I'm going to start all of my quick hit game reviews with this warning: Like most of you I don't own a HDTV, so the graphics in the screen captures and what I saw weren't as impressive as they would be on a better TV.

My first 2K Sport's game for the 360 was NBA 2K6. The game follows in the footsteps of the NBA 2K franchise, meaning it's a fairly strong entry into the basketball genre.

The controls seem to be pretty similar to what I remember from earlier entries into the franchise, but a this time around they are a little tighter. Now you have a bit more control over what sorts of shots and passes you make and even how you get around defense. This is done through use of the triggers and the sticks. Basically, the right stuck lets you manually control shooting and stealing and you can use the left stick to control fakes and the like while in possession of the ball.

This latest 2K has a bunch of minor tweaks but the real 360 upgrade to the game is its graphics. The players all have new animation that relies on something 2K calls muscle driven body morphs. The game also uses better player head and eye tracking, true life cloth simulation and something called sweat technology. It might sound silly, but the players actually start to sweat as the game progresses and the effect is simply amazing.

Despite all of the bells and whistles I still found the game oddly disjointed in its graphics at times. When a player fouled another his arm would sometimes pass through the guy, or the ball would seem to magically float an inch or so away from a player's hands when he was holding it. It's minor stuff, but more noticeable now with the extreme graphics. I was playing the game on my debug, so it may still have some tweaking coming, but I doubt it.

Overall, I still found this to be the most realistic and intense basketball game I've played.

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