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MVP
OVR: 14
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Cleveland, OH
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Re: NBA 2K14 Wishlist Thread
I've been playing a lot of online quick matches recently, and I wanted to write in about some of the problems I'm seeing with the game online ( some of these issues apply to offline play as well...but they are especially noticeable online ).
I know it may be a bit late, but maybe there is still enough time to incorporate some of this into how online behaves. The main philosophy behind the game should be to reward good decision making and reward getting open shots, but as of now the game is not doing that enough. Overall there are too many bailouts for bad decision making, and too many hinderances to good decision making.
1. Great shooters make way too many shots. Some players can often shoot 75-80 percent on outside shots. Also, for superstar players shot success is not very reliant on getting quality/open shots. Good shooters are way overpowered to the point that contesting them doesn't do much. Durant is the worst. he is a casual gamer's dream. I think the new sigs skills are overpowering superstar players so that they can be abused way too easily for scoring. I don't care how great a player is in real life, in 2k basketball contesting his shots needs to result in misses. It's ridiculous that a person can shoot the same percentage just by forcing up shots with an overpowered shooter as they can by taking their time to actually get open shots.
When it comes to rewarding good shot selection, 2k11 got it right. Sure 2k11 had it's exploits, but 2k11 really shined with its shot success formula. In 2k11 there was a clear, predictable formula for what determined shot success: The more open you were, the better chance you had of making the shot. The more open shots you got, the higher percentage you shot. Regular jump shots were regarded as much better than turn-arounds and fade-aways. If you tried too many turn-arounds or spin shots, you would miss most of them. If you took contested jumpers or contact layups you would shoot horribly and miss almost everything. It didn't matter if you were taking shots with a superstar like Durant, or just a regular solid shooter...this was a clear, logical formula, and it behaved consistently.
But now, in 2k13, there is too much randomness to the shot success. The game still somewhat rewards good shots, BUT IT DOESN'T PUNISH BAD SHOTS ENOUGH. If you use a superstar shooter, jacking up garbage jump shots will often result in made shots, and forcing up contact layups often results in bailout free throws or and1's. In 2k11, you would've shot 10-20 percent by taking those shots...but in 2k13 you can shoot 38-40 percent by taking those same bad shots with superstars. I understand that 2k is trying to make the game "accessible" to casual gamers, but if you want to discourage bad decision making, you need to be willing to have shooting percentages in the 10-20 percent range. I also understand that 2k is trying to differentiate the "superstars" of the league by adding sig skills and allowing these superstar players to shoot crazy percentages. I get that this happens in real life...but it just shouldn't happen in a video game. A video game is between 2 people with controllers...the game should be about rewarding who gets the best shots, it shouldn't allow someone to avoid decision making by just forcing up shots all game with superstars. By incorporating the overpowered scoring abilities of these star players, 2k has somewhat removed decision making and shot selection from the equation.
2. Too many bailouts in the paint. There are occasional bailout foul calls inside that were not fouls, but just good defensive positioning. There are also not enough deflections when driving inside. When people drive inside, they often dribble the ball THROUGH another player's body when trying to do spins or other dribble moves...and of course the ball never gets deflected off said player - LIVE BALL PHYSICS AT ALL TIMES PLEASE. I don't want live ball some of the time, I want it ALL OF THE TIME. Force people to deal with the consequences of their sloppy play.
3. The inside pass cheese. This is that crap where somebody can drive inside and make short passes to big men right over a group of defenders without it getting tipped. There will be 4 players all in a cluster (the two PG's and the two big men)...and somehow the PG just dishes a short pass through or over the crowd right to the big man...the 2 defenders just stand there and let him throw this weak pass right by them or over them. These ARE BAD PASSES. People should not be rewarded for these passes by getting the ball under the hoop for layups. These short interior passes in a cluster of players should always be deflected by one of the defenders who is standing right there.
4. Too many slow catch animations and bobbled catch animations when making good passes. The game doesn't reward making good passes enough, because you often end up with a slow catch or a bobbled catch for no apparent reason. It's like the game is trying to give the defenders time to recover and contest you by forcing these crappy catch animations. 2k, please don't randomly give me these lame catch animations when all i did was make a good pass. These catch animations discourage good ball movement and passing to the open man. I'm fine with bad catch animations when you make bad passes...but don't give me a crappy catch animation when all i did was attempt a simple pass to an open teammate. Then there are the annoying "overthrown" passes in transition where the pass just sails WAY over the receiver's head for no reason. It often happens on relatively short passes to receivers who are wide open...it's like the game just wants to give you a turnover just for the heck of it. Sure, 2k11's passing might have been a little too accurate, but i'd rather have it too accurate than randomly sloppy...good catch animations reward utilization of ball movement and court vision.
5. Too many offensive rebounds. Stop having the CPU defenders just fail to box out. Offensive rebounds are a bailout for bad shots. UNLESS the user screws up by timing their jump wrong or failing to box out, a missed shot should almost always result in the defense getting the defensive board. I get that this might be a bit scripted, but it has to be that way if you want to punish bad shot selection...having too many offensive rebounds basically turns bad shots into assists...instead of being punished for their bad shot, the person is rewarded with an easy layup after the offensive board
6. Your CPU teammates don't defend well or contest well. I play on-ball defense as much as possible, but when i do play off-ball, it would be nice if I could trust my teammates to contest shots better. A lot of the time they just stand there and give the player an uncontested jumper. I get that 2k is trying to encourage playing on-ball defense by making it easier to score on CPU defenders...but this is only adding to the ease with which people can score 1-on-1.
7. Your CPU teammates don't move to open areas when their man leaves them open. If you're driving with your PG and you draw in two defenders, your teammate who is left open often drifts off behind another defender and is no longer open. This discourages ball movement and court vision. If you are able to draw mulitple defenders with the ball handler, a teammate should be open somewhere, but they're often not because they run to the worst possible spot where you can't pass to them (behind other defenders or into a crowd). Examples: you drive into the paint, a second defender runs over to help, leaving your SG wide open on the perimeter...but instead of staying put and waiting for the pass, your SG inexplicably runs into the paint just as you pass to him - either the ball gets tipped because he ruined the passing angle, or he ends up in a crowd with no open shot. Another example: in a similar situation, the SG might drift off to another area of the perimeter and moves behind a defender so that the passing angle is no longer there...whereas if he had just stayed put, he would've been open.
Here's how 2k should address online play: When you go to do a quick match online, the user should have to choose if they want a "sim quick match", or a "casual quick match." By "sim" I mean a mode that rewards good shot selection and punishes bad shot selection. Wins in sim quick matches could be worth twice as much as wins in casual quick matches...then the rankings would reward the people who choose to play sim more than those who play casual quick matches. Or another option would be to simply have separate leader boards for casual and sim games. Either of these options would allow casual players to still play casual ball, but at the end of the day 2k would be sending a message that sim play is preferred and more respected.
Last edited by blues rocker; 07-31-2013 at 10:23 AM.
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07-28-2013, 01:46 AM
