A couple years ago my son wanted a basketball goal setup for his room. We went through a huge list of them, looking for the right one, until we ran across the Lifetime Basketball Double Shot game. It was perfect, it was built with quality materials, it folded up, and most importantly it was fun. This is a review after owning it for the past two years.
Lifetime Double Shot Assembly
First off, my son is a complete basketball nut. Completely. He’s 11, but watches tons of NBA games, watches the draft, plays NBA 2k games, etc. And when he wanted this for his 10th birthday, it was hard to refuse even though it was barely going to fit into his room. We ordered it through Amazon, I’ve include my affiliate link through Amazon below:
Lifetime Basketball Double Shot Arcade System
It wasn’t bad to assemble, but not the most fun thing either. It just has a lot of a large awkward pieces that make it somewhat difficult to assemble. A second person would probably help sometimes, though I didn’t have that luxury. After a couple hours, I finally got the thing put together so we could play.
Durability
The first thing I noticed was how sturdy the hoops were on the Lifetime Double Shot vs all the other games I’ve looked at. Most of the time those games have flimsy rims, not this one, they’re rock solid. Balls were pretty nice (comes with 7) and were of pretty good quality, better than what would normally come with your over the door mini hoop.
The rest of setup is pretty sturdy as well. In two years we’ve never had anything break or bend, which is pretty remarkable for a home piece of equipment, most of the time things like this aren’t built to last very well. This basketball goal though is an exception to the rule.
Playing it
We played it ton, I think my high score was 127 or 132, something like that. My son could never quite compete with me because I could shoot with either hand, making it hard for him to keep up. The game features an initial session where you try and get to 30, then to 60, and then the time just runs out. With about 10 seconds left in the first period, your shots start to count for 3 points instead of 2, and stay that way for the rest of the game.
For little kids under like 7 or 8, they’ll probably never make it out of the first period. It’s not super easy to make 30 points in that amount of time. My 8 year old has only made it out a couple times I think. My 14 year old though can get into the 80’s in a regular basis, so evidently there’s an age where it becomes a lot easier somewhere between 8 and 11. I’ve put a video below of my 14 year old and I playing it in his room.
The sensors work pretty good for the most part. I believe there are sensitivity adjustments in the back but I’ve never used them. For the most part they’re pretty accurate with the made shots, the only ones it has trouble with are shots that go around the rim and then out, or ones that bounce out from below the rim. I would guess that on average, you probably get an extra 4 to 6 or so points from misses counted as makes in an average game. Luckily both players get the same advantage, so it doesn’t hurt the competition level.
Improvements
What could make the Lifetime Basketball Double Shot Arcade System better? I could name a few things off the top of my head.
- Music during play. It has sound effects, but no music. Music would help a lot with excitement.
- More modes of play besides just the default.
- LED lights on the back for better presentation.
- A better scoreboard. It’s fine, but for 2018 it’s a little 80’sish.
It’s great overall, but a few minor tweaks like the things I mentioned above would make it a lot better.
Conclusion
Would we buy it again? Absolutely. Unlike so many other gifts which get played with for a week and then gather dust, my son has consistently played with it over the past couple years. It’s a gift that ages well too, as it’s just as fun for adults as it is kids. Highly recommended for your basement, or if your child’s room is big enough, there as well.
The other good thing about the hoop not mentioned in any other review is that you can actually store a bunch of stuff under it. My son has a bunch of things stored underneath his, which is nice because it takes up so much room. We’ve actually never folded it up while we’ve owned it, never felt the need to.
