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News -
Xbox 360
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Written by Duff
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Tuesday, 12 August 2008 06:35 |
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 I have said it before and I will say it again, gaming on a strict budget is a necessity when it comes to being a Married Gamer. Add in children and you will will have to tighten up that budget even more. The bigger that the family becomes, the less that you will have to throw towards frivolous (wife's words, not mine) things such as games... unless you are loaded of course. I happened to pick up another cheap game in my penny pinching lifestyle of gaming and it ended up being a more-then-decent game in my opinion: NBA Street Homecourt.
 I have never been a huge fan of sports games, at least on the simulation side. I never really cared for any of the Madden games, the NBA Lives, and definitely not any of the baseball games. There might have been a game or two here or there that garnered my interest for a little while but nothing lasted; that was until Midway brought out the original NBA Jam. This was the start of a new era for me; I got a little taste of the exaggerated sports genre and I was hooked. I love the NBA Jams, SSX, Freakstyle, NBA Streets, NFL Streets... you name it and as long as it was a sports game with a ridiculously arcadey theme, I was in...
 When I was browsing one of the local used game stores, actually a few months back, I nabbed a copy of EA's NBA Street Homecourt for the Xbox 360 for $14.99. Unfortunately, the game sort of sat on the shelves for a few months in the shadows of some of the other bigger titles that have come out over the year like Soul Calibur 4 and GTA4. I finally took the time to throw the game in this weekend and sink some time into it and realized that I had more than gotten my money's worth out of this purchase.
 Fans of the original NBA Street games are in for more of the same, and that is a good thing. NBA Street Homecourt takes the same crazy game design of the original titles and throws it into the next generation with upgraded graphics and online play as well as some new gameplay twists. The main mode of the game focuses around the Homecourt Challenge mode where you will design a custom / created character and take them from the local schoolyard courts with nobodies to competing on some of the most famous courts in streetball lore against familiar NBA greats. As you progress through your career, your statistics and skills will improve and you will make friends and form teams with the cream of the crop of NBA and WNBA players. Don't laugh at the mention of the WNBA players, they have some of the best shooters available in the game.
This mode has you traveling to various courts in the United States and taking part in different challenges available at each court. Some are simply pickup games to 21 or 30, others are dunk only matches and local tournaments. The variation in these challenges makes for a nice change of pace in the game as it becomes easy to fire up a save and play a couple of games in a matter of 10-15 minutes if you choose challenges that can be completed quickly, like the "first to lead by 3 wins".
 There are also basic quick matches available for multiplayer and single play as well as Xbox Live network support if the career style mode isn't quite your fancy. This is the one place that really saddens me is that I decided to jump on this bandwagon so late in its lifespan that there isn't anyone online to play against, ranked or unranked. Hopefully, as a result of this article, I can find another community member or gamer who has the game and is interested in playing online.
 What can I say? I think that I have more than gotten my money's worth with this purchase. NBA Street Homecourt is a decent game and definitely worth the $10-$15 that it can be found for now days. Anyone looking for one of those games that is more fun than it is deep need look no further as the fun factor of the game is over the top. If you like the arcade style sports games and over the top action, this is definitely worth taking a look at or at least renting.
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