Graphics
Simply put, the best player models ever seen in any sports game. I know it may be hard to believe since this is a sports game that does not come from Electronic Arts, but one glance at the faces on these players and you'll agree. The backgrounds, or "mansions" as they call them, look really good and add a different element to the customary street courts we've seen before. Midway used a few real street players to mo-cap dozens of moves, so the animations are accurate, but a little jerky on occasion. The visual effects though are top notch. There is an "On Fire" element to the game, but instead of literally being set on fire, the player will have a heat fume aura about him. So everywhere he runs or moves will leave a blur trail. Overall the game looks way better than I expected.
Control
The gameplay is what you would expect from seeing the title name. You've got your basic shoot/block, pass/steal, special move, and "Juice" (Turbo) buttons. You can use the right analog stick to perform jukes and special dribbles more accurately than you can if you just use the face buttons, which is nice. And much like NBA Street, the combination of shoulder buttons you hold while going into the paint determines what type of dunk/layup you will do. Also, you may notice I listed "pass" as a button, and that this is a 1-on-1 game. Well, as you progress through the game you can build your own posse of friends to stand around the court. You can pass to them and have them lob the ball up for an alley-oop. You can also pass to yourself off the backboard or off your opponent's face. As you perform flashy moves, points rackup in the Jackpot, and if you score on the combo, those points go to your total earned. This total factors into your "House" rating, which is kind of like a momentum meter which shows who the crowd is behind. Fill up the House meter and you can unleash a devastating dunk that shatters the backboard thus ending the game. All of this plus Stunt Dunks, Secret Shots, and a lot more are part of NBA Ballers excellent yet fairly unoriginal controls.
Sound
The game features over a dozen underground hip-hop tracks including several original ones made specifically for the game. The game is hosted by a highly annoying DJ named MC Supernatural who apparently thinks we all know who he is. Anyway, his commentary gets old fast, but the rest of the game's sound is pretty good. It would've been nice to have some voice-overs from the actual NBA players, but generic taunts and audience shouts will have to do.
Replay Value
Well, at the start of the game, you only have access to about a dozen NBA stars, which kind of sucks, but what this means is that you will spend a ton of time unlocking all the content available in this game. There are 60 current NBA stars total, plus a handful of NBA Hall of Famers including Magic Johnson, James Worthy, and Darryl "Chocolate Thunder" Dawkins. Your created player will go from being an average Joe on the street to picking up all new gear, Cadillacs, jewelry, tattoos, and eventually a mansion, which is basically just a background for your home court. The only real drawback to this immense amount of unlockables is that most of it comes randomly. So if you're a huge fan of Kobe Bryant, you may be spending days before you actually find him. So sometimes the "replay value" may seem like work, which is obviously bad. Once again, the PS2 version has exclusive online play, where Midway will set up tournaments for people to win prizes as well as set up all types of leaderboards and hall of fame records. Think of it like those scoreboards on the NBA Jam arcade machines, but nationwide. Overall there's a lot to do here, whether or not getting every little shoe or necklace is worth it is up to you.
Conclusion
Ballers does several new things that I wasn't expecting. The Rags to Riches mode puts you in a match of Best 2-Out-of-3 style games of first one to 11 wins. Points are scored in 2's and 3's and you have to win by 2. The catch is that there is a 2 minute timer so you have to be fast. If the game is tied at the end of the two minutes, you have to restart the round. The games of 11 play like you would on the playground, so if you get a rebound, you have to clear the ball at the 3-point line before you can attempt a shot. The "Act A Fool" moves are definitely fun to do and are alot like the Gamebreaker moves in NBA Street. The action slows down as you perform some type of crazy dribble between your opponent's legs or ball fake like you see on the And1 Mix Tape shows and then blow passed him on your way to the hoop. Another thing I didn't expect was how Ballers took a page from NBA Showtime by limiting the amount of roughness you can dish out. You can literally pick up some of the smaller players and take the ball away or just shove them to the ground NBA Jam style. But if you do this 5 times in a match, your opponent gets a Free Throw worth 3 points AND gets to keep the ball. That's a huge advantage in a game to 11. The last thing I really liked is that you don't "buy" attributes like most other sports games of this type. Your created guy will evolve. So if you want to be a long range sharpshooter, start firing up threes and you'll slowly get better. Basically, the way you actually play dictates what your guy will become good at, which is an awesome way to push character development in a sports game. Overall, NBA Ballers takes many elements from the other games in the genre in an effort to make one perfect NBA arcade style game. And while it succeeded in many aspects, it fell short in several others.
*** This review was written for Flamevault.com shortly after the game's release. ***