Happy Hour: Qualifying coverage and the new NASCAR video game
It’s time for Happy Hour. As always, tweet us your thoughts or shoot us an email at happyhourmailbag@yahoo.com if you want to participate.
Fair warning, NASCAR fans. Qualifying at Kentucky won’t be shown live on Friday (Update!) unless you have a sports tier or live in an area with a Comcast regional network.
NBC Sports Network is televising Track and Field Olympic Trials before Friday night’s Xfinity Series race as Cup qualifying is going on. Since NASCAR Twitter doesn’t handle change too well, we’re anxious to see the anger that’s shelled out Friday evening as fans discover they can’t watch qualifying.
Well, they can. And on the devices they’ll be tweeting from. NBC is streaming qualifying on its Live Extra App, which is pretty handy. So it’s not like you’ll be shut out of qualifying. Just fire it up on your phone, tablet or computer and you’ll be set.
@NickBromberg Qualifying is Live on TV Friday. Comcast Sportsnet Bay Area & Comcast Sportsnet Mid-Atlantic. Mid-Atlantic 30 mins joined in
— Eric Sturrock (@EricSturrock) July 7, 2016
Is it inconvenient? Sure … assuming you consider this to be an inconvenience among all other things in life that are inconveniences. And besides, it’s just qualifying. NASCAR qualifying sessions, even with the knockout format, aren’t incredibly dramatic. They’re more a show to set the field than anything else. It’ll all be OK.
@NickBromberg I guess the only thing I don't understand is with all the NBC properties, why not?
— Chris (@AllMilitaryNews) July 7, 2016
CNBC is running episodes of Undercover Boss while USA is showing reruns of Modern Family. Those are the two primary backups for NBC sports programming, though we imagine it’s easier to bump things on a weekend morning than it is on a Friday evening. And again, it’s just qualifying. It’s also a way for NBC to get people used to the idea of using the app, which isn’t a terrible idea. Who knows, maybe in 10 years the idea of television and streaming being separate services will be antiquated.
@NickBromberg Qualifying not being shown live due to Olympic-related event. Track and field finals. NBC will push Olympic event over NASCAR
— Jason R (@phillyphanatic2) July 7, 2016
Do you blame NBC? it’s a way to drum up interest in what’s likely to be the most-watched Olympics ever because of the live coverage ability. Sorry, NASCAR’s viewership numbers won’t compare to the huge audiences many Olympic evenings will have.
Oh, and one more TV note before we get off that subject – yes, there were more commercials during Saturday night’s race at Daytona than there were the year before. Though as it was pointed out to us, NBC would have fulfilled its commercial obligations during its rain delay fill time during 2015.
We’ll see how many commercials happen during the race at Kentucky.
@NickBromberg How many people don't attend Cup races at Kentucky because it was unprepared for its first race? Citations, please
— Geoffrey Miller (@GeoffreyMiller) July 7, 2016
This number has to be greater than zero, but how significant is it? You may remember the traffic and infrastructure disasters that plagued the first Cup race at the track. If you attended that race and have a horror story, we can’t blame you for swearing off a trip to the track again. Especially if Indianapolis, Bristol, Chicago or Michigan is within driving distance.
@GeoffreyMiller @NickBromberg will a poor release by Nascar heat evolution doom nascar games for good
— Dylan Goodin (@dgoodin24) July 7, 2016
It was hard to avoid the NASCAR video game commercials during NBC’s Daytona coverage. It looks like Dusenberry Martin is going to have a huge push for this game, which is set to be released in September.
And damn, I hope it’s really good. I grew up playing NASCAR video games (starting with Papyrus’ NASCAR Racing 2) and still race NASCAR 07 a couple times a year on the XBox.
Ever since NASCAR 07 it’s felt like NASCAR games have gotten progressively worse leading into the abomination that was NASCAR 14 and NASCAR 15, the latest NASCAR video games. They were borderline unplayable and simply unrealistic. And even more so when compared with the Formula 1 series of games and Project Cars, which is a great racing simulation.
The realism may be a reason why NASCAR games have gone downhill in recent years. As someone who loves games like Football Manager and Out of the Park Baseball, the need for realism doesn’t escape me. But it feels like the ability to jump into a game, make a couple generic tweaks to the car and have a good time in a 50-lap race is gone.
I want to spend minimal time on a setup and maximal time racing with a still fairly-real racing experience. That isn’t that much of a request, is it?
Hopefully NASCAR Heat Evolution can deliver on that. Here’s a video about the game, which apparently includes Ryan Ellis, a driver with two career Sprint Cup Series starts and no top 10s in the Xfinity Series and Camping World Truck Series.
We’ve got high hopes for something better than the previous iterations of NASCAR games. We’ll let you know if this game delivers.
@NickBromberg Are (KFC) we in the (Coke) dog days of (Sprint) summer racing, or will it be (NASCAR Heat) fun racing? https://t.co/xFqFkY6lx8
— Brian Cullather (@Briancullather) July 7, 2016
Looks like Brian’s weekly tweet got interrupted by commercials.
Given Kentucky’s newly-repaved status, don’t get too anxious about the quality of racing you’re going to see Saturday night. Oh, and don’t consider Kentucky to be a good judge of the lower-downforce test rules that the teams are running. With all the variables at play – teams are scuffing tires because of possible blistering issues – it may not be a fair test.
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Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at nickbromberg@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!