NBA Jam Tournament Edition

"The reason why I like like unrealistic sports games..."

Wow, this game surprised me. First off, I really am not a fan of sports games. Almost every sports game I’ve played is always dull and boring, and I fall asleep playing it. But then I played “NBA Jam: Tournament Edition”. At first I thought it was the stupidest thing ever. Your player either jumps across the entire court or does 20 front flips just to make a dunk. Oooh. Well, I played it for a little while longer, then I just started getting addicted to it a little. It was just so cool. In fact, this is what led me to like unrealistic sports games.

Graphics: 8/10
Colorful, sort of detailed characters, great looking dunks, and pretty good character pictures. Need more info? Too bad.

Music and da Sound: 8/10
Umm… there isn’t much music except for the opening screen and character selection, which were pretty good. There’s a lot of sound on the other hand, which includes the ever so annoying announcer yelling “Monster Jam!!!”, “HE’S ON FIRE!!!”, or “Whhooooooooa…” Annoying? You bet it is. They sounded pretty impressive, though. The other good sound is the squeaking when running across the court, and dribbling the basketball was good.

Gameplay: 8/10
Lots of unique, unrealistic stuff. You’ve got a variety of different teams… no, pretty much ALL the teams at the time, with each one carrying three characters. (Exclude Rookies) Each character had its own realistic (realistic… [gasp]) attributes. For instant, Shremph can’t dunk, but can score threes. Shaq, on the other hand, can dunk from across the entire court at times, but can’t shoot threes for his life. Get it?

{insert your name here}: Got it.

Good. Now for the unrealistic stuff. On the court, your can press a shoulder button and boost your speed. Run up to the net looking for a simple dunk, but you suddenly hear “Monster Jam!!!” and you do twenty front flips in the air twice as high as the basket, and come down with your dunk. Cool, ain’t it? If you score three times in a row, then you’re on fi… oops, sorry announcer guy.

Announcer Guy: He’s on fire!!!

Yes, you’re on fire. Well, at least the ball is. When you’re on fire, you can do amazing dunks and shoot near perfect three-pointers from almost anywhere.
Aaaaand, you can put a special little thing on called hot spots. If you stand on these “hot spots” and shoot from them, then you can make the amount of points that the number is on the hot spot. For instance, if you see a hot spot with the number 5, you can shoot from there and score five points. Yes, you can score an 8-point shot from right in front of the hoop.

The Factor That Is Fun: 10/10
You’ll get a kick out of the dunks, trust me. Nuff said.

BrakZero says…
Still got that dusty old SNES? Got a FuncoLand near you? It’s cheap, so you might want to consider going out there and spare five bucks for this game. It’s mad cool. But just take my warning – if you like serious, realistic sports games, stay away and let the other gamers enjoy it.

And the final score is …

Drum roll, please!

{ Drum roll }

8 out of 10!

{clapping}

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/07/01, Updated 02/22/01