NBA 2K17 Gameplay Blog with Gameplay Director, Mike Wang

[LorenzoDC]

Mike, I just want to shout out to you and the dev team for how you collectively have observed and analyzed your own game, identified areas to improve, and (more than likely) executed on those targeted areas for improvement.

That's a very substantial undertaking. Seriously, it gets short shrift among your buyers and most people here. But what's really standing out to me, as I absorb all this and your answers to questions, is the level of clear eyed review you all did about the places where game play was weaker and could improve.

OS'ers offer a fair amount of analysis on those lines, some better than others, but you guys have taken all that and your own assessments to identify areas in a short cycle where you could make real changes - physicality, animations and post play, defensive movement on ball and off, and so on -and translated it into technical projects you can focus on and complete.

Nevermind all the project management and testing and coding and frustration that comes out of all that, which is itself huge. I'm just really appreciative of the genuine effort and intelligence that goes into really trying to make the game better as a basketball game.

Yes there may be areas where you don't execute as well as you hoped, and yes there are choices to make about developmental resources that leave some players disappointed. That's a given. But other game teams don't engage the hard core fans the way you do to help you target areas to improve and enhance design.

So thank you. I wanted to call that out.

[eko718]

Mike, question about dribbling. Some of the community day guys have mentioned that defensive players were falling way too frequently. Is this already being addressed? I can see that become old pretty quick and taking the joy away from actually breaking ankles skillfully.

[KoolAidNoSugar]

Will 6'11 bigs be able to compete with 7'3 bigs in rebounding battles? On 2K16 smaller bigs just gets rebounds taken over their head by these 7'3 monsters.

Will the difference in Veritcal & Lateral Quickness actually be noticeable? As that's what 7'3 bigs get penalized for the most.

People tend to go towards 2 7'3 C and it clogs the court in ProAm/Walk on. If the undersized bigs could compete that would grant more spacing on the court.


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[Beluba]

Quote: Originally Posted by Kstat

To piggy back on that, if a ballhandler stops in the lane and a defender runs into him from behind, is that going to start being called? That's the go to tactic for a lot of point guards past and present.

We did add fouls for defenders ramming into a stationary ball handler. But they've been tuned back quite a bit because they would often fire off in cases where people were just trying to get back into position. They're in there though.

[Sundown]

Quote: Originally Posted by Beluba

Great post, Sundown. I actually started off the dev cycle how you just suggested. More frequent greens, high-ish success rate, but lots of misses. People, at least the handful that tested it, didn't like it at all. I can actually make that change right now and you'll get it when you play Prelude next week... but my guess is that it won't go over well.

Do it. You know you want to. >8)

I can definitely see folks not liking it, if at first-- it would take a while to undo the expectations set by a couple of years of programming. If there's a chance of them accepting it, there would still probably be a pretty big adjustment period.

Quote:

I think greens are rare enough that it doesn't spoil the drama, so I don't really think that's too much of an issue. Maybe I can kill them off completely next year or tune them to be super rare this year and let them slowly die off. Still debating that one.

With their rarity, they probably won't spoil things too much, but I'd prefer to be unsure of every shot's success until it goes through the net. That matches more closely to how I experience basketball and there could the rare game where a big shot in the clutch shows up green. I'm probably kind of weird this way but when that happens it's a bit anticlimactic for me.

Or you can just kill them slowly. With fire.

[HPShizzle]

Hey Mike, awesome post but I have a question: I plan on making a Sharpshooter PF and running the stretch 4 spot similar to a Dirk Nowitzki in ProAM but i'm worried about how I will do against other teams who will likely run two Glass Cleaner C's who have better rebounding and vertical stats. My question is how will user skill affect the battle for boxout positions and cleanly grabbing rebounds? And to add on to that, how will height effect that same battle? It felt like there was no reason not to use a 7'3 big in 2K16

[harryl]

Quote: Originally Posted by Beluba

I think greens are rare enough that it doesn't spoil the drama, so I don't really think that's too much of an issue. Maybe I can kill them off completely next year or tune them to be super rare this year and let them slowly die off. Still debating that one.

Personally, I think it makes the most sense to make them 100%, but to make them extremely rare. If they're not going to be 100%, then they shouldn't be a totally different color/animation.

Quote: Originally Posted by Beluba

Defensive Assist is back to being a slider, the pressure sensitive thing didn't work out the way we wanted.

Really? I ended up playing with it at 5 or 10 because, it "felt" necessary to have it on slightly to keep correct orientation, but dialed way down to provide more precise control. And I tried to be as conscious as possible about varying pressure on L2 for when I was digging in, versus trying to move rapidly and laterally.

So now how can we control the balance between digging in/lateral quickness? Or is this somehow made a moot issue due to the new collision/body-up dynamics?

And what if we want to just simply break out of a defensive posture and run as normal? Do we have to shuffle until we get to some pre-set distance, and then we break into the "normal," non-defensive movement animation?

[Beluba]

Quote: Originally Posted by K_Dub

Appreciate all the work you guys put in for NBA 2K17, Mike. Quick question for you: how does the shot stick timing affect step back jumpers this year? I'm assuming they're still triggered by the shot stick as well as the button + left stick combo. Also, will step back jumpers be more effective this year, specifically for the guys that use them often in real life? A lot of the animations seemed too slow to me to effectively create space for a good shot in 2K16.

Stepback Js are off the Shot Stick this year. You tap the Shot button to get them now. Timing works the same way though, after the stepback finishes and the player starts to gather, the meter starts to fill.

They're pretty effective this year with the right guys. Pullups, spin jumpers, and stepbacks all got a decent boost for the guys that can actually do them IRL.