And 1 Streetball should be a sweet package, since the Mixtape Tour features real guys that basically pull off the spectacular dunks and dekes we’ve seen countless times on the videogame screen ever since NBA Jam made its arcade debut back in 1993. Unfortunately, once you get down to the nuts and bolts of And 1, the better parts of the game get lost in sloppy design and broken game play.

Boom Shakalaka!

And 1’s got two things going for it. The first is the inclusion of a handful of real MixTape athletes. Spyda, The Professor, Half Man, Half Amazing and more make an appearance in the game. And while that may not mean much to most of us, to basketball fans it’s fantastic news.

On the game play side, the standout feature in And 1 is the unique I-Ball control system that requires you to use the right-analog stick to perform the tricky moves these guys perform to move up the court. With three levels of moves, the main idea behind using the fakes is to “break the ankles” of your opponents, causing them to fall and giving you an opening to perform a trick shot or other special moves. It’s a nice centerpiece for the game. Or at least, it should be.

Achilles’ Heel

The problem lies in how easy it is to break this unique move system. Braking ankles requires the breakee to be standing right in front of the player doing all the sweet moves. Otherwise the moves aren’t effective at all. So, to keep from being “broken,” all a player has to do is back off the opposing athlete. This works every single time.

And it’s not like you can just fire off one move to build your special meter. The I-Ball system requires particular chains of moves in order to be effective, so an opponent that can back off at any time is incredibly frustrating.

Not as frustrating as figuring out some of the move chains, though. Or the fact that you have to complete very specific objectives during the single-player mode in order to progress. Simply spanking the opposing team in the score department isn’t always enough, as the game features somewhat arbitrary goals you have to achieve in every level.

Whiffer

To cap off all of these issues, And 1 just doesn’t look very good. It’s a shame that the one good idea in this streetball title had to be overshadowed by bad execution and a mediocre presentation.

Article By: Greg Sewart

Video Produced By: Jonathan Solin