NBA 2K14 VC Shows Its Ugly Side

[poloelite]

Quote: Originally Posted by LorenzoDC

I play 12 minute quarters. So your solution to me is to play half a season to rack up about 36,000 VC points to spend (win some lose some, average 900 VC points per game). That's 40 hours of in game gameplay, plus maybe 30% additional time to manage the mode in the main screen and sub menus. So, call it 52 hours. 52 hours for 36,000 VC. That's not fun gameplay, that's game grinding to be able to have the mode just function. Why is that? Because if I don't pay stuff to keep the morale of role players up, their morale tanks and I win fewer games (fun!). Or my coach may quit because I didn't buy a weight room (MOAR FUN!). Etc. Meanwhile, embedded in every screen is a link for me to pay an extra $10 to buy 35,000 VC points. So, for an additional $10 I can free myself of the need to grind 52 hours of games (19 cents/hour), and instead, I can play the games that interest me, the ones I want to play, and take more time engaging the pure franchise management portion of the game. Maybe I can even have time to use the practice mode. Now I can have fun! Once you start grinding games because you feel like you have to just to make the franchise management mode playable, it's stops being "play" and it becomes "work." It's like the feeling of trying to get out from under a debt. That's not entertainment, and they are selling an entertainment product. There's a reason open world games are so popular: they maximize player choice. Do what you want, when you want. Explore! There are no negative gameplay repercussions for doing this, except maybe getting killed and resurrected. Because you do whatever you feel like at any moment, it's fun. It's not the role playing or story line alone that's fun, it's the freedom to roam, to choose, to explore, depending on your mood. NBA 2k14 NG has taken choice away from the gamer. Customization is severely curtailed. Events in MyPlayer are more scripted and linear. Stories in general can be fun when done right, but even Mass Effect allowed for a lot of optional open world exploring, and choice about what mission to do when, until the end game sequence. The implementation of VC in this game is, aside from everything else, just really bad game design. It's a pay to win game that forces people to play the game in a very narrowly defined way. So you get less fun, unless you give in and pay more than you thought you would when you paid your $60. At that point it's less fun because you're probably pissed off and resentful. Not everyone will feel that way, but a lot will, including casual gamers. Would it affect half the game's buyers? Wouldn't surprise me in the least. Will that affect future sales? What do you think? Keep in mind the people playing now are the ones who could afford to buy a NG box at release. Later on, less wealthy gamers will be getting their hands on it, and they will be more pissed. To escape grinding completely for a 12 minute quarter player, it would cost you a lot more than $10. I haven't tallied it up, but my wild guess is it could take at least 100,000 VC points to max out your MyGM without ever touching the other big bucket of VC store items under the Facilities and Game Pricing menus. That's easily another 75,000 VC points, off the top of my head. Two 80,000 (total 160,000) VC packs would cost you an additional $40. With all that, why would anyone buy a virtual suit and clothes for their MyGM? To earn 160,000 VC a 12 minute quarter player would have to play about 230 hours! C'mon, man. Be serious. I can't believe some developer(s) at 2k didn't look at this when they were writing this code and say to themselves, man, this s**t is f****d up. PS - I didn't even add in hours you lose because your game was booted from the 2k servers in the third quarter. There goes 45 minutes of your time! No VC for you! Grind again! Have a nice day!

My dude your write up was insightful and I hear your gripes, but I think the point is to not max out your GM. Most GMs aren't maxed out and they have specific strong suits. I can't tell you what's entertaining to you or not, but myGM has been pretty entertaining to me besides the injury glitch. I wouldn't play the mode thinking somehow I should have a maxed out GM in the middle of year 1. That should take years to achieve. Because of what I'm reading here, do I think they need to balance the game better going forward? Yes!! But I just don't think VC is a terrible idea all the way around. I think there is a way to better balance it so both sides can be happy.

[poloelite]

Man I hear everybody's gripes, I really do, but I can't say I feel them 100%. People who play myGM and actually play the game, will make enough VC to build a respectable GM. People who play myCareer will do the same. I do agree the price of packs in myTeam are ridiculous, but it seems the Domination mode will give you specific team packs that could yield Gold Players.

The wack side I'm noticing is 2K is making it so you have to build from being a scrub to the top and if you want to bypass that, then you have to buy VC. This sucks for online gamers because you will build regularly and some other guy may buy VC, I get that. But to the guys who want to play the game and mainly the offline portions (myGM and myCareer) how is VC stopping that? What if they called it XP, eliminated the price tag but had the same progression levels?

To me it seems like the best of both worlds because you can act as if VC doesn't exist (call it XP), play the game (which is why we bought it) and unlock things as you go along. Or, you can buy VC and play the game that you want to play it. The only thing that has seem to change to me is you can't max out your myPlayer or myGM in year 1 and dominate the league, which is realistic. I think this debate needs to go on and better balancing is needed, but the option to pay more and play the game the way you want to instead of how the developer wants you to, is a great option.

[poloelite]

*seemed to change*

[da ThRONe]

Quote: Originally Posted by poloelite

Man I hear everybody's gripes, I really do, but I can't say I feel them 100%. People who play myGM and actually play the game, will make enough VC to build a respectable GM. People who play myCareer will do the same. I do agree the price of packs in myTeam are ridiculous, but it seems the Domination mode will give you specific team packs that could yield Gold Players. The wack side I'm noticing is 2K is making it so you have to build from being a scrub to the top and if you want to bypass that, then you have to buy VC. This sucks for online gamers because you will build regularly and some other guy may buy VC, I get that. But to the guys who want to play the game and mainly the offline portions (myGM and myCareer) how is VC stopping that? What if they called it XP, eliminated the price tag but had the same progression levels? To me it seems like the best of both worlds because you can act as if VC doesn't exist (call it XP), play the game (which is why we bought it) and unlock things as you go along. Or, you can buy VC and play the game that you want to play it. The only thing that has seem to change to me is you can't max out your myPlayer or myGM in year 1 and dominate the league, which is realistic. I think this debate needs to go on and better balancing is needed, but the option to pay more and play the game the way you want to instead of how the developer wants you to, is a great option.

What sucks the most is 2K won't move to a more natural form of progression in any of their modes now in order to promote VC. The fact that we even have skill points/VC going into next gen now is a clear example of a lack of realistic growth with the game and these modes more specifically.

I have no problems with them providing short cuts for people. However basing a mode around VC is completely wrong. If you want to sell me something sell me a combine, summer league, and training camp I'll pay extra for those.

[spacedog]

Quote: Originally Posted by KayOtic723

people would have real problems if they gave you everything free and charged $120 for the game

That's because the content already on the disc isn't worth an extra $60 on top of the $60 price tag smh I don't know where you're getting this whole concept of wanting free stuff. Nobody's asking for free stuff. Some might and that's their problem. Anyway, some people may want to buy VC to help boost their players when they have little free time and that's ok, players should be able to do that. But 2k tries to force that on everyone by making it so that the grind to unlock things is so excessive that it wouldn't be worth the time, leaving the purchase of VC as the most viable option. That's how the free to play model works, even though this game isn't free.

Personally I actually often enjoy when DLC comes out, micro transactions, etc. when they add new content. I'll pay for extra content easily if I want it, because people put work into extra content and I try to pay it back buy giving them the money due. Can't say the same about 2k. Lots of the things you pay VC for aren't extra content whatsoever. Again, they're trending toward the free to play model without a free to play game.

And lastly, your other post seems like you think people who don't have time to play all day are lazy or something (saying they want free stuff when you're wrong). Think about what you're suggesting. This is a video game. People that don't have all day probably do things like, you know, go to school, or work. And yet they're the ones who want free stuff? lol Ok so grinding in a video game and being able to buy a headband is real work nowadays apparently.

[Sundown]

Quote: Originally Posted by poloelite

I think this debate needs to go on and better balancing is needed, but the option to pay more and play the game the way you want to instead of how the developer wants you to, is a great option.

This has really been what the debate has been all along (by more reasonable folks anyway).

But the rewards have been tweaked and the costs have been raised so people feel like you can no longer "play how you want" without paying additional money. Instead, they feel like the developer wants you to grind or pay up. And if you actually want to progress at a reasonable rate in more than one mode, again, grind or pay up.

This wasn't how 2K played before and people don't enjoy that change. It feels as if 2K has been actively unbalancing the game, and it's easy to suspect what the motivation behind it might be. That's why the complaints have gone from "VC is okay, we just need some balancing" to "VC is terrible, because its inclusion into all modes singlehandedly DRIVES the unbalancing."

[ahuffman]

The bigger problem for me is the side effects of VC. Not being able to play modes like MyGM offline is such bs and clearly due to the VC. I also wonder how much dev time was wasted on this that could have gone for more important things.

[kadzier]

Some people don't seem to get it. Having a sense of progression is good, and giving players the option to bypass that progression by paying can be good. So the concept of VC itself isn't inherently bad.

What is inherently bad is messing up the delicate balance of that progression to encourage the spending of VC. This is exactly what has happened with 2k14. Players have to restrict themselves to one mode, and grind out multiple games for rewards that are totally disproportionate to the effort. Either that or they play the game for 8 hours every day or say "screw it" and spend money. None of those choices are desirable for me.

I'm okay with super rare or special stuff maybe taking weeks or months of normal playing time to acquire, like a unique pair of shoes or something. It's not okay when it's things like basic arm sleeve accessories or the ability to perform basic functions essential to the game (changing your rotations, training players, etc).