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Xbox 360 | Sports | NBA Street Homecourt

Boxart for NBA Street Homecourt
NBA Street Homecourt 45 screen shots
  • GRAPHICS: 4.00
  • SOUND: 5.00
  • CONTROL: 4.50
  • FUN FACTOR 4.50
  • AVG USER SCORE 3.9
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 4.5
Winner of the GamePro Editor's Choice Award

Review: NBA Street Homecourt

Review by Dave Rudden | 02/26/2007 | 14:50:50 PM PST

Arcade sports games are a difficult endeavor. Franchises like NBA Jam, NFL Blitz and NHL Hitz burned out after a few iterations because of a lack of innovation.

EA's NBA Street series, however, has managed to stay on top with a consistent formula that was tweaked over the course of the franchise's history, ultimately culminating in the fantastic Homecourt.

Fixing What Was Never Broken

As it was, is and will be forever in the series, this latest version of NBA Street features 3-on-3 streetball games in which your style is almost as important as your score. By attempting tricks before hitting your shot, you build up your Gamebreaker meter. Fill the meter and you can attempt a Gamebreaker--a shot that will add 1 to 4 points to your score while deducting a point from your opponent. EA Big has consistently tweaked the Gamebreaker concept throughout the series, and this may be the best implementation of the concept yet.

Basically, whenever a team has activated the Gamebreaker, the point swing goes to the first team that scores during it. Previously, only the team that activated the Gamebreaker could use it, and if the opponent managed to gain possession during it, they'd have to play keepaway until the Gamebreaker mode subsided. By allowing any team to take advantage, EA added a welcome layer of strategy that can dramatically affect the outcome of a game.

NBA Street: Homecourt is also the most stylish sports game you'll ever play. Between the old-school funk music, the classic, soulful pregame narration, and the easily accesible arcade-style gameplay, it's the kind of game that should appeal to b-ball neophytes and the hardcourt hardcore alike.

Breaking What Already Worked

Unfortunately NBA Street: Homecourt hits a few snags that keep it from perfection. The create-a-player mode has been dumbed-down in every regard. Gone is the ability to tweak your own stats or create a visage from scratch. Instead, you "morph" your character using two NBA stars and a third generic character as a template, while your stats auto-increase with every level-up. The single and multiplayer modes haven't seen much tweaking, which is also disappointing, but the ability to play on Xbox Live is always welcome.

NBA Street: Homecourt has the flashy moves of a superstar but it needs to work on its fundamentals. Maybe then it'll elevate its game to true legend status.


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