In many ways,
if a basketball game does not move forward in terms of gameplay, it’s going to
get stripped of the proverbial ball and the competition will take off in the
other direction on a fast break. That’s what has happened with Sony’s NBA 09:
The Inside. This is a game that had potential but squanders it with disabling
SIXAXIS controls and downgrading the The Life portion into a series of
mini-games that purport to track the career of a player created by the gamer.
Let’s look at
the latter first. One of the hallmarks of Sony’s NBA title was the ability to
step into the shoes of a player and guide that player up through the ranks to
potential NBA stardom. You begin by creating a player, but don’t worry too much
about the looks because regardless of the player you create, the cut scenes are
handled exactly the same. You might create an Ivy League Caucasian player, and
he will have the vocalization and mannerisms of a street-smart black player.
With a generic wash over that element, the option to create a player is
negligible. There are three storylines to track in this game – a point guard, a
shooting guard or small forward and the center or power forward. You start in
the development leagues with goal-specific objectives. Fail and you start again.
There are alternative objectives that you can achieve as well within the time
limit given. Then you hit up some mini-games, like basketball golf, with your
father, and take on spot objectives here and there up until a key moment in the
Finals. It is very directed and lacks a lot of flexibility.
Given that EA
Sports’ Be A Pro option is very barebones, The Life is an opportunity missed. It
is ultimately disappointing and uninspiring.
On the flipside
of that, though, is that you can create players and add them to NBA teams. As
you play, you accrue points that can be spent to improve their abilities.
As mention, by
default, all SIXAXIS motion controls are turned off, but you can enable them in
the options menu.
The menu hub
has been given a sleek look and while the game AI is suspect, the trade AI has
finally been fixed. In previous iterations, it was easy to have other teams
trade their top players to your favorite team, creating a monster squad that ran
the table with ease. But in 09, you cannot do that. The franchise mode has also
been given a bit of a deeper appeal, adding in the ability to rebuild teams in
the off-season, negotiate contracts and train.
The game has
the quickplay feature, The Life, Franchise mode as well as NBA Replay (step into
the shoes of top players during key moments in the ’07-’08 season) and mini
games. The mini games can be a bit hit and miss – like Blacktop Golf is made
hard by the angles you have to use to try to “sink” your shots – but are
generally entertaining and a pleasant diversion.
The meat and
potatoes of the program is, obviously, the on-court games with the TNT-style
television coverage. However, what starts as clever discourse by the
play-by-play and color commentator soon becomes repetitious noise that can be
turned off without affecting the experience. The witticisms might sound clever
the first time they are heard, but by the fifth time in the same game, they are
beyond old.
The game’s AI
is also suspect at times. In one of the first games played, Phoenix’s Steve Nash
didn’t do what he is really known for – dishing the rock. Instead, Nash went
inside, he put it up from outside, he passed up open players beneath the hoop to
launch (sometimes improbably successfully) three-pointers. When the game ended,
Nash (who averaged 16.9 points per game in 2007-08 and 11.1 assists per game)
had 34 points and five assists. Not to deride the abilities of one of the best
players in the NBA, but that simply is not a Nash-like performance.
When it comes
to the graphics, NBA 09 plays at 1080p in high def, which is very nice. The
players can move a little awkwardly at times, but generally the graphics are
decent and the player likenesses are very well done. But there are graphical
anomalies that crop up. At times the
fouling seems very off, with an opposing player moving backwards as the
controlled player attempts to swat the ball, to have three feet of air between
the two and the whistle blow for what the announcers call an audible slap on the
arm. And rebounding is its own particular brand of frustration at times. When a
shot goes up, before it even nears the rim, if it is a miss, there will be a
glowing halo on the floor. You can position a player inside that halo, and then
jump when the ball comes off the rim, only to have your angle wrong, and have an
opposing player snag the board.
Inevitably,
Sony’s NBA title has to be compared to EA’s and EA’s is the better game. The
Inside has too many flaws, and missed opportunities to qualify for a run through
the playoffs to the championship.
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Gameplay: 6.8
There are a few
moments when one player seems to slow down in going for a highlight moment, but
generally the game runs well at 60 frames per second. The AI, though, can be a
bit frustrating at times, especially if you try to play to players’ tendencies
rather to what the AI dictates they do. The controls are easy to understand and
use.
Graphics: 7.4
Solid environments,
good player models but the animations sometimes feel a bit off and interceptions
occur at odd moments.
Sound: 6.8
The musical score is
decent but the tandem of Kenny Smith and Kevin Calabro can get very repetitious
to the point of dragging down the audio portion of the game.
Difficulty: Medium
Concept: 6.5
The Life is an
element that could have been so much better and truly elevated the game, but as
it stands, it feels half-baked here. Some of the tweaks are night, but nothing
really stands out.
Multiplayer: 7.0
Playing with another
human is still preferable to playing against the game’s AI.
Overall: 6.6
There is a level of
frustration that accompanies this game that simply won’t go away no matter how
many games you play or in what mode. Sure, the mini-games are fun, but they
cannot carry the franchise. Even placing the EA title and Sony title
side-by-side in the household for basketball video-game fans (who had tried
both) produced an overwhelming vote for the EA title. The Inside could have
taken advantage of creating a deeper experience with The Life, but really
didn’t. And the gameplay is fine, but nothing that truly sticks out.
