Basketball Nightmare

The Good
The graphical look of the courts has good use of the Master System’s colour palette and the basketball player sprites are even better and fluid when they move. The opposing teams consist of monsters from Japanese folklore including kappas (or turtle-doves lol!), vampires, tengus and a few others. A nice finishing polish is the closeups when a player is on there verge of scoring a goal. It is satisfying to score goal after goal and beat your opponents to progress. There’s also the option to challenge a friend to a basketball match. Where would any sports ballgame be without two player mode(s) included?

The Bad
Even being creative in its design, there are some things missing from the game. One of them is a training mode to get a better grasp of gameplay. Another is a lack of variety in the single player mode in which it’s just a straightforward play through seven courts with a different team and no actual story. It would have been better if you could play as any of the monster teams and the next opposing team was randomly determined. And speaking of variety, there’s none in the music or the sound effects, just a single repeating tune and persistent ball dribbles. The game doesn’t take into account how strong and agile the team members are. It’s basically the CPU going easy or hard on you. The game also lacks the potential for what could have been, such as cooperative two player mode.

The Bottom Line
A weird kind of title which can’t really define the nightmare that is meant to be present. This isn’t NBA, this isn’t JBA, what you’re looking at is a classic basketball with a twist in the teams. Exactly the break you can use from all the licensed and branded sports. Would be sensational if a truckload of additional teams and creatures made its way to a remake of this title. It all goes to show you that there are many ways basketball can be played. Don’t miss this one if you can help it.