The best basketball game, and best 'Street' game, for the GCN.

User Rating: 8.9 | NBA Street V3 GC
EA Big is back to serve up another helping in the original and best 'Street' series around: NBA Street. Vol. 3 introduces a new level of polish and some sweet, sweet unlockables. The amount of customization possible is awesome, from each aspect of a created player, including: hair, frame, playing style, and designable shoes; to each aspect of a created court: city, neighborhood, backboard, net, court, and more. Once you’re on the court, the in-game announcer is repetitive and obnoxious, but a quick trip to the options screen will mute him for good, so you can enjoy beats from incredible and memorable hip-hop tracks from De La Soul to the Beastie Boys. The presence of beats and no lyrics leaves an ample amount of room for talking smack, and NBA Street Vol.3 basically begs you to taunt your opponent. The game flows smoothly, with an adaptable learning curve, making NBA Street Vol.3 very easy to pick up for the first time and play, though with customizable trick books the game is just about as deep as you want it to be. Many of the play mechanics and the overall aesthetic of the previous NBA Street games are present in Vol. 3, but this version shows how much developers have adapted to the capability of this generation’s consoles. The game looks and feels very polished, but EA didn’t put so much ‘pretty’ in to take away from the core gameplay, which is both approachable and fun.