When colonnade games gained recognition in the 1970s, they were the standard type like the 1st pinball games, Pac-Mac, Pong, and Space Attackers. Over time, the creators of these games realized they needed to innovate and improve consistently to keep the eye of their players.
This led on to them widening into games like the High Impact Soccer game series. This was a totally new format for colonnade games. These games didn't do as well as their ancestors. Maybe players took time to adapt to them. It wasn't till the release of basketball colonnade games that this kind of game actually caught on.

The 1st that really took the colonnade games by force was NBA Jam. This genre got spotted instantly with its release and became preferred globally. NBA Jam was unique in lots of ways. Firstly it was dearer than the other games, where finishing a game needed about $2. It was also the first game that used real groups, real players with their real names, with the digitized version of these players playing the game on screen. Playing the game was similar to watching a game on the television, only better, since here the game players could make control each move of their fave basketball players. More so, one could defy gravity to make them to do what a player wanted them to do. This has been one of the feedbacks of the game, that it featured impractical effects, with the players flying as much as their heights to score a point.
Fans of the game however maintained, this was essentially a great high. the game continued to climb on the renown charts and featured basketball greats of their times like Karl Malone, Chris Webber, Colbert Cheaney, Jeff Hornacek, David Robinson, Charles Oakley amongst others.
After a time people discovered different or other features of the game like Easter eggs and other special features to be turned on by use of buttons and joysticks. The game saw many follow ups and spin-offs, including the NBA Jam : Competition Edition, NBA Jam Extraordinary of 1996 and even a 3D version of the game featuring a commentary. The other games in the line were are NBA Hangtime and NBA Hangtime Extraordinary. A university version of the game, called School Slam was also introduced in 1995. The massive success of basketball games also gave rise to other sports games, which centered on games like football and baseball.