What does the KG trade mean to the basketball games?

With the news now official, Kevin Garnett is a Celtic. He has been traded to Boston in exchange for Al Jefferson, Gerald Green, Sebastian Telfair, Theo Ratliff along with his expiring contract and two first round picks. Combining Garnett with Paul Pierce and Ray Allen in Boston is going to make for an exciting trio.

This amounts to a huge swing in terms of how both teams will be viewed in the basketball games. I'll be doing power rankings in relation to how good every team should be in NBA Live 08 and NBA 2K8 in the near future. This trade will catapult Boston in those rankings.

The Celtics certainly appear to be one of the better if not the best team in the Eastern Conference based on the trio of superstars. They will lack depth and struggle from the PG position. They don't have anything at C either. Really it will be a team that relies Garnett, Pierce, and Allen for everything. Despite that it will be difficult to contain the big three who all have the ability to drive or shoot from the outside.

Meanwhile the T-Wolves may not have the marquee player anymore, but this seems to be a good deal for them as well. They weren't going to do anything in the Western Conference with or without Garnett for the next couple years, so building for the future was the way to go. They'll now have a fun team to play with and have talent spread out on the court instead of only in one player. It makes them a more appealing team or a less appealing team depending on what kind of style an individual plays the game with. Some people do better with a superstar or two, while others like the freedom of not relying on just a couple specific players.

It looks like a good deal for both Boston and Minnesota. Not only for the NBA teams but also for their representation in the basketball games. Minnesota wasn't going to be a highly sought after team before but now they're a little more intriguing. When you get into a Dynasty mode they look to be in great shape for the future. Meanwhile in the weak Eastern Conference the Celtics become one of the premiere teams. They still may not match up against the Western Conference powerhouses, but with the trio of All-Stars they'll be dangerous on a game to game basis.

New NHL 2K8 details and screenshots

2K Sports has released some more info on the upcoming NHL 2K8 detailing two new features. The "ProStick" and a new face-off system. They also released a few new screens featuring the cover athlete Jason Spezza.

The new ProStick gives players precision puck handling movements and all new controls intuitively mapped to the right thumb stick while the groundbreaking face-off system brings an unmatched level of depth and strategy with every drop of the puck.

"The ProStick and face-off system work hand-in-hand to bring a new level of control to hockey video games," said Graeme Bayless, President of Kush Games, a 2K Sports studio. "With these two features, we feel NHL 2K8 offers a fresh gameplay experience that will appeal to gamers new to the series as well as our loyal fans."

Stick movement and commands are tied directly to the right analogue stick, giving gamers authentic control and puck handling ability. Hundreds of new animations give users a full range of movement, creating a genuine NHL gameplay experience on both offense and defense.

Click the thumbnails to view the full size images.

Madden video going over technical enhancements

Gametrailers has posted a new video that has producers for Madden 08 discussing different improvements to the game on the technical side as well as new gameplay footage to go along with it. Some of the topics discussed include control responsiveness, branching animations, mid-air collisions, collision detection, gang tackling, AI, and fatigue.

This was one of the more impressive videos put out for the game this year. Not only in hearing about all of the improvements and additions but also how incredibly fluid and quick the gameplay was. There were some really neat highlights shown in this video. As much as some of these same things came into play with NCAA Football 08, from this video alone many of them appear as if they’ll be significantly better in Madden.

Click through to watch the trailer.

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Some more online play reviews

A couple days ago I wrote an article regarding the lack of attention that online play gets in reviews. I included four of the main sites and what they wrote about the online play in NCAA Football 08 compared to the real situation which has been dreadful. The positive reaction to that article was overwhelming. There certainly is a faction out there that cares about online play and are disappointed with the current situation.

Here is a new review for NCAA Football and a couple for the recently released Nascar 08 which has been getting widespread reports of lag-plagued games. When EA can't even get games to run smoothly in one vs one matchups how could anyone expect anything else for 16 player races in Nascar?

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Padre’s Campus Legend: Part 10

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5 - Part 6 - Part 7 - Part 8 - Part 9

As I mentioned previously the Campus Legend career of Pasta Padre will continue throughout his Junior season with the possibility of a Senior season. Since he’ll be carried over into Madden’s Superstar Mode, it’s a good idea to keep following along to have the full history.

Continue on for the full second half of Padre’s sophomore year.

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Gamedaily’s take on the NBA 2K8 event

The impressions from Gamedaily regarding NBA 2K8 were interesting. As opposed to the majority of the sites that attended the recent media event, Gamedaily didn't just talk about the new dunk contest but they actually shared their opinion of what it meant in the big picture. They were disappointed that 2K didn't actually show off the game, which is what most people had hoped or expected going in. You can read their impressions in full here.

NBA Live 08 is already a great sports game, and EA’s demoed it multiple times. Last night, 2K Sports mentioned that it’s not resting on its laurels. If that’s true, then it needs to show us more than an unpolished dunk contest. We don’t mean to hate. We love 2K7 and want 2K8 immediately, but unlike years past, 2K Sports has some serious basketball competition. Time to deliver.

I mentioned in one of my previous writeups that it was curious that 2K's first reveal of NBA 2K8 would be an event to show off a dunk contest addition, which is being touted as their big feature this year. That goes along with the disappointing screenshots they released. In the past a ton would've already be out there about the game. Lots of developers have altered strategies with the changing of E3 so that in itself isn't concerning.

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Reports from NHL 08 Community Day

The EA Sports NHL 08 Community event took place on 7/27. I've collected some of the sites that have reported back on the event and linked to them below. I will update the list as they are posted. 

5W-G: 10 new screenshots, Full Impressions, Analysis of the event

ConsoleSports (registration required): Community Day update thread 

The Breakaway: Community Day update thread 

New Madden blog: “Things you won’t see on the back of the box”

In a new blog on the official Madden 08 site, Producer Ian Cummings goes over some of the less publicized aspects of Madden 08 and displays examples in a video. The topics touched on are team specific celebrations, bad weather jukes, short yardage play-action, defender fakeout logic, and “Mario running” fixes. You can check out the full blog posting here.

This is another really good blog from the Madden team showcasing things in the game that may generally be glossed over by the media sites and casual fans. As cool as the short yardage play-action looks, I only wish for a time when I can run play-action consistently without getting sacked before my QB even turns around. For myself that continues to be the most frustrating thing in EA football games.

NBA Live 08 Chris Paul screenshots

EA Sports has released a handful of new screens featuring Chris Paul from NBA Live 08. Paul is the cover athlete for NBA 2K8, so of course it is sure to draw a reaction.

After seeing the disappointing screenshots released for 2K8 (and that is especially so with the two showing Paul) EA has come out and presented their own version of him for direct comparison.

Click the thumbnails below to view the images full size.

Highlight clip contest winner

Congrats to the winner of the NCAA Football 08 highlight clip contest. Clip #2 came through in a narrow victory over #1. The Penn State INT to forced fumble to return for TD was unique enough to beat out the great Miami TD run. He'll have the choice between NBA Street: Homecourt on the PS3 or Def Jam: Icon on the 360.

Check back to the site in the near future for another contest!