Basketdudes: Basketball Just Went RPG
By Remko Molenaar (Proxzor), OnRPG journalist
In Basketdudes Online you are in charge of a basketball team with which you can compete against other players and accumulate points. As you progress, your players will level up; improving their performance, and new players and items to equip your team with will be available. As each player develops and levels up, his skills improve and you can personalize him to make him unique from all of the other players. Also you have the option of equipping them with a wide variety of items to strengthen their strongest features or compensate their weakest one.
When you start up the game and log in it is time to create your team! You have the choice between different teams with all sorts of abilities. These abilities are important throughout the game so pick the best suitable choice with your desired gameplay. After you have chosen your team you can design your own jersey. You can design 2 sets of jerseys so you don’t have trouble playing a person with the same color shirts. After you have designed your jerseys you are able to pick an emblem for your team. There is a wide variety of choices to pick from, all the designs are well made and are all looking very cool. I chose for a Mexican cactus that plays the guitar.
Schools
From 1930 and even from the beginning of official competitive basketball, many players came not only from each club’s player pool, but also from various different traditional schools that were specialized in the arts of bball. The original three schools: Kiev school, Saber school and the Vonkann Schule were the precursors. Each of these schools had its particular methodology. Later with the development of university basketball, they moved on to specializing in specific training for the WBC Championship. These championships required special skills from the players. Now they call themselves official schools of the WBC. Since then various new schools have joined the original three. Each one has a unique playing style and focuses on different tactics, offenses and jukes.
American School: The American School focuses mainly on the showmanship of basketball and it has produced some of the most high profile and most loved players.
Asia United: The AUBC (Asia United Basketball Clubs) is possibly the strongest of all the schools, because it combines very methodical tactics that value offense and defense equally.
Kiev School: The Kiev school is characterized by its defensive style, which some call the wall. Its training method is based on intense physical work so intense it has no comparison. It gives the player a high-performing, rock-solid physique greatly valued for centers.
Saber School: This school is definitely oriented towards offense, basing its style on speed and precision shooting. Its facilities in San Lorenzo claim to have the most powerful explosive sprint training in the world today.
Urban United School: The Urban United School came to be as a result of basketball’s popularity expanding faster than schools could house potential players. They all had great potential but missed the characteristics that adapted to the various schools. As a result these players are rough edged and wild but often lacking in the fundamentals.
Vonkann Schule: The Vonkann players are skillful and give the team a vision of the game that is hard to improve, offering the team strategic possibilities of the highest level.
Gameplay
The controls in this game are quite easy and really feel smooth. To move the current character you have to use the arrow keys along with the WSD keys to do different actions. These keys do different actions depending on the situation; if you are attacking you will pass, shoot and sprint. When you are defending you will steal, block and sprint. Like in every basketball game there are breaks. In these breaks you can change players to let them rest on the bench.
The players that are playing can get tired. This reduces their energy and their performance. The players that are tired can miss important shots and are slower in running then before. Fatigue can be an important factor in the game that will help you win or lose various situations. So keep an eye on your players and treat them with care. This is a very beneficial system as it prevents the issues of oldschool bball games where you would only ever pick the two or three best players on your team and ignore the rest. Now the entire team must pull their weight.
After a game concludes the characters that participated in the played match will attain experience that will help them level up and acquire more abilities and statistics. You will also earn some cash used to purchase new items and players. You will also acquire various kinds of cards; these items will help you throughout the game to make the chance of winning the game even bigger. Your true test as a coach is knowing when to use which cards to utilize their full benefits. If you want to look up every player’s statistics of how well they are playing you are able to look up the statistics in the team tab. You are also able to see your lineup and trophies in this window.
The graphics in this game a rather good looking and have a nice cartoonish style. To play this game you need a DirectX 9.0x compatible video card. Most likely everyone with a computer is able to play this game; the requirements are not that high and you must have an ancient computer made out of bricks if you can’t play this game with a proper frame rate.
Shop
In the shop you can purchase all sorts of players with different stats, with some players priced higher than others due to their inherent skill. These players are all from different schools, each school is specialized in different training methods so think twice before purchasing a new player. You can also buy all kinds of clothing for your uniform, such as new shoes, armbands, and tattoos. There aren’t any other items you can buy for your uniform unfortunately and I hope they expand the shop with multiple different clothing styles. You can also stock up on cards before especially intense matches to swing the game ever so slightly in your favor.
Conclusion
Basketdudes is a fun basketball game to play, the gameplay seems refined and near flawless and there are different servers to make the game playable for everyone with a proper ping. There are also various tournaments to play and win trophies for which makes this game a nice challenge. Unfortunately the community is not that big and could use more players. This game is still in open beta and I hope they will add more items to the shop to customize your character and team to make them seem more unique. Overall the game is a really fun game to play and I would recommend every basketball fan to try this game.
