SMW begins a recurring series focused on various media related aspects of sports video games. Today, a look at announcing.
Sports Media Watch recently had an opportunity to try out 2K Sports games TopSpin 4 and Major League Baseball 2K11, in addition to last year’s NBA 2K11. The NBA and MLB games try to replicate a real-life broadcast, while TopSpin goes in the opposite direction.
The announcers for NBA 2K11 and MLB 2K11 do a good job of replicating a real sports broadcast. The games’ advantage stems from the conversational-style broadcast offered by the NBA team of Kevin Harlan and Clark Kellogg and the baseball team of Gary Thorne, Steve Phillips and John Kruk.
MLB 2K11
In the few games sampled, Thorne, Kruk and Phillips offered a broadcast that was not exactly filled with personality and energy. While constant excitement would be distracting even in a video game, there perhaps needs to be more of a pulse. When Game 5 of the World Series — a potential clincher — went to extra innings, Thorne sounded like he was calling a day game in April when he said “we’ll head to extra innings in San Francisco.”
That said, there was something about the ‘just the facts’ approach that made the game seem more like a real broadcast. For the most part, Kruk and Phillips sounded natural as they reeled off stats and opinions about teams and players. During a Brewers/Pirates franchise mode game, Kruk and Phillips went into specific detail about several players, such as Ryan Braun, Corey Hart, Jose Tabata, and Pedro Alvarez. Kruk at one point even mentioned Yovani Gallardo‘s 2008 knee injury.
The announcers also kept up with season stats; in a Marlins/Braves game, Thorne noted that Brian McCann was leading the league in home runs (in franchise mode, not real life).
However, authentic does not necessarily equal perfect. The three-man booth seemed largely unnecessary, and Kruk and Phillips sometimes seemed indistinguishable. The first time playing the game, it took multiple innings before it was clear that they were not the same person.
NBA 2K11
Harlan and Kellogg are more engaging than their MLB counterparts, yet still manage to retain an air of realism. Harlan brings much of the energy he has on TNT’s NBA broadcasts, though signature lines such as “right between the eyes” or “with no regard for human life” are rare, if used at all. Like Harlan, Kellogg also brings his own unique style to the game. The term ‘spurtability’ — said all-too-frequently in the game — is something Kellogg actually uses in real life.
Like Thorne and co., their commentary is peppered with specific observations about individual players and teams. In the first few minutes of a Hornets/Pacers game, the duo went into detail about Darren Collison, David West and Hornets coach Monty Williams. When hearing the dialogue for the first time, it really adds to the game. However, once one hears the same story the second or third time, it starts to become a negative.
For a fast-paced basketball game, long conversations tend to get irritating, especially when they continue through plays, timeouts, and the like. For example, a Doris Burke report about Emeka Okafor ran over three possessions and a foul. In some ways, that’s authentic in and of itself. How many times have announcers talked over the action and repeated the same catchphrases and storylines?
Flaws aside, the dialogue for the Harlan/Kellogg team is virtually seamless. There was little evidence of the choppiness of years past (e.g.: “Iverson [pause; change in tone] is too good to miss those kinds of shots). The same can also be said for the previously mentioned MLB team of Thorne, Kruk and Phillips.
TopSpin 4
By contrast to the MLB and NBA games, 2K?s TopSpin 4 does not use announcers, instead allowing crowd noise and the umpire to tell the story of the match.
Though TopSpin does not try to replicate a real tennis broadcast, at least in terms of announcing, there is an argument that this makes the game a superior experience to its real-life equivalent. Particularly in tennis, announcers tend to overshadow the game, often with superficial remarks.
Conclusion
Overall, the NBA and MLB games come as close as one can imagine to accurately reflecting real life broadcasts. There are still, however, some issues that need to be fixed. Considering how far games have come over the past decade, one imagines many of these issues will be handled in the coming years.
(Kellogg uses ‘spurtability’ three times in this 2009 cbssports.com article alone, not including the headline)
