Bringing a real-life athlete into a video game isn't easy. We learn that every year when Electronic Arts and 2K Games re-up on their yearly sports franchises like NBA 2K and Madden NFL. Mainly, the problem has to do with expectations. When we see LeBron James or Russell Wilson or Kevin Durant in a video game, we expect that we'll be able to do LeBron James or Russell Wilson or Kevin Durant things with them. This wasn't always the case.
Before we had the stunning graphics and gameplay mechanics that currently grace our consoles and computers, things were worse. Sports video games were stale, repetitive, often suffered from licensing issues, and typically offered the driest, most milquetoast version of a game possible.
In order to mitigate the technological limitations of the time, and to differentiate their product, game developers and publishers sought out athletes to endorse their games. We're not speaking strictly in terms of cover athletes, though. The role had the potential to be bigger. Athletes like Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, and Shaquille O'Neal were enlisted to serve in a variety of different roles across the expanding video game industry. As a result, we got titles both good (Barkley Shut Up and Jam!) and bad (Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City).
As we were looking back on these games, we decided to figure out who fared the best and who fared the worst during this strange and now-bygone era of sports gaming. We decided to rank The Greatest NBA Players in Video Game History not for the sake of figuring out the best characters in NBA 2K12 or NBA Street V3, but so that we could see who made an actual impact on the history of gaming.
20. Scottie Pippen
Title(s): Slam City with Scottie Pippen
Console(s): PC, Sega 32X, Mega-CD
Even in the virtual realm, Chicago Bulls legend Scottie Pippen was forced to play second fiddle to better-known stars like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, and Charles Barkley. In March of 1994, when Pippen was the man in Chicago and Jordan was still striking out for the Birmingham Barons, Sega decided to team up with the Bulls' small forward to produce Slam City with Scottie Pippen for the company's poorly-received Sega 32X. In a way, the pairing was perfect. The 32X was a complementary product to the Sega Genesis, while Pippen was best utilized as a complementary player to Michael Jordan.
However, Slam City's failures were many. First and foremost, it was made using Full Motion Video technology, an ill-conceived graphics and gameplay system that was often criticized for being stiff, scripted, and highly expensive. The style was abandoned around 1995, similar to the 32X, which was discontinued just two years after its 1994 release. Coincidentally, that was around the same time the Chicago Bulls started winning rings again.
18. Magic Johnson
Title(s): Magic Johnson's Fast Break
Console(s): Arcade, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, DOS, MSX, NES, ZX Spectrum
Created for a host of now-defunct and mostly unsuccessful consoles, Magic Johnson's Fast Break was notable only for the two names endorsing it: Magic Johnson and PepsiCo. Otherwise, Johnson's left-to-right basketball sidescroller was clunky, unimaginative, and poorly designed.
Honestly, the most memorable thing about Fast Break was making a three-pointer, and only because every time you launched a successful shot from downtown, you were treated to a cameo from Magic himself.
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Funnily enough, this shot also serves as a perfect review for the game itself.
16. David Robinson
Title(s): David Robinson's Supreme Court
Console(s): Sega Genesis
Released in 1991 for the Sega Genesis, David Robinson's Supreme Court has been mostly forgotten for a couple different reasons. Firstly, it didn't have a licensing agreement with the NBA. As a result, the four teams in the game were fictional, and featured no player names or actual team logos. Secondly, Robinson's star status waned considerably after his playing career ended. As we all know, Robinson was a great player and is a great human being and would probably play mahjongg with your grandmother if she asked him, but he was never a superstar in the same way that guys like Magic Johnson, Charles Barkely, or Shaquille O'Neal were.
Still, though, upon its release, Supreme Court was a complete and enjoyable experience for sports gamers, offering a full-court basketball package that few other titles could compete with.
14. Michael Jordan
Title(s): Jordan vs. Bird: One on One, Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City, Michael Jordan in Flight, Space Jam
Console(s): DOS, Commodore 64, PC, Game Boy, Mega Drive/Genesis, NES, Sega Saturn, PlayStation, Super Nintendo
Surprisingly, Jordan checks in on the low end of this list. Sure, His Airness may have appeared in a fair amount of games but, unfortunately, quantity did not always equal quality for the Bulls star. The Space Jam video game is best remembered as a failed marketing opportunity, while Michael Jordan: Chaos in the Windy City is best not remembered at all. The title was a weird and mostly forced attempt to cash in on Jordan's name by staging him in a platformer filled with aliens, magical basketballs, and lame levels.
Indeed, Jordan's best title was the 1993 PC title, Michael Jordan in Flight, a game which showed off the system's 3D capabilities by making Jordan the star of a three on three basketball simulation. Still, though, the actual game itself pales in comparison to some of the fun that could be had on titles fronted by other NBA superstars. For a player such as Jordan, we expected better than an empty gym and some no-name players.
12. Shaquille O'Neal
11. Julius Erving
Title(s): Dr. J and Larry Bird Go One on One
Console(s): Amiga, Apple II, Atari 7800, Atari 8-bit, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, DOS, Macintosh, TRS-80 CoCo
Dr. J's flirtation with gaming was brief but glorious. In 1983, the former ABA and NBA All-Star paired up with Larry Bird to lend their likenesses to Eric Hammond's Dr. J and Larry Bird Go One on One, an early Apple II computer game which was praised for its realistic and addictive gameplay. Mind you, this was 1983, so realistic is a relative term to the highly-detailed and lifelike simulations we're able to play today, but for its time, One on One gave computer gamers a thrilling and worthwhile substitute for any sports gaming action they would otherwise find in an arcade, allowing them to pit Larry Bird up against in Dr. J in a battle for digital supremacy.
After its initial success, Dr. J and Larry Bird Go One on One was ported to a number of other platforms throughout the 1980s, and became a franchise when its sequel was released in 1988. By then, however, Erving was retired, and a young new star by the name of Michael Jordan was on the rise, usurping Erving's role as a title character for the game. Regardless, Dr. J's virtual legacy lives on for gaming historians, as well as anyone who somehow still owns a working Apple II computer.
9. Bill Laimbeer
Title(s): Bill Laimbeer's Combat Basketball
Console(s): Super Nintendo
As a member of the Detroit Bad Boys, Bill Laimbeer is easily one of the most reviled basketball players to ever play in the league, and Bill Laimbeer's Combat Basketball is his crowning achievement in this respect. Released in November of 1991, the Super Nintendo title allowed your players to use weapons against your opponent, tackle the opposing team, and play a game only loosely resembling actual basketball.
Unfortunately, for all of its fun quirks, Combat Basketball didn't fare particularly well. It was poorly made, and received bad reviews as a result. But really, if you do decide to pick this game up, the quality should be a secondary concern. Just play it for the very fact that it exists. Combat Basketball is one of the finest troll jobs in NBA history.
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7. Larry Bird
Title(s): Jordan vs. Bird: One on One, Dr. J and Larry Bird Go One on One
Console(s): Mega Drive/Genesis, NES, PC, Game Boy, Commodore 64, Apple II, Amiga, Atari 7800, Atari 8-bit, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, DOS, Macintosh, TRS-80 CoCo
During the sports game boom of the '80s and '90s, even Larry Bird was getting in on the action, starring alongside Dr. J and Michael Jordan for Electronic Arts' One on One series. Bird was the constant for the franchise, as players made the Hick From French Lick work his hardest to out-hustle and out-play two of the NBA's greatest players ever. Thankfully, Bird wasn't too shabby himself, making both One on One games into competitive if simplistic experiences.
Honestly, though, it's baffling why Bird and his chief rival during this era, Magic Johnson, never had a One on One video of their own. Is it too late for someone to make Magic & Bird: A Courtship of Rivals: The Video Game?
5. Kobe Bryant
Title(s): Kobe Bryant in NBA Coutside, NBA Courtside 2: Featuring Kobe Bryant, NBA Courtside 2002
Console(s): Nintendo 64, GameCube
Shaquille O'Neal may have been the undisputed star of the Los Angeles Lakers during the late '90s and early 2000's, but Kobe Bryant still found his ways to shine. With the NBA Courtside series, Bryant served as the cover athlete and main attraction for Nintendo's major NBA franchise, putting out a collection of video games which rivaled EA Sports in both quality and sales numbers. The first installment of the series was even designated as a "Player's Choice" title for the Nintendo 64, denoting the game's particularly high sales.
Courtside isn't a sports game that many are likely to revisit—it doesn't possess the mayhem or novelty of other vintage games like NBA Jam or NFL Blitz. Still, though, when you do take a look back at it, it's easy to remember why you enjoyed it in the first place: the ridiculous music, the blocky graphics, and the gameplay (which, surprisingly, holds up pretty well).
3. Charles Barkley
Title(s): Barkley Shut Up and Jam!, Barkley Shut Up and Jam! 2, Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden
Console(s): Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, PC, Mac
Charles Barkely is an unlikely hero within gaming circles. The TNT broadcaster and former NBA All-Star was the star and namesake for two video games released in the '90s, both considered to be NBA Jams clones—though the first iteration was decidedly more successful than the second. However, in 2008, the original Barkley Shut Up and Jam! experienced an unexpected renaissance when it was rebooted as Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden, a title which remixed Barkley's game into a JRPG-meets-basketball experience.
Gaiden was perfectly weird, blending the best elements from '90s games together with the best elements of '90s basketball to make Barkley into a cult figure. Its premise? For Barkley to discover the origins of the "Chaos Dunk, a jam so powerful its mere existence threatens the balance of chaos and order." Sign us up. With someone like Charles Barkley, that idea is just crazy enough to work.
