NLSC Your source for basketball video games.
This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! From retrospectives of basketball games and their interesting features, to republished articles and looking at NBA history through the lens of the virtual hardwood, Wednesdays at the NLSC are for going back in time. This week, I’m taking a look back at NBA ShootOut ’97, aka Total NBA ’97 in PAL regions.
The first NBA ShootOut was an admirable effort by a brand new studio to provide an alternative to EA Sports’ established series of basketball games. However, as I noted in my retrospective of that game, it ultimately fell short of NBA Live 96 PC, which remains my pick for the best 1996 NBA sim title. Having recently spent more time with the PlayStation version of NBA Live 96, I’d also have to say that EA beat Sony on its own platform! Nevertheless, it was nice to have options; something that many of us greatly miss in light of NBA 2K’s virtual monopoly over the virtual hardwood.
To that end, when we had more developers throwing their hat into the ring with basketball video games back in the day, a few of them didn’t just stop at one. They made an effort to establish their own NBA series with annual releases to compete with NBA Live. Obviously it was ultimately NBA 2K that succeeded in dethroning EA’s game, but there were other commendable attempts along the way. That brings us to NBA ShootOut ’97, aka Total NBA ’97. Did Sony Computer Entertainment’s second hoops title improve upon the first NBA ShootOut? Let’s take a look back…way back…