GameZebo: Shaq may be best known as a (former) basketball player, but his legacy is a little more expansive than that. He’s rapped, acted in movies, and even starred in a fighting game called Shaq Fu. It wasn’t the greatest game, but the sheer absurdity of its premise has made it something of a cultural legend. Not content to let his video game legacy end there, Shaq and developer Hiptic Games have partnered up to release ShaqDown.
Shaquille O’Neal so immense in size and heart he couldn’t be constrained to the basketball court, and believe me, we tried. To truly understand Shaq, one must become Shaq. And what better way to do that than by playing every video game Shaq has lent his namesake to? God help me.
DG: Shaquille O’Neal, the 7ft-tall former NBA star’s prior foray into video games was Shaq Fu, a 2D fighting game in which Shaq must rescue a young child from an evil mummy, was never met with positive acclamation. In fact, you could say Shaq Fu transcended the “So good it’s bad” threshold into borderline-unplayable territory, and in no way could it have been deemed a good game.
STP: An endless runner with a good dose of humor and a big-name hero, held back by punishing difficulty and not quite enough replay value.