NBA Ballers – XB – Review

There may not be
an ‘I’ in team, but there certainly is one in ‘Bling’.  That just about
summarizes NBA Ballers, the newest one-on-one over-the-top streetball title from
the insanely action-oriented Midway Sports guys.  NBA Ballers has many of the
pros and cons that riddle action sports titles, but does offer a unique
experience that will leave fans of series such as MLB Slugfest, NFL Blitz, and
most notably NBA Street jumpin’ out of their chairs and doing a funky little
robot dance.

NBA Ballers is
street basketball at its flashiest.  It’s not about making it to the
championship, it’s not about retooling your game to be the best player, it’s
barely even about winning.  NBA Ballers is about pulling off moves that only
Cirque de Soleil performers can and embarrassing your opponent.  Targeted at a
crowd that prefers style over substance, NBA Ballers is a fun one-on-one street
basketball game that’s great for button-mashers and gamers who don’t mind some
flawed gameplay.

There are five
modes of play to choose from including standard versus mode, triple the fun
one-on-one-on-one, the ladder TV tournament, career-like Rags to Riches, and
booooooring practice.  In the TV Tournament, gamers select an unlocked NBA
Baller and battle him against a select group of players (Rookies, #1 picks,
MVPs, etc…) to win credits and unlock players.  Rags to Riches is similar to
ESPN Basketball’s career mode, a brilliant way to create a baller and build him
up by playing one-on-one matches, except in NBA Ballers, it’s more about
acquiring luxuries that include cribs, cars, and hotties.  Practice mode makes
me realize what Allen Iverson was talking about, but it does have some great
tips on how to play the game.  Rags to Riches will take most of a gamer’s time,
being the deepest and most entertaining of the bunch. 

Rags to Riches
begins with creating a player from scratch.  If you’ve already made a player in
another mode, guess what?  You have to do it all over again!  The
create-a-player is pretty solid, but not quite as rich as Tiger Woods or Fight
Night.  Gamers can make their ballers seven-foot juggernauts that can really
rattle the rim or lightning-quick guards with a shooter’s touch.  At the onset,
there are a lot of options for certain pieces of the create-a-player puzzle,
such as the tilt of your baseball cap, but fewer for other notable accessories
such as jewelry.  Once the created player makes his way up the ranks however,
there’ll be more Bling than P. Diddy’s closet.  Skills progress with playing,
and increase depending on how you play.  Shoot from long range a bunch to
increase your three-point skill, steal a lot to increase you steal skill, etc.
Special skills can also be purchased with credits, such as the ability to alley-oop,
throw a ball to someone on the sidelines, or get ‘on fire’. 

Rags to Riches’
most unique pieces are its story and game format.  The story for Rags to Riches
actually begins in a television network executive’s office.  Told in a slideshow
of stills, we see “the Man” at his most despicable – ready to exploit the
inner-city for his own financial gain (at least that’s how I interpreted it).
His brainchild is a new reality TV show featuring one unknown street baller
competing against fictional and NBA players in one-on-one competition.  The
premise is simple – beat the ballers and collect the credits.  Spend the credits
on flashy glasses, shiny medallions, or NBA jerseys.  It’s capitalism at its
best, and really teaches kids the value of working hard for your money (ahem –
that’s blatant sarcasm for the sarcasm impaired).  There is something incredibly
satisfying about taking down an NBA player and using the cash to buy a throwback
Clippers jersey or some new kicks, and this is NBA Ballers’ strongpoint.  In
Rags to Riches, the materialism goes further than just things you can wear.
Further in the game ballers can buy cars, members of their entourage, and even
cribs, though they seem to have little effect on the game itself.

The game format
for most of the modes is a best-of-three match, with each individual game to 11
points.  The matches are also timed, and if the players are tied when time
expires, the round is played again, which can get very annoying.  This best of
three formats extends the game considerably, which is a plus for gamers looking
for a lengthy challenge and an annoyance for those looking to unlock the entire
roster of more than 80 NBA players (only a fraction of the total lineup is
available at the start – boo!).  To serve as a twist, some matches have special
rules to shake things up.  The twist can be a single game to 30 points or spiced
up with a steal or dunk requirement.  We saw this work well in ESPN Basketball’s
one on one career mode, but for this action-oriented game it becomes more of a
nuisance than Spike Lee is to Reggie Miller. 

The real
attraction to NBA Ballers is the flashy street style B-ball.  More akin to
Midway’s basketball classic NBA Jam than EA’s NBA Street, NBA Ballers features
players catching fire (literally), the ability to pass to homies on the
sideline, and of course physically impossible dunks that made NBA Jam famous.
Ankle shattering jukes are simple as using the right analog stick, and
combinations of buttons and “juice” (Midway’s answer to turbo) deliver more
complicated actions, including the “Act a Fool” moves that humiliate your
opponent in slow-motion, often dribbling between an opponent’s legs three times
or rolling the ball off his back after a big time juke.  NBA Ballers definitely
delivers the goods when it comes to street style action, and fans of the sport
will howl over the plethora of show-stopping moves (though they are often chosen
at random). 

The entire game
sticks with its hardcore street-savvy presentation, but also isn’t afraid to
have a little fun with it.  Hip-hop reigns the airwaves, announcers dish out the
slang, and ballers repeatedly taunt and show off.  It makes for a great
presentation, and keeps the theme rolling the entire time.  Midway has never
taken itself too seriously, and once gamers get through the thuggish fa