ESPN NFL 2K (originally NFL 2K) was an American football video game series developed by Visual Concepts and jointly published by Sega and ESPN.HistorySeries beginnings: Dreamcast exclusivity and the move to multiple platforms
The NFL 2K series was introduced by Sega for its Dreamcast to address EA Sports's decision not to publish Madden NFL on the Dreamcast. Its first two installments—NFL 2K and NFL 2K1—were exclusive to the Dreamcast, but with the demise of Sega's system, the NFL 2K series was repositioned as the main cross-platform rival to Madden NFL. Both series were published on the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and GameCube. With the cancellation of the NFL GameDay (989 Sports) and NFL Fever (Microsoft Game Studios) video game series in 2003, NFL 2K—now ESPN NFL Football—truly became Madden NFL's primary competition.Bargain price
In 2004, Sega signed a deal with Take-Two Interactive in which Global Star (Take-Two's low-price unit) distributed and copublished all titles in Sega's ESPN franchise. As a result, ESPN NFL 2K5 was priced at US$19.99 the day it shipped—versus the typical new-release price of US$49.99. This earned it a wide audience among more casual football fans on the PlayStation 2 and Xbox. It was also the first time that ESPN NFL managed to grab a significant chunk of market share from the otherwise dominant Madden NFL.EA's exclusive licenses
However, in December 2004, EA signed an exclusive agreement with the NFL, making Madden NFL the only series allowed to use NFL team and player names. EA also signed an agreement with ESPN to become the only licensee of ESPN's brand in sports games on all platforms. This was an immense blow to Sega's franchise in their MLB, NBA, and NHL video game series.Installments
[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for ESPN NFL 2K ]
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