I know there are people out there who play RPGs that are dozens of hours long on their GBAs, PSPs, and Vitas, but those people are mental.

Volume two was a simpler game, and as well as suiting the PSP’s single-analogue controls, it also suits the nature of portable gaming. I think deep down I would have preferred if they’d gone for the less realistic graphical style of Vol.2 as well, but I think I’ll leave that particular nit unpicked. When you hit the court it becomes clear that the limitations of the hardware mean that, despite sharing it’s visual style with Vol.3, the gameplay is very much based on Vol.2 - and this is by no means a bad thing. You play this version of the game with a baller you create yourself and start with a very limited set of stats that are increased as you go it’s always been my favourite mode in this series. I’ve spent all my time so far with the Campaign, called ‘King of the Courts’, in which you face off in games with occasionally mixed up rules to ‘own’ various parks across America. There are a few different modes in the game, ranging from a quick pick-up game to a full campaign with a couple of mini games to fill the gap between. At least in the case of ‘NBA Street Showdown’ it gets most of the bad stuff out of the way early doors, and I mention here that the loading times are insufferable we can move on to happier themes. I guess it’s pretty weird to start the conversation about a game with the audio, but that happened. The basic sounds are all good and there’s some nice ambient stuff in there, but important audio cues such as the shot clock running down and the ‘Gamebreaker’ charge being full are lost to everything else going on, and are entirely inaudible without headphones. Which just leaves the sound effects to save the day, a task they entirely fail at. His entertaining, enthusiastic commentary from the console releases has also been butchered so that it repeats itself enough to be annoying after just a couple of games. This is all a bit of a shame really as some of the other soundtracks in the ‘Big’ umbrella are outstanding ‘Fifa Street 2’, in particular, has possibly the best licensed playlist ever to appear on a video game.įurther audio crimes are committed by legendary DJ Bobbito Garcia, although in fairness it isn’t his fault. Luckily, the game itself is identical to the US version.Īs per the ‘Big’ branding music is an important part of the package, and starting up this game sees you immediately smacked in the face with some of the most obnoxious hip hop known to man - and this is coming from someone who’s a big fan of the genre.ĭe La Soul’s classic ‘Me, Myself, and I’ is the soundtrack’s only real saving grace, although the Beastie Boys’ ‘Open Letter to the Five Boroughs’ has always been a tune with its heart in the right place, even if the delivery is far from the trio’s best.Įverything else is pretty horrific to start with, but many have been further butchered in the name of keeping a ‘E’ rating - and are only made even worse as a result. I picked it up cheap from eBay last year in the name of completionism and it turns out the box and manual of my copy are both in Chinese! Fun fact: It was the first game of that generation to be native 1080p resolution.īut back when ‘NBA Street Vol.3’ was being released onto home consoles, ‘NBA Street Showdown’ was released for the PSP. Volumes one, two, and three were put out on sixth generation consoles, Homecourt was the fifth in the franchise and was an early generation seven release. I’ve played 14 of them, and they are all various kinds of amazing fun.įive of the games comprised the ‘NBA Street’ series. Over the 8 years it was going, Big released 21 games with installments based on Basketball, Football (Soccer), American Football, Wrestling, Motocross, Rallying, Skidooing, and, most famously of all, Skiing/Snowboarding (with the SSX series). Sports that focused less on trying to accurately recreate a given sport and more on taking the aspects of each activity that made it entertaining and exaggerating them in the name of OTT style and fun.Ī lot of these games had official licenses and, unrecognisably from the EA we know today, were possessed of an almost reverential respect for each sport’s history these games, from the most soulless corporation in gaming, had real heart. 'Big', for those out of the loop, was basically a sub-label of E.A. It’s amazing to think that, given the company's reputation with gamers today, EA was once the home of the E.A. I think this is the first time I've posted one of these in this sub, this is Day 80, but due to a couple of multi-game entries, this is actually the 100th game I've played from my backlog while furloughed from work.

Nba street showdown psp gameplay