Ohhh, so that’s how you make basketball fun!
Sega Genesis
Released in 1994 by Acclaim and Midway
Grade: A
This is expertly engineered 2-on-2 arcade basketball, famous for hyper-realistic dunks and continuous no-rules action, supported by crisp controls, joyful presentation, bombastic commentary, and pretty graphics.
It’s the pioneer of a genre that had many iterations and inspired arcade titles across all sports. NFL Blitz, NHL Hitz, MLB Slugfest, MLB The Bigs, and FIFA Street all spawned from NBA Jam.
Where it falls in the series
While it’s technically a follow-up to the 1989 game Arch Rivals, NBA Jam was such a breakthrough that it’s reasonable to call it the original in the series.
It was in arcades in 1993, with rosters from the 92-93 season, before hitting consoles in March 1994 with the 93-94 rosters.
It was followed by NBA Jam: Tournament Edition, which had the same gameplay with more gimmicky power-ups. It was then followed by one variation after another, with NBA Hang Time on N64 and PS1 building on the original formula the best.
The brand came back to life for real in 2010 with NBA Jam (same exact name) on PS3 and Xbox 360, an awesome and challenging (and underrated) game that is a faithful ode to the original, with smartly remade gameplay and gorgeous graphics.
Praises
The tempo, controls, size of the court, and abilities of players are all so in sync, and you can feel how well the game plays within a few minutes of picking it up.
The 2-on-2 format solves two big issues that plague basketball sims. 1) It declutters the court and there’s room to move around a defender; if you run to an open spot, the defense has to chase you instead of there already being a defender everywhere you go. 2) Since you only have one teammate, you never pass to the wrong guy, which happens too often in even the best basketball sims.
Also, you only control one of two players in NBA Jam, so there’s no “switch player” button on defense. The three buttons are used for turbo, block/rebound, and steal/shove.
The “on fire” concept added so much and was so simple. Make three baskets in a row and you’re on fire; the opponent needs to score to put you out. It adds a big scoring run here and there, which breaks up the repetition and actually happens in real basketball. Ironically, a very unrealistic feature helped bring a piece of B-ball realism to the game.
Everyone mentions “Boom Shakalaka!” and other phrases from the announcer, but the sound overall is fantastic: shoe squeaks, ball bounces, big crowd ovations, and saucy background music.
The dunks are pretty cool and there’s quite a few different ones. There are other nice touches: you can shatter the backboard and when you miss a dunk you hear a goofy “Boing!”
There’s a sneakily high chaos factor in the game. At times it feels repetitive, as you trade easy baskets, but then you’re suddenly caught in a frantic series of blocked shots and loose balls. Fun stuff.
They built in special quirks to mix up the gameplay, like hot spots for each player where their 3’s are more likely to go in. They also put in a noticeable ability for the CPU to drain a full-court buzzer beater at the end of the 1st quarter, which is just random. And according to this article, they even made it so that when the Bulls play the Pistons, the Bulls have a harder time scoring in the 4th quarter. That’s not exactly fair, but it helps add some chaos, which I like.
There are five difficulty levels, and at the highest difficulty, the CPU will put up a good fight, especially if you choose one of the weaker teams. This is key for a dork like me who’s playing by himself late at night.
One notable gripe that always bugged me: the bigger players can more easily shove the smaller players to steal the ball, which is curious since little guys are usually better ball handlers in real life.
Top teams
For such a classic game, the game has two notable no-shows. After Michael Jordan’s Bulls beat Charles Barkley’s Suns in the 93 finals, neither star is present.
The Bulls are the still the top team with Scottie Pippen and Horace Grant, but the Suns are down the list with the undersized Kevin Johnson/Dan Majerle combo.
The Charlotte Hornets were the second best team with Larry Johnson and Alonzo Mourning. Other good teams included Seattle, New York, and San Antonio.
The 94 Finals finished with Houston defeating New York in seven games.
Published May 10, 2017
Updated August 15, 2022