Hands-on: NAOMI Virtua NBA

Over the weekend EGM/OPM West Coast editor Wataru Maruyama and I got to test out Sega's new arcade basketball title, Virtua NBA. Using the NAOMI hardware (which shares many components with the Sega Dreamcast), Virtual NBA is the best-looking game of basketball ever to hit the arcade scene. It's just a shame the game doesn't offer the gameplay to match the impressive visuals.

Virtua NBA presents its basketball action on a 3D court, but it essentially maintains a 2D perspective for most of the viewing, save for its replay sequences. Essentially, it looks like a highly detailed 3D version of NBA Showtime. Because Sega opted to allow only five preselected characters per team, it could focus on making sure those players look very life-like (rather than attempt to bring every NBA player into the game). The players all animate well, and their shadows and reflections look very slick. Other than that, the crowd looks more realistic than any I've ever seen before - go up for a shot and people will actually look up at you. Very well done.

Where the game seems to falter, though, is in the gameplay department. You're given a pass button and a shoot button, and that's it. And with what little play control those allow for, the game actually takes liberties in reacting to what you command. For example, you'll press the shoot button, but your player may not shoot right away - instead, he may take a few steps and then toss up the ball. Overall, the game just doesn't give the same sense of control that we've come to expect from basketball titles as of late.

It's not yet clear when Virtua NBA will see a wide release in US arcades, but when it does it'd probably be worth a play. The graphics alone are worth the price of admission. It's just too bad the gameplay disappoints.