Sound was also very good. Sound effects rock! The announcing is by MC Supernatural and really suits the action well, though like all such game announcers, he does get a little repetitive after a bit. The soundtrack is a mix of rap and hip-hop … which I’ll admit I’m not a great fan of. Midway did not choose to implement the custom-soundtracks feature either. That costs them a full point.

Controls were adequate but seemed a bit mundane. They work well enough, but with so many sports games trying new and innovative controls schemes, I guess I was unfairly expecting something different from Midway.

Again, NBA Ballers is not a bad game. Somewhere it misses the line between just pretty good and really good. As a one-on-one basketball game to play with a friend, it probably has no peer. The whole street attitude of the game seems to be getting a bit overplayed these days. I’m disturbed that so much of the game seems to have gone into collecting stuff, which has nothing to do with improving skills, that the single-player game did not quite reach its full potential.