NBA Jam: Tournament Edition

NBA Jam

2

K-A

Basketball

6.5

1995-02-23

2018-07-03 12:30:37

NBA Jam is a basketball video game developed and published by Midway for arcades in 1993. It is the first entry in the NBA Jam series. The project leader for this game was Mark Turmell.

NBA Jam was the third basketball video game released by Midway, after TV Basketball (1974) and Arch Rivals (1989). The gameplay of NBA Jam is based on Arch Rivals, which was also a 2-on-2 basketball game.

Description:

NBA Jam: Tournament Edition brings you more senses-shattering slam dunking excitement than ever! More than twice as many NBA superstars, more than double the secret characters, Hot Spots, Super Jam Power Ups, battery back-up and - OH MY - nine all-new rim-rattling slam dunks plus all the original jams NBA Jam Tournament Edition ...it’s on FIRE!!!

- All-new jams.

- Go for the 7 point shot from the hot spot.

- Rocket across the court with the super slam dunk.

- Same team match-ups.

- New rookie and all-star teams.

- Substitutions after every quarter.

Gameplay:

NBA Jam is a two-on-two basketball video game featuring NBA-licensed teams and digitized likenesses of real players. Gameplay is exaggerated instead of realistic: players can jump extremely high and make slam dunks that defy both human capabilities and the laws of physics. There are no fouls, free throws, or violations except goaltending and 24-second violations. This means the player is able to freely shove or elbow opponents out of the way. Additionally, if a player makes three baskets in a row, the character becomes ”on fire” and has an unlimited turbo and increased shooting precision.[6] The ”on fire” mode continues until the other team scores, or until the player who is ”on fire” scores four additional consecutive baskets while ”on fire”.

The game contains many Easter eggs, special features, and players activated by initials or button/joystick combinations. For example, pressing A five times and right five times on any Genesis controller will activate ”Super Clean Floors”. This feature causes characters to fall if they run too fast or change direction too quickly. Players can also enter special codes to unlock hidden players, ranging from US President Bill Clinton to Hugo, the Charlotte Hornets mascot. On the arcade machine, there is also a hidden ”tank” game that allows the player to drive a tank and shoot enemy tanks for a minute. Just before the court is shown at the start of a game, joysticks 1 and 2 must be moved down and all six of their buttons held down.

• Teams and players

The original arcade version of NBA Jam has team rosters from the 1992–93 NBA season and the console versions use rosters from the 1993–94 NBA season. More up-to-date rosters were available in subsequent ports released for the Sega CD, Game Boy, and Game Gear in 1994. Midway did not secure the license to use Michael Jordan’s name or likeness (as Jordan himself owns the rights to his name and likeness and not the NBA), and as such he was not available as a player for the Chicago Bulls or any other team. Another notable absence from the home versions is Shaquille O’Neal, who was in the arcade version as a member of the Orlando Magic (and who later followed in Jordan’s footsteps in buying his name and likeness from the NBA). New Jersey Nets guard Dražen Petrović and Boston Celtics forward Reggie Lewis, both of whom died after the release of the arcade version, were also removed from the home versions.

A limited edition version of the game with an additional team composed of Gary Payton and Michael Jordan was developed primarily for Jordan and Payton’s personal use.

During development, Godzilla and Bart Simpson were planned to be secret characters, but were ultimately scrapped.

Legacy:

• Tournament Edition

An update named NBA Jam Tournament Edition (commonly referred to as NBA Jam T.E.) was released in arcades. NBA Jam T.E. included updated rosters, new features and Easter eggs combined with the same gameplay of the original. Jon Hey created new music specifically for NBA Jam: T.E. to replace the original NBA Jam music. Teams now consisted of three players (though only two could be on the court at any time; in practice, the extra player meant greater variety in lineups), with the exception of the new ”Rookies” team, which consists of five players, all picked in the 1994 NBA draft. Players could be substituted into the game between quarters. The game also featured new hidden teams and secret playable characters. Early versions of the game included characters from Midway’s Mortal Kombat games. Players were also assigned more attributes, including clutch and fatigue levels. In addition, the game also introduced features such as a ”Tournament” mode that turned off computer assistance and on-court hot spots that allowed for additional points or special slam dunks.

The test version of NBA Jam Tournament Edition included eight hidden characters which were taken out of the final version at the request of the NBA: Elviscious, Grim Reaper, Kongo, Raiden, Reptile, Scorpion, Sub-Zero and Tim Coman. Midway also stated they would update all test version cabinets to remove these characters.

In addition to the arcade version, NBA Jam Tournament Edition was ported to the Super NES, Genesis, 32X, Game Boy, Game Gear, Sega Saturn, PlayStation, and Atari Jaguar, with the PlayStation port serving as a North American launch title.

After Midway produced 250,000 Genesis cartridges, the developer learned that the flash memory used for savegames only works if games are played in a specific order. After attempts to repair the cartridges failed, Midway included a flyer advising customers of ”AutoStat” functionality that requires playing two games using initials ”XXX” and ”NBA” to initialize the cartridge, turning the flaw into an undocumented feature.

Ports and sequels:

The NBA Jam games were ported to many home video game consoles and PC, published by Acclaim. The console versions were well known for featuring many new secret characters; the home versions of Jam T.E. even allowed the player to use then-President Bill Clinton, First Lady Hillary Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, and, on the Atari Jaguar version, Atari’s Vice President of Software Development Leonard Tramiel.

Acclaim later ended up winning the exclusive rights to use the NBA Jam name, and without Midway’s involvement, released a sequel, NBA Jam Extreme, in 1996. It features 3D graphics and Marv Albert doing commentary. The game received mixed reception. Acclaim continued to use the NBA Jam name on subsequent console games until the company closed in 2004, although the games were only mildly popular.

Midway released their own sequel in arcades in 1996, NBA Hangtime, which was better received. Hangtime featured refined 2D gameplay and added a create-a-player option among other new features. An update called NBA Maximum Hangtime was subsequently released for the arcade, and the game was ported to home systems. Midway later produced further entries in its NBA series with 3-D graphics, beginning with NBA Showtime: NBA on NBC in 1999, followed by the console-exclusive NBA Hoopz in 2001, which expanded the gameplay to 3-on-3, and the NBA Ballers series.

EA Sports, having acquired rights to the name, released a new version of NBA Jam, with the Wii version released on October 5, 2010, and PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions released the following month. Original NBA Jam creator Mark Turmell was hired to work on this new version in conjunction with EA Canada. Following the game’s critical and commercial success, a follow-up, NBA Jam: On Fire Edition was released for PSN on October 4, 2011, and XBLA on October 5, 2011.

In 2020, Tastemakers LLC released a 3/4 scale replica of the original NBA Jam cabinet featuring emulated versions of the original arcade game, along with Tournament Edition and Hangtime, with newly added online play.

Popular culture:

In popular sports culture, the phrases ”He’s heating up”, ”He’s on fire”, and ”Boomshakalaka!” are identified with NBA Jam. In the game, these catch-phrases describe when a player hits two or three shots in a row. When a player is ”on fire”, the ball literally catches fire and singes the net. Voiced by Tim Kitzrow, the announcer is reminiscent of Marv Albert and has contributed numerous memorable lines to the basketball lexicon. The NBA Jam script was written solely by Jon Hey, although Kitzrow has stated that the lines were largely improvised.

NBA Jam also incorporates a slogan from Spike Lee’s alter-ego in his 1986 film She’s Gotta Have It, Mars Blackmon, who was also featured in a Nike basketball shoe television commercial at the time. The NBA Jam commentator asks, ”Is it the shoes?” after a player performs spectacularly. The 2010 game features a nod to this particular piece of commentary, when the commentator (Kitzrow reprising the role) sometimes exclaims ”It’s gotta be the shoes!” under similar circumstances.

The upbeat, funky music written by Jon Hey was inspired by sports music themes and has been compared to George Clinton’s P-Funk All Stars. Funkadelic’s 1979 ”(Not Just) Knee Deep” shares the most similarity with the music of NBA Jam but was recorded more than a decade before NBA Jam’s music was written. The likeness of George Clinton was used as the character ”P. Funk” in the console versions of NBA Jam Tournament Edition. The original NBA Jam arcade release and the NBA Jam T.E. arcade release had different music for the title screen and for each quarter.

In July 2009, Mortal Kombat creator Ed Boon revealed (on Twitter) that a Mortal Kombat court was to be hidden in a console port of NBA Jam or NBA Hangtime.

In October 2019, writer Reyan Ali published a book on the game/series for Boss Fight Books called NBA Jam documenting the game’s development, success and impact on Midway afterward.

Nintendo Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES)

Acclaim Entertainment Inc.

021421620189

1-2

United States

16-bit

Cartridge

1

Cardboard Box

~$4.00

2026-04-15

2018-07-03 12:30:37