Street Hoops

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 Street Hoops.

There was a time when multiple studios threw their hat into the ring with basketball video games, providing a choice beyond the brand leaders such as NBA Live and NBA 2K. Of course, while that era is nostalgic now and many of us miss having a plethora of hoops games, the market glut definitely wasn’t sustainable. Not every game ended up being a big enough hit to spawn sequels or a series, often for very good reasons. Still, there are some overlooked gems and interesting releases that became cult classics and personal favourites for gamers who grew up with them.

As I’ve expanded my collection, it’s been fun to experience games that I overlooked back when I was primarily playing NBA Live, NBA Jam, and NBA Street. Even the titles that lack the polish of the all-time classics are still fun to revisit, and they’re definitely fascinating to dive into all these years later. That’s an apt summary of Street Hoops by Black Ops Entertainment! Like its spiritual sequel, AND 1 Streetball, this 2002 release for PlayStation 2, Xbox, and GameCube is rough around the edges, but unquestionably had ambitious ideas and potential. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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Catch up on the latest basketball gaming highlights that Dee and I have uploaded to the NLSC YouTube channel! Recent videos include our co-op game of Street Hoops, and a game of NBA 2K6 that I played against the CPU featuring a Draft Class showdown.

As we discussed in Episode #510 of the NLSC Podcast, Dee and I revisited Street Hoops for PlayStation 2 in a co-op game over Parsec. We were quite impressed with how well it held up, and what a strong release it was from a developer not known for their basketball games. The session produced some outstanding streetball highlights that’ll evoke memories of the AND1 Mixtape Tour from the early 2000s. Check out the action as we use the Highflying Homies to take on the Mad Bombers!

My NBA 2K6 game was played before my old desktop crashed late last year, so I’ve been sitting on the footage for a number of weeks! I was eager to put together a highlight reel from it, as I had a blast taking on the Draft Class of 2000 with the Draft Class of 2001. Jason Richardson was the star for me, and in looking to dunk as often as possible with him, he ended up putting on a show. As I said in my retrospective, NBA 2K6 for Xbox 360 is a game that’s really grown on me, retroactively becoming one of my all-time favourites.

Check out both highlight reels below, and be sure to subscribe to the NLSC YouTube channel for more basketball gaming content! As always, Dee and I are open to suggestions of games that you’d like to see us play, so by all means hit us up with those titles!

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From courtside of the virtual hardwood, it’s Episode #510 of the NLSC Podcast!

Are the NBA 2K League competitors actually the best NBA 2K gamers in the world? Both we and the community have some thoughts on that, as well as a ridiculous comparison to real NBA players. Meanwhile, a session with Street Hoops by Black Ops Entertainment has revealed it to be a hidden gem, as we had an absolute blast with it! We also discuss the importance of the unwritten rules of sportsmanship in basketball, and thanks to the NBA Live 2001 Legends, reflect on the real and virtual accomplishments of Keith Van Horn. Finally, since we shared our basketball gaming resolutions last week, this week we open up the mailbag to find out what the community has planned for 2024.

Download or play on your mobile device/tablet: CLICK HERE (Running time: 1:16:01 — 52.6MB)

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To get involved with the mailbag or to provide any feedback on the show, hit us up in the comments, reach out on social media, or post here in the NLSC Forum! For more information on the NLSC Podcast including episode guides, check out this page in our Wiki. You can also find the show on our YouTube channel, along with the rest of our video content. As always, thanks for tuning in, and go get buckets!