How to play RealSports Basketball online
- Move your player: arrow keys
- Shoot: Space bar
- Player 2 (two-player games): T/F/G/H to move, A for the button
- Start a new game: F12 (the console’s Reset switch)
- Choose a game variation: F11 (the console’s Select switch)
- Save and load your progress: Ctrl + 0–9 saves to a slot, Alt + 0–9 loads it
Gameplay
Each team has two players on the court. Their movement is split: one player can only move around the lower half of the court and the other only around the upper half, which limits how you can set up plays. Stealing is very simple. If a defender touches the player with the ball, possession changes, so games turn into a scramble of bumping and grabbing.
Many rules of real basketball are missing. There are no timeouts, no shot clock, no free throws, no three-point shots and no out-of-bounds calls. The graphics are a step up from Atari’s 1978 Basketball cartridge, and the sound is limited to crowd cheers and a dribbling noise.
Variations
There are twelve game variations. They change only the number of human players, the length of the periods and the speed of the players.
Tips
- Keep your distance. Any touch from a defender loses the ball, so steer the ball carrier away from opponents before you shoot.
- Attack the ball carrier. On defence the same rule works for you: run straight into the player with the ball.
- Remember the half-court limits. Neither of your players can cover the whole court, so think about which one is in position.
Why it was never released
In the RealSports series, Baseball, Football, Volleyball, Soccer and Tennis all came out on the 2600 between 1982 and 1983, and Boxing followed in 1987. Basketball was announced but dropped. The prototype collectors’ site AtariProtos suggests that Atari was not happy with how polished the play was, and that the stronger sports games on Mattel’s Intellivision may also have played a part. Two prototype versions are known, a late beta dated 28 December 1982 and a final version dated 11 January 1983. A prototype box also exists. Much later the game was included on AtGames’ Atari Flashback consoles.
Similar games to play next
- Basketball – Atari’s original one-on-one basketball cartridge from 1978
- Double Dunk – a later two-on-two basketball game with set plays
- RealSports Volleyball – a released game from the same series
- RealSports Soccer – another RealSports team game