The real fun happens if you utilize your GameBreaker while heading toward the hoop. The player will launch himself high into the air, and you can use the right analog stick (there's that Trick Stick functionality again) to perform a variety of mid-air tricks. Combining them with the turbo buttons will allow you to attempt increasingly difficult stunts, but you have to be careful that you don't hold the ball for too long, or you'll end up losing the ball, your GameBreaker, and any street cred you might have earned. Luckily, your teammates will usually take off while you're in the air, so you can give them mid-air alley-oops and they can pull off their own tricks before throwing it down. This will quickly jack up the trick points that you get for a successful dunk, and with it the number of street points you can use to improve your player's skills.

Although the new GameBreaker system is an extension of the mechanic that was in place in the previous games, there's one addition that, shockingly, hasn't been featured in any of the previous NBA Street games. One would think that a Dunk Contest would be a natural fit for a game that offers so much above-the-rim play, but this is the first time you've been able to dunk outside of the context of an actual game.


The Dunk Contest is very similar to the GameBreakers, in that you can use the right analog stick (and the turbo buttons) to pull off a huge variety of high-flying, impossibly acrobatic moves. All you need to do is run toward the hoop, hit the shoot button, and start flicking the stick this way and that, all in an effort to impress the randomly chosen celebrity judges. Again, if you try too hard, there's a good chance that you'll end up with nothing more than a bruised ego.

Unlike the GameBreakers, however, you've got a few other ways to show off for the judges. If you want, you can choose from several props (including a dumpster and a Porta-Pottie), then leap over them while performing your aerial wizardry. Taking a page from the excellent Dunk Contest found in this year's edition of NBA Live, you can also toss the ball to yourself in a variety of ways, such as kicking the ball off the backboard before gathering it for the throwdown.

It would have been really easy for the developers, realizing that they had a hugely successful formula on their hands, to simply toss a few new moves and players into NBA Street V3, safe in the knowledge that most fans would rush out to buy the new game as soon as it hit store shelves. Thankfully, as was the case with the last game, they wanted to create a brand new experience, and they've definitely succeeded with the additions of the new GameBreaker system and the Dunk Contest. Life above the rim has never been better.