RIP, I started typing this out and it never saved. Guess I'll be starting over.
This will probably turn out to be similar to what I have written about in past on previous ultimus week topics. I originally came across the league by complete accident. I was walking tv and nothing interesting was on, so I was skimming over random channels. I was close to the end of my channels and had still found nothing when I came across a sim league football game on. It was on a channel I had never even heard of and I was not even sure if I would get it. When I went to select it, sure enough it went through. The first thing I noticed was that the graphics were a bit aged so I could tell whatever game they were using had to have been at least 10ish years old. I could also tell that the style was not that of Madden and it had me really curious. As I was watching, the announcers gave mention to what this league was and what it was about. They also said that they were using All Pro Football 2k8. After a quick search, I found that the game had a huge following despite being over a decade old. The stadium was really unique and I also loved the team names. I googled the league name and tried to find out how I could join. I saw a post that lead me to reddit, so I went through with that. Lo and behold, that link actually lead me to the NSFL and not the SFL. That is how I first came in contact with our league. I joined on discord (and I was completely clueless when it came to discord at the time) and people were quite friendly. They asked how I found them and I said "I saw you on tv". Needless to say, most people were quite confused on what I was talking about. After getting some help on what to do next, I created a player. Shortly after I joined, the DSFL draft was coming about. I got scouted by a couple teams and that's when I really started to love this league. Then the draft itself hit and I had a blast. It was amazing to hear my name called and shortly after join my new team. Once the first game came about, I was moderately crushed. By now I had known that this wasn't the league I had seen on tv, but I was pretty let down by what the game itself looked like. It was a bunch of small dots moving around so fast that I could hardly follow the flow of the game the first time. Discouraged, I still found that I liked the idea of slowly improving my player over time and the idea that I was in a team locker room, so I hung in a bit longer. This next time I watched, I had a better idea of what to expect and I found that I didn't hate it this time. It was still too fast to try reading each play, but I also accepted that it was better to follow the general concept of what was happening and just read for the bigger plays. A couple more streams in and I actually found that I really started to enjoy those silly little dots.
The league became a big part of what I did. I had started when there was no pandemic, but when that hit a lot of activities I did anyways weren't going to happen. That's not to say I wouldn't have kept doing the league anyway though, as I had started to get more and more involved. On Christmas eve, I was invited into the NOLA War Room and then shortly after named a captain of Tijuana. That day was one of the most meaningful days of my sim league life. I went on to be a rookie mentor for 4 seasons (3 seasons? I'm honestly not sure anymore, everything runs together). I also was a GM for the Tijuana Luchadores for 3 seasons. During that time, I met a huge portion of the league userbase for the time. It was such a privilege getting to know so many great people and help out in their journey to enjoying the league. The best feeling for me was seeing others get to enjoy those same positive emotions I felt, like getting drafted or being named a captain of your team. This league has been way more positive than negative in my time here and I hope it can continue to be that way for others.
Even bigger RIP. I went to WordCounter and found what I had typed still saved in there. Because I don't want to feel like I wasted time doing this twice, I'm going to post below as well.
Happy Silver Jubilee ISFL/NSFL! You've made it through 25 seasons now, a feat that feels pretty monumental. I think a lot of us take it for granted that these sim leagues are just up and running, but that is never a guarantee. Joining the Grass Roots Soccer League from close to the start, I saw the insane amount of work it takes just to get a league like this up and running. Once that is done, it still takes the dedication of a lot of people to keep things running smoothly. For over one year of my real life now, I have been a part of this league.
From day one, this league was something I was fascinated in. I loved the idea of doing different activities each week and slowly making my player improve over time. I remember watching my first sim and almost getting turned off though. The chat was going crazy for these stupid little dots and I was really unimpressed at first. I thought that the structure was cool, but I didn't really feel like I was watching much when my player was on the field. After a couple of days though, I started warming up to the idea of 22 little dots running through a 60 minute game in just about 5 minutes. I've come to really love those silly little dots, though sometimes I do wonder about what it would be like to see a more life like presentation. The other aspects of the league is where the magic really happens though.
The scouting process and draft is hands down the coolest aspect of what we do. Having all of the teams reach out and scout you was an awesome feeling. I feel like scouting has really made a shift to being much more impersonal with the stupid questionnaires these days, but those who reach out and do it the old fashioned way get big props from me. It just makes a more personal touch from the beginning and probably goes a longer way for that prospect.
Besides scouting, I think the other best aspect of this league is the locker room structure. Being in a place with all of your teammates really does feel like a locker room. You get to shoot the breeze, talk sports and of course talk about anything league related. This is also something that has changed quite a lot since I first joined, but luckily where I'm in we have a closed locker room. I know a lot of people prefer an open locker room, but I strongly disagree with that sentiment. I think the whole point of the team locker room is to keep it to just current and former players of that organization. If you want to socialize with the rest of the league, go to the dedicated server that literally 99% of the league is a part of from the start. I also don't understand the allure of being a part of 17 different locker rooms and trying to communicate in all of them. I can barely keep up with 2 these days.
Of everything I've mentioned, the single best part of this league has been the users I've meet. A large majority of the users I'm closest with stem from NOLA and Tijuana. When I was more active as a GM and Rookie Mentor, I did get to meet a ton of awesome people in that regard as well. For the sake of not leaving anyone out, I won't start naming names. I think anyone who I have become close with knows already. To those people, I just want to say thank you for everything you have done. The league is in a better place because of you being here. I also feel like I am a better person for getting to know so many of you this last year. Keeping being awesome! Here is to wishing another 25 seasons for the ISFL.
This will probably turn out to be similar to what I have written about in past on previous ultimus week topics. I originally came across the league by complete accident. I was walking tv and nothing interesting was on, so I was skimming over random channels. I was close to the end of my channels and had still found nothing when I came across a sim league football game on. It was on a channel I had never even heard of and I was not even sure if I would get it. When I went to select it, sure enough it went through. The first thing I noticed was that the graphics were a bit aged so I could tell whatever game they were using had to have been at least 10ish years old. I could also tell that the style was not that of Madden and it had me really curious. As I was watching, the announcers gave mention to what this league was and what it was about. They also said that they were using All Pro Football 2k8. After a quick search, I found that the game had a huge following despite being over a decade old. The stadium was really unique and I also loved the team names. I googled the league name and tried to find out how I could join. I saw a post that lead me to reddit, so I went through with that. Lo and behold, that link actually lead me to the NSFL and not the SFL. That is how I first came in contact with our league. I joined on discord (and I was completely clueless when it came to discord at the time) and people were quite friendly. They asked how I found them and I said "I saw you on tv". Needless to say, most people were quite confused on what I was talking about. After getting some help on what to do next, I created a player. Shortly after I joined, the DSFL draft was coming about. I got scouted by a couple teams and that's when I really started to love this league. Then the draft itself hit and I had a blast. It was amazing to hear my name called and shortly after join my new team. Once the first game came about, I was moderately crushed. By now I had known that this wasn't the league I had seen on tv, but I was pretty let down by what the game itself looked like. It was a bunch of small dots moving around so fast that I could hardly follow the flow of the game the first time. Discouraged, I still found that I liked the idea of slowly improving my player over time and the idea that I was in a team locker room, so I hung in a bit longer. This next time I watched, I had a better idea of what to expect and I found that I didn't hate it this time. It was still too fast to try reading each play, but I also accepted that it was better to follow the general concept of what was happening and just read for the bigger plays. A couple more streams in and I actually found that I really started to enjoy those silly little dots.
The league became a big part of what I did. I had started when there was no pandemic, but when that hit a lot of activities I did anyways weren't going to happen. That's not to say I wouldn't have kept doing the league anyway though, as I had started to get more and more involved. On Christmas eve, I was invited into the NOLA War Room and then shortly after named a captain of Tijuana. That day was one of the most meaningful days of my sim league life. I went on to be a rookie mentor for 4 seasons (3 seasons? I'm honestly not sure anymore, everything runs together). I also was a GM for the Tijuana Luchadores for 3 seasons. During that time, I met a huge portion of the league userbase for the time. It was such a privilege getting to know so many great people and help out in their journey to enjoying the league. The best feeling for me was seeing others get to enjoy those same positive emotions I felt, like getting drafted or being named a captain of your team. This league has been way more positive than negative in my time here and I hope it can continue to be that way for others.
Even bigger RIP. I went to WordCounter and found what I had typed still saved in there. Because I don't want to feel like I wasted time doing this twice, I'm going to post below as well.
Happy Silver Jubilee ISFL/NSFL! You've made it through 25 seasons now, a feat that feels pretty monumental. I think a lot of us take it for granted that these sim leagues are just up and running, but that is never a guarantee. Joining the Grass Roots Soccer League from close to the start, I saw the insane amount of work it takes just to get a league like this up and running. Once that is done, it still takes the dedication of a lot of people to keep things running smoothly. For over one year of my real life now, I have been a part of this league.
From day one, this league was something I was fascinated in. I loved the idea of doing different activities each week and slowly making my player improve over time. I remember watching my first sim and almost getting turned off though. The chat was going crazy for these stupid little dots and I was really unimpressed at first. I thought that the structure was cool, but I didn't really feel like I was watching much when my player was on the field. After a couple of days though, I started warming up to the idea of 22 little dots running through a 60 minute game in just about 5 minutes. I've come to really love those silly little dots, though sometimes I do wonder about what it would be like to see a more life like presentation. The other aspects of the league is where the magic really happens though.
The scouting process and draft is hands down the coolest aspect of what we do. Having all of the teams reach out and scout you was an awesome feeling. I feel like scouting has really made a shift to being much more impersonal with the stupid questionnaires these days, but those who reach out and do it the old fashioned way get big props from me. It just makes a more personal touch from the beginning and probably goes a longer way for that prospect.
Besides scouting, I think the other best aspect of this league is the locker room structure. Being in a place with all of your teammates really does feel like a locker room. You get to shoot the breeze, talk sports and of course talk about anything league related. This is also something that has changed quite a lot since I first joined, but luckily where I'm in we have a closed locker room. I know a lot of people prefer an open locker room, but I strongly disagree with that sentiment. I think the whole point of the team locker room is to keep it to just current and former players of that organization. If you want to socialize with the rest of the league, go to the dedicated server that literally 99% of the league is a part of from the start. I also don't understand the allure of being a part of 17 different locker rooms and trying to communicate in all of them. I can barely keep up with 2 these days.
Of everything I've mentioned, the single best part of this league has been the users I've meet. A large majority of the users I'm closest with stem from NOLA and Tijuana. When I was more active as a GM and Rookie Mentor, I did get to meet a ton of awesome people in that regard as well. For the sake of not leaving anyone out, I won't start naming names. I think anyone who I have become close with knows already. To those people, I just want to say thank you for everything you have done. The league is in a better place because of you being here. I also feel like I am a better person for getting to know so many of you this last year. Keeping being awesome! Here is to wishing another 25 seasons for the ISFL.
![[Image: rqph9tT.jpg]](https://i.imgur.com/rqph9tT.jpg)
![[Image: 6HEXEeb.png]](https://i.imgur.com/6HEXEeb.png)
![[Image: sylGM0.2x.png]](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/718873200989044747/756695549234643054/sylGM0.2x.png)
(Brice Boggs, Ryan Applehort, Jaylen Storm)
(Brice Boggs, Ryan Applehort, Jackson Kingston)
(Ryan Applehort)
(Jaylen Storm)
(Jaylen Storm)
(Jackson Kingston)![[Image: MaQlGdl.jpg]](https://i.imgur.com/MaQlGdl.jpg)
![[Image: fWGXIIe.jpg]](https://i.imgur.com/fWGXIIe.jpg)
![[Image: LPLD95s.gif]](https://i.imgur.com/LPLD95s.gif)
![[Image: wildstar.png]](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/758471909196562442/782037618690883594/wildstar.png)
![[Image: -_Derek_Wildstar.png]](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/743276659964379178/761742585101549579/-_Derek_Wildstar.png)
![[Image: 96bOxSB.png]](https://i.imgur.com/96bOxSB.png)
![[Image: h5Ta7H1.png]](https://i.imgur.com/h5Ta7H1.png)
![[Image: image0.png?width=822&height=426]](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/830854638353645609/830854703713746954/image0.png?width=822&height=426)
![[Image: purchase_sig.png]](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/319945672310784010/629840905351725069/purchase_sig.png)
