Trust me, you're much better off with something else.
The graphics were good for the PSP version, although they did poorly with the face mapping. None of the NBA players looked anything like their real life selves and they just did a poor job. It really shows that they haven’t even tried to get it right the first time.
The sound was okay. The soundtrack was very short and you would hear each song a lot of times.
The commentary wasn’t all that good. It was poorly done and everything that they say about one player will eventually be said about another player.
The controls were difficult at times. It takes a good 20 minutes to get used to the controls and it’s just a hassle to waste 20 minutes when you could be playing a game.
The Conquest Mode was a great feature in the game as it had a very long and enjoyable experience. You choose one team and attempt to gain control over all of the other team’s territories. Because there were so many, you could guarantee yourself about thirteen hours of gameplay.
The mini games were terrible. Adding dodge ball just made it worst. The mini games were called Carnival Mode. And each one was bad.
Dodge ball was confusing to adjust to and was way too hard no matter what difficulty you would set it on. It really was useless and had nothing to do with basketball.
Big Shooter had you roll a ball into these hoops. It was like those games you’d find a Chuck E Cheese but only basketball style. It was poorly done and made no sense.
Hot Shot had you shooting a ball into the hoop and try to make as many as you could in 60 seconds. And after a while, the hoop would move back, and then back, and then back.
Pinball was good for the first 3 games, but after that it was boring, and really had nothing to do with basketball. It was also poorly constructed.
Whenever you would play these mini games, you obtain points which will allow you to purchase old jerseys from 20-30 years ago for several different teams. It sounds cool but really, why would you want it?
Game Sharing is enabled in this game. You can give your friends the carnival mode to play and try out. But really, if you were there friend, you’d not even tell them about it.
The online play was horrendous. You were able to play one on one against your friends, which was good, but the internet play was horrible. You’ll constantly end up losing connection, and there is rarely anyone ever there. When you log in, there is just a list, you pick somebody and play. There is no chatting enabled or anything. It was bad.
You could use the camera to take a picture of yourself and put it on the game but there’s only one small problem. The camera hasn’t been released in North America yet. Only in Europe and Japan. So this is an extremely useless feature that they should have at least taken out of the North American version.
The color-coded shot system was a pain in the neck. You have to hold the O button to shoot. And you would have to hold it until it got to green. And when it got to green, you were guaranteed a successful shot. Red meant a bad one, orange meant it would go in and that’s it. Although orange usually meant that it would be successful, it never really was. And it’s difficult to get it to green. And when you do, you have the opponent hovering over you and slapping the ball down, causing it to go out of bounds.
Overall, this game is a rent. It shouldn’t be bought, it was just terrible. Everything is fun for the first time, but after that, you’d wish you had another game. Several features of the game were useless and you shouldn’t even rent it. Just stick with the other NBA games. You’ll be better off.