{"id":10347,"date":"2026-06-09T21:10:50","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T18:10:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/?p=10347"},"modified":"2026-06-10T00:35:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T21:05:11","slug":"nba-the-run-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/imdbnews.ir\/index.php\/2026\/06\/09\/nba-the-run-review\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA The Run Review"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Some years back, a few buddies and I started going to the park every Wednesday afternoon to shoot hoops. Five-on-five, first-to-11, 1s-and-2s; that way, we could take a break after each game, swap a couple of guys around to keep things fresh, play another, and repeat until it was either too dark to see the rim or people were all balled out. This is what NBA The Run feels like. There\u2019s the burst of excitement I get the second I hit my first shot. There\u2019s the novelty of having enough players to switch it up so things don\u2019t become stale. And, unfortunately, there\u2019s also the unavoidable exhaustion at the end; of having played too many games, shot too many threes, and alley\u2019d too many oops until I need to take a complete break from it. Sure, I can go again next Wednesday, but until then, I\u2019d rather be doing something else.<\/p>\n

Thankfully, something NBA The Run lacks compared to my local court is that one guy who always throws elbows. Instead, it hosts a roster of 30+ NBA all-stars and five street legends full of hardwood pros who are all masters of their craft. Trying out different characters in these fast, 3v3 matches never got old because, much like in reality, each guy has certain things they\u2019re better at than others: Victor Wembanyama is, as you\u2019d expect, an alien who can shoot, dunk, and block with his Go Go Gadget arms. On the less-freakishly-tall side, there\u2019s Stephen Curry and Damian Lillard, who can both throw it up from pretty much anywhere. And we can\u2019t forget Ja Morant, who is a highlight dunker and <\/em>daring shooter like no one else. That deep player roster keeps things exciting, and the championship I won with Devin Booker felt very <\/em>different than the one I got as Nikola Jokic. (And no, I\u2019m not just saying that as a desperate Suns fan.)<\/p>\n

To top it off, NBA The Run doesn\u2019t just capture each player\u2019s likeness; it also accurately mimics their signature jump shot forms, which was a very pleasant surprise. I\u2019ll be honest, having played a lot of the NBA Street series on the PSP and GameCube back in the day, I was half-expecting generic character movements and animations to be copied and pasted across all the different players. Instead, I\u2019ve had the pleasure of seeing Book\u2019s silky smooth shot and even LaMelo Ball\u2019s unorthodox release throughout each match.<\/p>\n

All of these hardwood icons and their jumpers are playable within NBA The Run\u2019s two main game modes: Knockout Squads and Knockout Solos. The former is a lot like The Park in NBA 2K, where each pro in your squad of three is controlled by a different player, and you have to work as a team. The latter, on the other hand, lets you control all three of them by yourself against another person doing the same. There\u2019s also a third mode called Knockout Friends (tragically named, in my opinion, because you shouldn\u2019t knock your friends out unless you want enemies), which is a promising private tournament format where you can invite up to 48 people to play for a championship, but I wasn\u2019t able to test that out ahead of release.<\/p>\n

Across all my runs, I gravitated more towards Knockout Squads because you just can\u2019t replicate the wild highlights, the frequent taunting from both sides, and the pure joy of winning a championship with two random teammates. Sadly, there\u2019s always a chance you get paired with someone who apparently doesn\u2019t know how to pass the ball. But if that happens, and it does often, the short match times make it easy enough to just chalk it up as a loss and run it back without much frustration.<\/p>\n

Side note: I am begging<\/em> you to pass the ball, people. It\u2019s one button on your controller. One key on your keyboard. It\u2019s not that hard. Basketball is a team sport. There is no \u2018I\u2019 in team, \u201cWe, not me<\/em>,\u201d and all that jazz. Now, back to our regular programming.<\/p>\n

Home (Court) Is Where the Heart Is<\/h2>\n

Look, I get that I can\u2019t just ask Kevin Durant to replace that flying elbow guy in the real world, so how about we find a new court to play on instead? You know, one that doesn\u2019t have multiple dead spots? NBA The Run has options for me here, too.<\/p>\n

Take The Tenement, for example, a small piece of my home from the heart of Manila, Philippines, brought to the global stage. I\u2019m a bit biased here, but it’s my favorite of the seven in-game courts, not just as a nostalgic hit, but also because it so perfectly captures what basketball is: a spectacle that draws crowds, from the oldheads who can barely walk to the youngins who stand on their tiptoes just to watch. From that towering behemoth to the concrete jungle\u2019s iconic Rucker Park, I appreciate the care and attention developer Play by Play Studios has put into building these courts, treating each one like the gathering and celebration of hoops that they are. And with every arena being a grand, near-accurate recreation of a real place, it turned the first few runs I went on into an exciting global tour where I may or may not<\/em> have lost some matches because I was busy taking in the sights.<\/p>\n

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Nico’s Favorite Basketball Games<\/h3>\n

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