Title: Slam City with Scottie Pippen CD
Released: 1995
Genre: Basketball
Developer: Digital Pictures
Publisher: Digital Pictures
Regions: USA, UK
Availability: Rare

It's hard to imagine that there was a time when many people believed that video games comprised of nothing but full motion video were the future of the gaming industry. Sega certainly lead the battle charge with awful "interactive video" titles like Sewer Shark and the infamous Make Your Own Video series, and poor Digital Pictures followed gamely behind. This now-defunct development house was responsible for the release of four of the five available Sega 32x CD games, hereby known as "the five turkeys." It's hard to find fault with the innovative spirit of Digital Pictures, and they certainly did their best to try and combine several of the most popular video game genres with the new full motion video technology. Unfortunately, the experiment went terribly wrong and hasn't been repeated since. Slam City with Scottie Pippen was envisioned as the natural evolution of the basketball genre, a kind of NBA Jam for the next generation; too bad it's saddled with terrible control and near-zero interactivity. Basketball games had been a staple of the gaming scene since the time of the Atari 2600 and seemed a natural for the digital video treatment, so basketball legend Scottie Pippen was drafted to front the first basketball video game comprised entirely of video footage. Played completely from a first-person perspective, Slam City pits you against an assortment of silly trash-talking opponents. Like the equally terrible Supreme Warrior, Slam City compromises gameplay and precise control for its innovative but ultimately flawed presentation. Control pad inputs are terribly unresponsive, and most matches degenerate into dull frustration fests. Success requires hitting a particular button at a precise moment (much like Dragon's Lair) and then watching a video sequence. Unfortunately, this sort of memorization gameplay is the exact opposite of truly fun basketball games like NBA Jam. The final match with Scottie Pippen himself can be found on disk 2, but its doubtful you'll make it that far. As far as we know, no other basketball game has attempted to replicate Slam City's first-person playing perspective, and this should definitely be considered a good thing. Avoid this one if your a fan of the sport or video games in general.