ITT: I play one season of Tecmo Super Bowl with each team

[Warner2BruceTD]

Let's see how many Super Bowls I can win.

House Rules:

-One team per season, play every game. No skip, no CPU, no coach.

-No players playing out of position in multi back sets (barring injury). RB play RB, WR play WR, etc. (with exceptions for players like RB/WR's Eric Metcalf & Mel Gray, RB/TE Rod Bernstein, and a few others). RB2 & TE may be substituted for WRs in three/four WR sets.

-Money plays will absolutely be abused. That means Lawrence Taylor is blocking every kick, Bo Jackson is getting carries on 3rd & 17, and Bob Nelson is leading the league in sacks with 47.

-I will alternate between AFC teams and NFC teams until I play one season with each team. After that, we move on to Tecmo Super Bowl (Genesis), also known as Tecmo Super Bowl I. Assuming Rush doesnt flip the site for an $80 profit and a free copy of Madden, we'll keep going with Tecmo Super Bowl II and Tecmo Super Bowl III. We'll stop there, because every Tecmo after that was dogshit. But let's face it, in the spirit of VSN lists, this will probably be abandoned after one and a half seasons or something.

For my first go, I want to use a powerful team since i'm no doubt very rusty. So, i'm using Bo Jackson and the Raiders. I'm also playing on a third party emulation box with a sketchy unresponsive controller, which provides another handicap.

Updates coming.

Los Angeles Raiders: 13-3, 1st place AFC West (Super Bowl Champs)
Tampa Bay Buccaneers: 8-7-1, 3rd place NFC Central (Lost Divisional Round)

[Macken]

Will you be streaming this?

[ram29jackson]

Lol this game would be hilarious on a modern tv screen,so big

[Warner2BruceTD]

The game uses 1990 rosters, with the 1991 NFL schedule. Player ratings seem to be based on 1990 statistics.

Let's break down the Los Angeles Raiders roster, and discuss strategies.

Tecmo Geek ranks every Tecmo player based on a very nerdy algorithm. It's not perfect science and there are many people in the Tecmo community who weigh the various attributes differently. I'll be using Tecmo Geek throughout as a quick guide to the players and rosters.

Of course, in season mode, players fluctuate from "Injured" (out), "Bad", "Average", "Good", and "Excellent" condition from week to week, which means these base ratings are always changing anyway.

Tecmo Geek Raiders breakdown: https://tecmogeek.com/teams/raiders/

1990 Raiders (12-4): https://www.pro-football-reference.c...s/rai/1990.htm

QB
Not good. Schroeder is one of the worst starters in the game, and Beuerlein isn't quite good enough to warrant a Schroeder benching. I'll have a quick hook here based on the hot hand. I can't count on either one at "average" or lower to make non routine throws.

In the actual 1990 season, veteran Vince Evans was Schroeder's backup. Steve Beuerlein didn't play a single snap. Tecmo didn't goof. Beuerlein was on the team, but this is why he never played:

Going into the 1990 season, Beuerlein was to be the lowest-paid starting QB in the league, at a salary of $140,000.[15] This led to a contract dispute and holdout, and although he eventually signed before the start of the season, the holdout angered Raiders owner Al Davis, who refused to allow the Raiders' coaches to play Beuerlein. Schroeder was handed the starting job with Vince Evans as the backup, and Beuerlein was held inactive for every game. To compound matters for Beuerlein, the Raiders finished 12-4, and advanced all the way to the AFC title game, where they lost to the Bills, 51-3.

RB
Bo isn't as dominant here as he is on the original Tecmo Bowl, but he's still arguably the best player in the game, and virtually unstoppable when in "excellent" condition. He will be fed plenty. Marcus Allen is good enough to get real touches and eat carries in blowouts to avoid a Bo injury. Greg Bell & Steve Smith are name players, but bring virtually nothing to the table. Bell was coming off back to back 1,000 yard seasons with the Rams in '88 & '89, but struggled to find carries in a deep Raiders backfield and put up poor stats, leading to bad ratings in the game. Smith is ranked 191 out of the 206 RBs in the game.

WR/TE
WR2 Willie Gault is the 14th rated WR/TE in the game. Swervin' Mervyn Fernandez is also Top 20, and Tim Brown makes this a deep unit. Brown will be my return man for realism~!, and also to keep Bo & Gault healthy. The TE's kinda stink.

OL
Rory Graves is the only poor player. Wisniewski is one of the best lineman in the league. You're at the mercy of player condition here. When you've got a bunch of "bad" OL conditions, good defenses will run right through them even when they don't guess the play. Bo can survive that, but the bad QB's can't and will make bad throws when rushed before routes are complete.

Defense
The DL is awesome, with Howie Long (3) & Greg Townsend (4) top five lineman, and Bob Golic (25) being starter quality for any team. Hybrid DL/LB Scott Davis is the best of a mediocre LB crew, based on his 10 sacks in 1990. The DBs are fine, Eddie Anderson is the star. My strategy will be to use the DL, guess wide side runs, and cheese my way to sacks on pass plays.

K/P
Nothing to see here.

Gameplan/Goals
Run Bo as much as possible and attempt to crush rushing records. Attempt to get Marcus Allen to 1,000 yards. Double digit sacks from all three DL will be key, 20+ from a couple of them means my gameplan is working. The Raiders are a very good squad with one god like player, so anything less than a Super Bowl win will be a letdown, and it's not out of the question to go undefeated.

[Warner2BruceTD]

Update as we head into the BYE week.

Crushed the Oilers Week 1. Bo went for 300 yards, the DL was unstoppable, and this game basically played out exactly how I envisioned the season to go.

Week 2, Bo gets carried off the field on the first play of the game. Welp.

We manage to beat Denver, a terrible Colts team, and Atlanta without Jackson. Allen is leading the league in rushing and TDs at this point. Schroeder is predictably terrible, only completing the most wide open of passes, but we're throwing the ball so infrequent that he doesn't even qualify for rate stats. So he's not hurting us.

At 4-0, i'm hoping to get Jackson back for the Niners, the best team in the game. Jackson returns, but fumbles twice, and I'm never in the game. You ever play a game of Tecmo where the other team is flying around the field you can tell you're fucked from the opening kickoff? This was one of those games. PIERCE HOLT was getting to my QB even without guessing the play. Rice was catching balls while covered. Jackson, with an 81 carry rating, still fumbled twice. I was never within two scores.

SD, without Marion Butts or Rod Bernstein, trotted out JOE CARAVELLO (career numbers: 1 carry, 0 yards) at RB, allowing me to guess pass and stop the run game with ease manually, so the Chargers were easy work.

It was around this point in the schedule that the playbook had gotten "stale", and if you play Tecmo a ton you know what that means. Plays stop working, CPU guesses better, and you need to switch things up.

Beuerlein took over as QB, and I benched the awful Mervyn Fernandez (for Tim Brown) who had more fumbles than receptions (stat glitch: fumbles negate statistics on a given play). Willie Gault was moved to WR1 and I added a bunch of streaks to the playbook.

Lots of struggles on offense, but I still held off Seattle and the Rams.

Marcus Allen went down during the Rams game. I saw this as a good chance to revamp the entire playbook, since I didn't want to play Steve Smith or Greg Bell, who were bad in spot action. I switched to single back, four wide for the Chiefs game. Big mistake. Beuerlein is just as bad as Schroeder, Fernandez has been in "bad" condition since Week 2, and despite 250+ from Bo I lose to the Chiefs. I head into the BYE 7-2, one game ahead of KC.

We're gonna regroup after the BYE, reset the playbook to default, and bring back all of the starters (minus Fernandez, who I now hate).

[FirstTimer]

We have a franchise section for this.

SMH

[Warner2BruceTD]

We have a franchise section for this.

SMH

that section is for nerds and as 2011 VSN Poster of the Year I refuse to conform or be subjected to the unwashed masses of "gamers"

[Warner2BruceTD]

Welp, we went 13-3 and won the Super Bowl, but it was the worst 13-3 possible.

Bo Jackson couldn't stay healthy, and when he was healthy, he was almost always in "bad" condition. Despite a BC rating of 81, he fumbled at least 15 times. I managed 1650 rushing yards, which sounds OK, but we all know that's not a good total for Bo in a full Tecmo season.

Marcus Allen had trouble staying healthy too, but stepped in for Bo admirably and did a lot of dirty work.

The QB situation was dire. I alternated both dudes all year but finally settled on Schroeder in the playoffs.

Howie Long took over in the postseason, and dominated vs Cincinnati (a tough team who beat me in OT in the regular season) in the divisional round with about 20 tackles and 5 sacks. I got next to nothing all year out of my back 8. Long, Golic, and Townsend carried the load.

Mervyn Fernandez recorded one reception all year as he sat in my doghouse, but I went with my highest rated guys in the playoffs and he made several key plays. Super Bowl was an intense game against the Niners, who smoked me in the regular season. I also beat the Chiefs in the regular season finale, so I avenged all three of my regular season losses.

Los Angeles Raiders 13-3 (1st place AFC West, #1 seed)
Divisional Round - def. Cincinnati Bengals, 21-13 (blocked PAT, they were never within less than 8)
AFC Championship - def. Miami Dolphins, 21-0 (Marino was dogshit, rocking chair game, held them well under 100 yards)
Super Bowl - def. San Francisco 49ers, 10-6 (SF led 6-0 at the half, totally shut down running game, forced to dink & dunk to 10)

Team Stats
8th in total offense (4680)
27th in Passing (2125)
1st in Rushing (2555)

1st in total defense (3259)
1st in passing defense (1817)
10th in rushing defense (1442)

QB
Jay Schroeder - 48/79, 1210 yards, 15 TD, 4 INT
Steve Beuerlein - 45/77, 915 yards, 9 TD, 1 INT

RB
Bo Jackson - 116 car 1650 yards, 19 TD. 13 rec 166 yards. Led NFL in rushing.
Marcus Allen - 114 car 733 yards, 15 TD. 27 rec 359 yards, 5 TD
Steve Smith - 76 yards, 6 total TD
Greg Bell - 8 carries, 0 yards. Thanks for playing, asshole.

WR/TE
Willie Gault - 20 rec 948 yards, 12 TD
Tim Brown - 7 rec 178 yards, 1 TD. 548 KR yards, 180 PR yards
Mervyn Fernandez - 1 catch for 27 yards. All year.
Sam Graddy - 2 rec 34 yards
Ethan Horton - 15 rec 323 yards, 3 TD
Mike Dyal - no stats recorded

Defense
Bob Golic - 23 sacks (tie NFL lead with Charles Haley, led AFC)
Howie Long - 11 sacks
Greg Townsend - 8 sacks
Riki Ellison - 8 sacks
Scott Davis - 5 sacks
Aaron Wallace - key PAT block vs CIN in playoffs
Mike Harden - led team with 2 INT

K/P
Jeff Jaeger - 62/62 PAT, 6/8 FG
Jeff Gossett - 60.5 yards per punt

[Warner2BruceTD]

Alright, next up: Tampa Bay Buccaneers. That means WAYNE HADDIX

Buccaneers Tecmo Geek breakdown: https://tecmogeek.com/teams/buccaneers/

1990 Buccaneers: https://www.pro-football-reference.c...s/tam/1990.htm

QB
Vinny Testaverde, which translates to "Green Dick", is totally competent and will feel like using Johnny Unitas after slogging through 19 games with the Raiders QBs. Even Jeff Carlson is no worse than the Raiders pair, and is a upper level backup ratings wise, so i'm pretty OK here.

I have no idea why Tecmo went with third stringer Carlson (who didn't attempt a pass all year in 1990) over Chris Chandler, who started three games and was clearly the backup QB.

RB
Gary Anderson was one of my favorite players as a kid and i'm going to feed him the ball like he's starving. Reggie Cobb, Bruce Perkins, and John Harvey don't offer much, although Cobb's 94 "HP" means he'll be able to truck some dudes and fight his way to first downs and TD's in short yardage, meaning i'll have three plays in the book for Anderson and one dive for Cobb.

WR/TE
Anderson is my fastest player so he'll be getting plenty of work in the passing game, and Mark Carrier is a serviceable WR. The rest of the receiving "weapons" are pretty bad. WR Danny Peebles is one of the slowest skill position players in the game.

OL
There are 28 teams in Tecmo Bowl, which means there are 140 total OL in the game. TB's five OL rank 103, 109, 131, 137, 138 according to Tecmo Geek. If these guys ever hit "bad" condition, i'm fucked.

Defense
TECMO BOWL LEGEND WAYNE HADDIX, BAY BAY

Why is journeyman Wayne Haddix (three teams in four years) arguably the best usable player in Tecmo Super Bowl? Because he had all 7 of his career INT's, plus 3 TD's, in 1990. He played his last snap in 1991.

The DB's are the clear strength. I think Broderick Thomas (7.5 sacks in 1990) got shafted a bit in the ratings. Rueben Davis is the best of a mediocre front 7, but the DBs are interception machines.

K/P
Steve Christie is one of the best kickers in the game, and i'll probably need him.

Gameplan/Goals
Feed Gary Anderson until he's dead, and look for Carrier when I need to throw deep. Call run plays on D and patrol the field with WAYNE HADDIX and look for USER PICKS. Milk the clock, don't do anything stupid, and try to make the playoffs by any means necessary.

[Senser81]

Defense
Bob Golic - 23 sacks (tie NFL lead with Charles Haley, led AFC)

Mike always got the publicity, but Bob was the better Golic.

[Senser81]

WR Danny Peebles is one of the slowest skill position players in the game.

Ironically, in the made-for-TV movie about the 1990 Tampa Bay Bucs, WR Danny Peebles was played by his uncle, Mario Van Peebles.

[Warner2BruceTD]

8-7-1 with TB.

Horrendous offense as expected. Very hard to move the ball against juiced up teams. Struggled to make the playoffs as the #5 seed. Gary Anderson was clearly my top offensive player, but the big surprise was TE Ron Hall, who had 37 grabs for 824 yards and 6 scores (the real life Ron Hall topped out at 555 yards in 1988).

Bucs have a good defense on the game. The DBs are absolute beasts. We led the league in pass defense by nearly 1000 yards, led by Tecmo legend WAYNE HADDIX BAY BAY.

The playoff loss to the 49ers was brutal. Reggie Cobb fumbled at the 2 yard line with 0:15 in a 14-14 game as I was running out the clock setting up the game winning chip shot FG. We swapped possessions in OT before the inevitable Jerry Rice TD.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers 8-7-1 (3rd place NFC Central, #3 seed)
Wild Card Round - def. Chicago Bears, 35-6 (Best offensive performance of the year. Payback for CHI whipping our ass during the season)
Divisional Round - lost to San Francisco 49ers, 20-14 OT (Gary Anderson injury in 4th Q was huge)

Team Stats
28th (LAST) in Total Offense (3142)
28th (LAST) in passing (2172)
26th in rushing (970)

1st in Total Defense (3081)
1st in Passing defense (1413)
23rd in rushing defense (1668)

QB
Vinny Testaverde - 109/180, 1996 yards, 12 TD 9 INT, 58 rush yards
Jeff Carlson - 6/11, 176 yards, 1 TD

RB
Gary Anderson - 675 rush yards, 263 rec yards, 271 kick ret, 44 punt ret, 12 TD (Team MVP)
Reggie Cobb - 133 rush yards, 268 rec yards, 8 TD
Bruce Perkins - 152 total yards, 2 TD
John Harvey - 6 touches, 15 total yards

WR/TE
Mark Carrier - 12 rec, 538 yards, 4 TD
Bruce Hill - 11 rec, 208 yards, 1 TD
Danny Peebles - 423 kick ret, 124 punt ret
Willie Drewrey - 5 punt ret, 24 yards
Ron Hall - 37 rec, 824 yards, 6 TD
Jesse Anderson - 1 rec, 8 yards

OL
C Randy Grimes - Just wanted to note that this guy FUCKING BLOWS and was blown up by every single NT, in every game

Defense
NT Tim Newton - 33 sacks (led NFL)
LB Kevin Murphy - blocked at least 10 kicks
LB Winston Moss - 3 sacks, INT
LB Eugene Marve - 8 sacks
CB WAYNE HADDIX TECMO LEGEND - 4 INT, roughly 9000 pass breakups and a million key first down saving tackles
SS Mark Robinson - 3 INT

K/P
Steve Christie - 15/18 FG, 36/36 PAT
Mark Royals - 62.2 yards per punt

[Warner2BruceTD]

Next up, Houston Oilers. One of my favorite teams to use in the game. I feel like airing it out.

Oilers Tecmo Geek breakdown: https://tecmogeek.com/teams/oilers/

1990 Oilers: https://www.pro-football-reference.c...s/oti/1990.htm

QB
Warren Moon rules. He threw for over 4600 yards in the season this game is based on, back when it meant something. He's arguably the best QB in the game and has weapons. Commander Cody Carlson was Moon's longtime understudy and a reliable backup in real life, but he is pretty much useless in the game.

RB
As a kid I was amazed that the Oilers had Lorenzo White, Allen Pinkett, Alonzo Highsmith, and Mike Rozier all on the same team, because they were all college stars. By 1990, Highsmith was backing up Emmitt Smith in DAL and Rozier was traded mid season to fellow run-n-shoot team ATL, but i'll still have White & Pinkett to work with. Victor Jones probably won't see the field, and Doug Lloyd, who played one career game in the NFL and didn't record a statistic, is the #4 back. I don't believe he even made the 1990 Oilers out of training camp, but Tecmo needed a 4th RB to fill out the roster with Rozier moving to the Falcons mid season.

WR
LOADED. Drew Hill, Ernest Givins, Haywood Jeffries, and Curtis Duncan are all Top 15 WR's, and Hill & Givins are Top 5. HOU is a Run-n-shoot team, so they start 4 WR's, 1 RB, and carry 6 WRs and 0 TEs. Gerald McNeil isn't completely useless as a backup, and Tony Jones fills out the roster and will likely not take a single snap unless disaster strikes.

OL
The tackles are bad but the interior is excellent led by Matthews (#5 OL in the game) and Munchak (39).

Defense
Sean Jones & William Fuller are good DEs. Doug Smith is meh, but NT is a cheese position anyway.

Ray Childress is the best LB, and he's the "bottom" OLB which is the guy I like to control. The DB's are strong, CB Richard Johnson is nearly as good as TECMO LEGEND WAYNE HADDIX. Cris Dishman, Terry Kinard, and Bubba McDowell were good real life players who are very useful in the game.

Goals/Strategy
The Oilers are one of the best teams in the game, with a high powered offense and a very good defense. There's no reason I shouldn't win the Super Bowl, so i'm gonna fuck around and try to do wacky shit like throw for 5000+ yards and see how many of my receivers I can get over 1000. HOU, BUF, and the Rams were my teams of choice as a kid, so the nostalgia will be in full force.

[FirstTimer]

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