen. These preset tactics help to execute strategies in both attack and defense. With roughly 15 options to choose from, you can select up to four at a time (two for both attack and defense) while also mapping them to the D-pad. Activating these in the match is as simple as pressing “L2 + D-pad direction), and by doing so you’ll see a small text notification when they’re activated.

With the emerging rumor that Madden NFL 21 won’t be there right at launch for Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5, the question becomes what needs to be better when Madden 21 next gen actually does come out? Even if many folks won’t really need to be “sold” on the game since current-gen owners will get a free upgrade to the next-gen version, in order to even be excited about playing Madden 21 again, what needs to be better?

As KG said in his review a couple weeks back, FIFA 21 is in a little bit of a weird spot. Beyond the potential next-gen delay, the gameplay is not amazing this year out of the box — at least not for fans of “realistic” soccer. The modes got a lot of love and the presentation has taken another step forward, but it can be hard to find a good game against the AI. This is where the FIFA 21 sliders from Matt10 and the OS community come into play.