Wayback Wednesday: In the Zone in NBA Live 07
This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! From retrospectives of basketball games and their interesting features, to republished articles and looking at NBA history through the lens of the virtual hardwood, Wednesdays at the NLSC are for going back in time. This week, I’m taking a look back at the In the Zone mechanic in the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07.
As you may know, NBA The Run will feature a mechanic called In the Zone. For more on that, be sure to tune in to the latest episode of the NLSC Podcast, where Dee provides his in-depth impressions of the upcoming game! Unsurprisingly, it’s not the first time that a basketball video game has used that well-travelled term for being locked in and performing at a high level. It was the name of Konami’s sim-arcade hybrid games, and it’s the title of an extremely catchy track from Midway’s NBA Hangtime. And of course, In the Zone was a mechanic in NBA Live 07 for Xbox 360.
Although NBA Live 07’s mechanic sprang to my mind when I first heard that NBA The Run would be using the name for its power-up, at this point, I think it’s safe to lay claim to the moniker. Not only is it a common term, but the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07 was a terrible release that few gamers would care to revisit, so its take on being In the Zone is largely forgotten. With that being said, Wayback Wednesday is as much about digging into the forgotten history of the virtual hardwood as it is celebrating our most nostalgic memories, so let’s take a look back…way back…
We can’t talk about being In the Zone in NBA Live 07 without first touching once again on Freestyle Superstars. Debuting in NBA Live 06 for PC and the sixth gen consoles, Freestyle Superstars was an attempt to have star players and specialists stand out with signature moves. Opinions of it have always been divided, since those moves could be overpowering. I maintain that it had merit, and if nothing else, it was ultimately a stepping stone to better solutions. Freestyle Superstars was absent from the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 06, which was surprising. Sure, the game lacked depth in general, but Freestyle Superstars was a major gameplay addition that year.
Prior gen NBA Live 07 expanded upon Freestyle Superstars with Superstar and Star level abilities. The labels for those two levels of movesets could be misleading, as they weren’t so much divided along the lines of good and great players, but rather above-average and best-in-the-league skill levels. To that end, a specialist role player may have a Superstar level ability, while a multitalented All-Star could have a mix of Superstar and Star level movesets. There were also X-Factor players: key role players who almost qualified for Star level Freestyle Superstar moves, and could temporarily gain access to them in clutch situations if they performed well throughout the game.
The Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07 not only brought Freestyle Superstars to Next Gen, but also expanded upon the revamp in its prior gen brethren. It featured three levels of Freestyle Superstars abilities, less ambiguously labelled Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3. It was basically the same concept though, down to players having a mixture of different skill levels in their abilities. For example, cover player Tracy McGrady was a Level 3 High Flyer, Scorer, and Shooter, but a Level 2 Playmaker. Both versions of NBA Live 07 allowed us to switch between multiple Freestyle Superstars types on the fly, instead of having to choose just one as in NBA Live 06.
However, the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07 didn’t feature X-Factors as part of its momentum system. Instead of unlocking the potential of your role players, it boosted the players with Level 3 Freestyle Superstars abilities. That brings us to In the Zone. An internal momentum meter kept track of factors such as big scoring runs, defensive stops, turnovers, and successful execution of Freestyle Superstars moves. Once a team built up enough momentum, players with Level 3 Freestyle Superstars abilities would be In the Zone, as indicated by a pop-up in the HUD. This allowed them to dominate the competition in spectacular fashion, for as long as the team maintained momentum.
In that respect, In the Zone was essentially a fourth level of Freestyle Superstars in the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07, unlocking additional flashy moves. High Flyers could break out slams that would be right at home in the Dunk Contest, while Scorers would pull off fancy acrobatic layups and even more effective post moves. The idea was that when your stars were In the Zone, you could really put on a show and run up the score. At the same time, if you started missing shots or the opposing team began getting stops and lifting their game, the shift in momentum would put an end to being In the Zone. CPU-controlled opponents were also able to make use of this mechanic.
On paper, both forms of Freestyle Superstars in the two versions of NBA Live 07 were good ideas. Multiple levels of abilities allowed for a wider array of players to perform advanced moves, and for specialists and borderline All-Stars to stand out from the pack along with the absolute best players in the league. In that respect, I’d suggest that the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07 actually had the better approach. I do prefer X-Factors to being In the Zone, but the latter made sense as a way to create highlights and inject some more excitement. Again, both versions allowed on-the-fly switching of abilities, so we could make use of a player’s entire repertoire of moves.
Unfortunately, neither version of NBA Live 07 was a good showcase of the revamped Freestyle Superstars, as well as the concepts of X-Factors and being In the Zone. The Xbox 360 version is one of the most infamous disasters in basketball gaming, right up there (or down there) with NBA Elite 11 and NBA Live 14. Player animations and movement are awful, and players often have to warp or fly backwards and sideways to complete dunks and layups. So many dunks end up in rim stuffs, and jumpshots are awkward. In short, so much of the new technology wasn’t ready yet. NBA Live 06 had its share of issues, but on the court, it’s a far better experience than NBA Live 07.
Fortunately, the series was able to begin correcting course with NBA Live 08, at least on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. The controls were reduced from three shoot buttons back to two, and concepts such as Freestyle Superstars, X-Factors, and In the Zone morphed into Go-To Moves, Hot Spots, and Own the Paint. It was the right move, and also underscores how Freestyle Superstars was ultimately the intermediate step that led to signature moves and advanced controls. One could argue that even if NBA Live 07 had turned out to be a great game, Freestyle Superstars, X-Factors, and In the Zone would’ve still been replaced by those other mechanics as they were superior solutions.
Still, it’s a shame how NBA Live 07 being a disaster overshadowed the potential of multi-level Freestyle Superstars, X-Factors, and In the Zone. They weren’t responsible for the atrocious gameplay, after all. Indeed, much like everything else, they suffered because of the flawed motion system and other technical issues! Of course, they did still pave the way for future concepts. Once again, Freestyle Superstars essentially gave way to advanced controls, signature moves, and various player tendencies such as Hot Spots. As for In the Zone, we’ve seen a similar momentum-based mechanic in the years since NBA Live 07 dabbled with it, and I’m not referring to NBA The Run!
When you think about it, the Takeover abilities in NBA 2K are reminiscent of In the Zone in the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07. First of all, they’re tied to the player builds and archetypes, similar to all the different categories of Freestyle Superstars. Second, in order to activate Takeover, you need to turn in a strong performance and maintain momentum throughout the game. Third, when Takeover is in effect, players gain boosts that make them even more unstoppable, and in some cases spectacular. No, the mechanics aren’t identical, but Takeover is basically the modern equivalent of In the Zone in NBA Live 07, right down to being a concept that not everyone likes.
Parallels like this put ideas from bad games into perspective. It suggests that with the right tweaks – and in a game that’s technically sound – they can certainly work. In the Zone moves don’t look any nicer than any other animations in the Xbox 360 version of NBA Live 07, but as I said, the mechanic wasn’t the cause of those issues, or any of the other problems with the gameplay. Also, while Takeover abilities have arguably strayed from a realistic approach over the years, the concept of players getting in a groove and benefitting from a temporary boost to their abilities isn’t antithetical to the sim style. To put it another way, you can have a more realistic form of being On Fire!
That’s what In the Zone was trying to accomplish in NBA Live 07. As contemporary interviews reveal, the developers were trying to make a sim game with NBA Live. People may scoff at that notion, but unsuccessful results shouldn’t be confused with intentions. The pace of the gameplay and several of the mechanics during that era of NBA Live were clearly aiming for a deeper and more realistic sim, but flawed motion systems, clunky animations, and other technical shortcomings let them down. Some real progress was made with NBA Live 09 and especially NBA Live 10, before it was sadly all thrown away with the ill-advised attempted revamp with NBA Elite 11.
Because NBA Live 07 for Xbox 360 was a flop that isn’t particularly fun to revisit today, In the Zone isn’t a mechanic that I’ve been able to get a lot of enjoyment out of. I do appreciate the idea though, and I’d suggest that NBA 2K’s Takeover mechanic – whether you love it or hate it – is an example of how it can work in a sim title. These days, In the Zone is certainly better remembered by older games as the moniker of a handful of hoops titles from Konami, and moving forward, the term may become synonymous with NBA The Run. However, there’ll always be that connection to having the hot hand in a game that was ironically part of NBA Live’s cold streak.
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