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#288 – Hoops

A basketball game? Now I’ve played everything.
The “white men can’t jump” joke writes itself.
That is a very lonely looking court.

PLAYERS: 1-2 simultaneous

PUBLISHER: Jaleco

DEVELOPER: Aicom

GENRE: Sports

RELEASE DATE: June 1989

Hoops is an odd sort: a 1-on-1 or 2-on-2 basketball game that seems to think bare-bones simplicity is the way to go. Normally, I’d agree with it. I don’t think I’ve found a basketball game on the NES that plays above average so far. As far as Hoops is concerned, there’s only so much personality one can give a two/four-man tumble. You either play what amounts to a half-court game of basketball with people who have names like Mr. Doc, Zap, and Wiz (apparently, any person you choose plays differently too, but I was hard-pressed to notice that) or you play “Around the World,” a three-point line competition between players. The latter is boring and the former is merely average. The players control pretty well on the court, but shooting certainly felt harder than it needed to be. There were no fluid shots, only stilted, half-cocked misses. Obviously, if you’re interested in wringing any fun out of Hoops, you’ll need to get yourself a second player. At least then you can laugh at the other player as they attempt – and fail – to make three-point shots, or, well, any shot. But if you’re alone, like me, sucking down a dry martini while crying clown tears, it’s best to leave Hoops on the sidelines. No point in becoming more depressed.

D+

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3 replies on “#288 – Hoops”

Haha – ‘clown tears’ – I liked that. 🙂

I remember Hoops from when it came out. I had only really played Double Dribble to that point, so Hoops felt like a fresh take on the basketball genre for me at the time. I didn’t own it, but a buddy at school did so I borrowed it for a couple of weeks. I did pretty well, beating it up with just about every combination possible, but looking back on the game? Yeah, pretty rough in retrospect.

No problem. I wasn’t trying to be an ass or anything, that line was just, well…yeah lol But to be fair, the black dude does look like the Black Ranger (Speaking of which, thank God there weren’t any Power Rangers games on NES) lol

As for the game itself, I have many memories of playing this game around the time it came out (Yeah, I have a good memory, and no, I’m not old lol), and I can confirm that your review was spot-on–Control-wise, the game is more frustrating than it has to be, and it hasn’t aged well overall, though I do like the art style for whatever reason.

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