NBA 2K14 My Career Mode Makes and Misses
Submitted on: 12/09/2013 by
Jayson Young
Of all the PlayStation 4 sports games, NBA 2K14 is the one I have played the most. Not because of its online modes, which are barely functional, or because of the lackluster My GM mode, which has been hampered by bizarre trade logic, nonsensical contract negotiations, outdated rosters (until this week) and a major bug where players never return from injuries.
Instead, I have almost exclusively played the new-look My Career mode, where you create an avatar and guide him through the cliché ascent from unknown street baller to NBA champion.
While the premise itself is stale, the mode's presentation is fresh, plus its scope is larger than any previous sports gaming story mode. You'd have to go all the way back to Midway's retired NBA Ballers and Blitz: The League series to find a sports game that put anywhere near as much work into crafting storylines and choreographing cutscenes.
Turning NBA 2K14's career mode into a low-budget Hollywood movie may have turned off some hardcore gamers who only care about what happens on the court. But Visual Concepts' attempt to capture the emotional parts of basketball -- player rivalries, teammate tensions, coaching disputes -- may also help usher in a new audience to sports gaming. One that, potentially, could become much larger and more lucrative than the audience who is outraged that they cannot "press X to fast forward."
During the console transition of the mid-1990s, roleplaying games used movie-quality video scenes to help take an unaccessible genre with a nerdy reputation from the unknown obscurity of EarthBound to the blockbuster success of Final Fantasy VII. At a time when the number of yearly sports franchises is dwindling, and the sales of key franchises like Madden NFL are slipping, the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One could finally become the stage where sports games start acting more like big screen dramas and less like interactive spreadsheets.
My Career, though not without some significant flaws, represents the first significant step towards making sports video games mean something more than just a bunch of numbers.
Cutscenes and Storylines
Between each game, NBA 2K14 uses cinematic sequences to show your created superstar interacting with coaches, trainers, teammates, media members, agents, businessmen and rival players. The 300-page script contains many memorable moments, and while the voice acting can be corny at times, these off-the-court sequences help build an emotional investment in the mode.
When I had to sit down -- face-to-face -- with my general manager and ask him to trade me, I genuinely felt selfish and a little remorseful, as the boss and I had experienced some funny, friendly moments during many previous meetings.
When a hotshot super agent pulled me into his limousine and tried to lure me away from my long-time friend, I couldn't wait to tell the champagne-sipping, Rolex-wearing sleazeball to take his contract offer, shine it up real nice, turn it neatly on its side, and shove it straight up his candy ***.
Intriguing behind-the-scenes moments provide extra motivation to play through My Career's grinding 82-game schedule, as I've already experienced many crazy and unexpected circumstances just two-thirds of the way through my first season.
Signature Skills and Personality Traits
While NBA 2K14's create-a-player interface is lacking in visual customization, it atones for that fault by offering excellent gameplay personalization.
In addition to the standard 0-99 attribute ratings, your player can also equip up to 7 Signature Skills, which unlock unique animations and provide performance enhancements in specific game situations. A "Pick & Roll Maestro" will have a greater chance of hitting shots or completing passes when coming off a ball screen. An "Acrobat" will have little difficulty changing his shots in mid-air using NBA 2K's patented "shot stick." With 35 Signature Skills to select from, created players can now choose specializations that go beyond simply being a "good shooter." In NBA 2K14, "shooters" have to decide whether they want to excel off the catch, in traffic or from the corners.
As many as three Personality Badges can also be equipped to further define your player's on-court role. An "Alpha Dog" will elevate his game whenever teammates are struggling. "Primetime" players perform at their peak during the playoffs and against rival teams. These 22 Badges are yet another tool, alongside the insanely detailed player models and hundreds of player-specific animations, that helps Visual Concepts capture the unique personality and mannerisms of each individual athlete in the NBA.
Misses
Dynamic Goals
NBA 2K14's career mode actively encourages you to be a ball hog and a bad teammate. At least, that's what will happen if you choose to follow the game's poorly designed dynamic goals.
I once was subbed into a game with six seconds left, down by a single point, with my coach telling me to "hit the game-winning shot." After receiving the inbound pass, I was immediately double-teamed, so instead, I passed to an open teammate, who hit the game-winning shot as time expired.
Afterward, the coach expressed his disappointment with my play, saying that he would be lowering my minutes and decreasing my role with the team. That night, media members and Twitter followers were asking me why I had missed the game-winning shot. Apparently, NBA 2K14 takes the cliché, "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" too literally.
To make matters worse, if you are pressing the X button to skip a cutaway camera shot and a dynamic goal suddenly appears on screen, there is no way to go back and view the assignment after you've accidentally "buttoned through it."
Virtual Currency
If you choose to ignore NBA 2K14 self-centered goal system in favor of playing strategically sound, team-orientated basketball, don't expect to earn many experience points.
Virtual currency, which is required to upgrade your player's attributes, special abilities and wardrobe, is incredibly hard to come by in NBA 2K14 without accomplishing any of the me-first goals.
Finish a game with 0 turnovers? You earn 25 VC.
Complete the social media challenge for outscoring -- AKA out-ball hogging -- Carmelo Anthony? You earn 250 VC.
Achieve an A+ teammate grade? You earn 15 VC.
Score 10 straight points all by yourself? You earn 150 VC.
As messed up at the VC earning rates are, the spending system is even more backwards.
Before I even began My Career, I created my own sneakers using NBA 2K14's awesome shoe designer feature. I initially had some trouble figuring out how to actually equip my custom shoes. Then I discovered that I couldn't even wear the shoes that I had made unless I spent 7,500 VC in the My Player store. For reference, I've played over 60 games in my first NBA season and have earned around 30,000 VC.
So almost a fourth of my "paycheck" for the year would have to be sacrificed just to wear a pair of sneakers that I created.
Obviously, no sane person is going to drop 7,500 VC for a cosmetic addition to their player when that same currency also has to be used to upgrade player attributes, unlock signature skills, buy personality badges, etc.
General Manager Moves and Coaching Decisions
It doesn't seem to matter what mode you play in NBA 2K14; there's simply no escaping the game's baffling general manager logic.
The Sacramento Kings should not be spending their lottery pick on my created point guard when the team's roster already includes Isaiah Thomas, Greivis Vasquez and Jimmer Fredette. I became even more dumbfounded when, a few games after their draft blunder, the Kings decided to trade for a fifth point guard, José Calderón. (Editor's note: OK, apparently the Kings like trading in real life, too.)
Coaching logic in NBA 2K14 suffers from just as many problems, as my player won Rookie of the Month multiple times and was leading the league in shooting percentage from day one, but he still had to wait the designated 30 to 40 games before finally "earning" a starting role over underperforming teammates.
NBA 2K14's coaches also have a bad habit of assigning players to unnatural positions. My 5'10" point guard has logged more minutes as a shooting guard than he has at his natural position, as my coach frequently matches me up against taller, stronger players like Kobe Bryant (6'6") and Dwyane Wade (6'4").
Do you enjoy NBA 2K14's My Career mode, or are the issues deterring you in another direction?
Instead, I have almost exclusively played the new-look My Career mode, where you create an avatar and guide him through the cliché ascent from unknown street baller to NBA champion.
While the premise itself is stale, the mode's presentation is fresh, plus its scope is larger than any previous sports gaming story mode. You'd have to go all the way back to Midway's retired NBA Ballers and Blitz: The League series to find a sports game that put anywhere near as much work into crafting storylines and choreographing cutscenes.
Turning NBA 2K14's career mode into a low-budget Hollywood movie may have turned off some hardcore gamers who only care about what happens on the court. But Visual Concepts' attempt to capture the emotional parts of basketball -- player rivalries, teammate tensions, coaching disputes -- may also help usher in a new audience to sports gaming. One that, potentially, could become much larger and more lucrative than the audience who is outraged that they cannot "press X to fast forward."
During the console transition of the mid-1990s, roleplaying games used movie-quality video scenes to help take an unaccessible genre with a nerdy reputation from the unknown obscurity of EarthBound to the blockbuster success of Final Fantasy VII. At a time when the number of yearly sports franchises is dwindling, and the sales of key franchises like Madden NFL are slipping, the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One could finally become the stage where sports games start acting more like big screen dramas and less like interactive spreadsheets.
My Career, though not without some significant flaws, represents the first significant step towards making sports video games mean something more than just a bunch of numbers.
Makes
Cutscenes and Storylines
Between each game, NBA 2K14 uses cinematic sequences to show your created superstar interacting with coaches, trainers, teammates, media members, agents, businessmen and rival players. The 300-page script contains many memorable moments, and while the voice acting can be corny at times, these off-the-court sequences help build an emotional investment in the mode.
When I had to sit down -- face-to-face -- with my general manager and ask him to trade me, I genuinely felt selfish and a little remorseful, as the boss and I had experienced some funny, friendly moments during many previous meetings.
When a hotshot super agent pulled me into his limousine and tried to lure me away from my long-time friend, I couldn't wait to tell the champagne-sipping, Rolex-wearing sleazeball to take his contract offer, shine it up real nice, turn it neatly on its side, and shove it straight up his candy ***.
Intriguing behind-the-scenes moments provide extra motivation to play through My Career's grinding 82-game schedule, as I've already experienced many crazy and unexpected circumstances just two-thirds of the way through my first season.
Signature Skills and Personality Traits
While NBA 2K14's create-a-player interface is lacking in visual customization, it atones for that fault by offering excellent gameplay personalization.
In addition to the standard 0-99 attribute ratings, your player can also equip up to 7 Signature Skills, which unlock unique animations and provide performance enhancements in specific game situations. A "Pick & Roll Maestro" will have a greater chance of hitting shots or completing passes when coming off a ball screen. An "Acrobat" will have little difficulty changing his shots in mid-air using NBA 2K's patented "shot stick." With 35 Signature Skills to select from, created players can now choose specializations that go beyond simply being a "good shooter." In NBA 2K14, "shooters" have to decide whether they want to excel off the catch, in traffic or from the corners.
As many as three Personality Badges can also be equipped to further define your player's on-court role. An "Alpha Dog" will elevate his game whenever teammates are struggling. "Primetime" players perform at their peak during the playoffs and against rival teams. These 22 Badges are yet another tool, alongside the insanely detailed player models and hundreds of player-specific animations, that helps Visual Concepts capture the unique personality and mannerisms of each individual athlete in the NBA.
Misses
Dynamic Goals
NBA 2K14's career mode actively encourages you to be a ball hog and a bad teammate. At least, that's what will happen if you choose to follow the game's poorly designed dynamic goals.
I once was subbed into a game with six seconds left, down by a single point, with my coach telling me to "hit the game-winning shot." After receiving the inbound pass, I was immediately double-teamed, so instead, I passed to an open teammate, who hit the game-winning shot as time expired.
Afterward, the coach expressed his disappointment with my play, saying that he would be lowering my minutes and decreasing my role with the team. That night, media members and Twitter followers were asking me why I had missed the game-winning shot. Apparently, NBA 2K14 takes the cliché, "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" too literally.
To make matters worse, if you are pressing the X button to skip a cutaway camera shot and a dynamic goal suddenly appears on screen, there is no way to go back and view the assignment after you've accidentally "buttoned through it."
Virtual Currency
If you choose to ignore NBA 2K14 self-centered goal system in favor of playing strategically sound, team-orientated basketball, don't expect to earn many experience points.
Virtual currency, which is required to upgrade your player's attributes, special abilities and wardrobe, is incredibly hard to come by in NBA 2K14 without accomplishing any of the me-first goals.
Finish a game with 0 turnovers? You earn 25 VC.
Complete the social media challenge for outscoring -- AKA out-ball hogging -- Carmelo Anthony? You earn 250 VC.
Achieve an A+ teammate grade? You earn 15 VC.
Score 10 straight points all by yourself? You earn 150 VC.
As messed up at the VC earning rates are, the spending system is even more backwards.
Before I even began My Career, I created my own sneakers using NBA 2K14's awesome shoe designer feature. I initially had some trouble figuring out how to actually equip my custom shoes. Then I discovered that I couldn't even wear the shoes that I had made unless I spent 7,500 VC in the My Player store. For reference, I've played over 60 games in my first NBA season and have earned around 30,000 VC.
So almost a fourth of my "paycheck" for the year would have to be sacrificed just to wear a pair of sneakers that I created.
Obviously, no sane person is going to drop 7,500 VC for a cosmetic addition to their player when that same currency also has to be used to upgrade player attributes, unlock signature skills, buy personality badges, etc.
General Manager Moves and Coaching Decisions
It doesn't seem to matter what mode you play in NBA 2K14; there's simply no escaping the game's baffling general manager logic.
The Sacramento Kings should not be spending their lottery pick on my created point guard when the team's roster already includes Isaiah Thomas, Greivis Vasquez and Jimmer Fredette. I became even more dumbfounded when, a few games after their draft blunder, the Kings decided to trade for a fifth point guard, José Calderón. (Editor's note: OK, apparently the Kings like trading in real life, too.)
Coaching logic in NBA 2K14 suffers from just as many problems, as my player won Rookie of the Month multiple times and was leading the league in shooting percentage from day one, but he still had to wait the designated 30 to 40 games before finally "earning" a starting role over underperforming teammates.
NBA 2K14's coaches also have a bad habit of assigning players to unnatural positions. My 5'10" point guard has logged more minutes as a shooting guard than he has at his natural position, as my coach frequently matches me up against taller, stronger players like Kobe Bryant (6'6") and Dwyane Wade (6'4").
Do you enjoy NBA 2K14's My Career mode, or are the issues deterring you in another direction?
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