Basketball

aka: Atari Basketball, Basketbol
Moby ID: 14905
Atari 2600 Specs
Included in See Also

Description official descriptions

Basketball allows you to play a game of one-on-one against either the computer or another player. The court is viewed from the side with a basket at each end of the screen. Using the joystick you can move your player around the court, dribble/shoot the ball, and attempt to block your opponent. The game is played in two 4 minute halves, and the player who scores the most points wins. There are two different skill levels available which can be set individually for each player.

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Credits (Atari 2600 version)

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Reviews

Critics

Average score: 54% (based on 7 ratings)

Players

Average score: 2.7 out of 5 (based on 33 ratings with 2 reviews)

Very simple one-on-one, but quite entertaining.

The Good
The game allows you to play with another player or alone against the computer. For once, both options offer quite a challenge. It's one of the first Atari games in which the AI is not too predictable. It even grows harder as the game progresses. The movement controls are relatively fluid, and after a while, you can even steal the ball from your opponent. Be careful, the computer is good at that maneuver.

The Bad
The graphics remain simplistic, but for gaming purposes, they suggest enough so you can play without complaining too much. The sounds are awful though. You need to be, most of the times, at the same spots to shoot the ball into the goal, because there are only two types of shots: short and long.

The Bottom Line
This game is like a little one-on-one basketball game. You control the movements of your player with the joystick and hit the button to shoot the ball in the basket. It's as simple as that.

Atari 2600 · by RobinHud (68) · 2005

One of the first Basketball games. Is it good?

The Good
Playing with friend with two controllers is really enjoyable. I can find myself really well shocked that so old game can be so enjoyable. But the magic ends within 5-10 minutes, after this time became a great monotony so we changed game. But after hour we played again, and it was as funny as before, but only 5 minutes...

The Bad
Playing single player is horrible, after 2 minutes you can throw your joystick out of the window, enemy is doing always one terrific trick, and that's all you can only run to him but it's very hard to get ball from him, always the same trick and always the same result, you are losing. The graphics ale so simple that they can't be simpler, 3 year child is making better drawings. The music isn't a lot better, just a piece of "dings" and "dongs", canĺt even say this is sound of a ball.

The Bottom Line
This game is a fine piece of multiplayer game for Atari 2600, you woudn't find in it anything other, just simple fun from 10 minute play with friend. The real fun begins with one corrupted controller and two players...

Atari 2600 · by Mejs (8) · 2007

Trivia

References to the game

This game makes a short appearance in the movie Airplane.

Analytics

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Servo.

Atari 8-bit added by LepricahnsGold. Arcade added by vedder.

Additional contributors: RobinHud, formercontrib, LepricahnsGold, Patrick Bregger, firefang9212.

Game added September 21, 2004. Last modified November 10, 2024.