Aaron's NBA 2k10 Impressions

[aholbert32]

I got a chance to watch and play NBA2k10 for an hour yesterday and I walked awayn thinking one thing: If you loved NBA2k9, you are going to love 2k10. If you liked NBA2k9 but had some issues with the game, you will probably love 2k10. If you are tired of 2k basketball and hoping for a change from 2k9, you wont be happy. The game plays like a much improved, better polished and better looking version of NBA2k9.

So because I was thirsty for information so I showed up 15 minutes early and bumrushed the preview session before me (Shoutout to Zo at Zoknowsgaming.com). They were playing a game between the Lakers and Cavs . The lighting at the Q looked great. The Q is one of the brighter arenas in the game and the NBA2k10 version looked just like that. A couple of things jumped out at me from watching the game. One, the crowd noise is much improved. The crowd is much more intelligent and they cheer and boo at the appropriate moments. It appears that 2k either redid or greatly improved the crowd noise because in the hour that I played the game I did not hear any issues with the crowd. More team chants and no annoyances like the random whistles we’ve heard in past years (That’s for you, Pared). This is one of the only places that I can compare 2k10 against the Live demo and in my opinion crowd noise and both games are well done.

Two, the TV style presentation has been improved in a few small ways. There are constant stat overlays. Individual stat overlays like how many points, rebounds and assists Lebron has in the game. Other individual stat overlays like what Lebron’s shooting percentage has been in each quarter. Team overlays like the Lakers FG% vs. Cleveland’s. As for the commentary, Its good news/bad news. The bad news is there are many lines from NBA 2k9 that are used in NBA2k10. Its unrealistic for me to think that they would redo all of the commentary from last year’s game but I was disappointed that about 60%-70 percent of the lines I heard were from last year’s game. The good news is that a lot of the commentary changes are tied to the NBA Today feature and since the season hasn’t started a lot of the new commentary hasn’t been activated.
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So it was my turn to play the game and I choose the hometown Wizards vs. the Blazers. I didn’t get the chance to play against the CPU so all of my impressions are based on head to head play. Lets start from the beginning. There is a new opening intro to each game. If you are playing with the Cavs or the Celtics, you will see Lebron’s chalk toss or KG getting pumped. If you are playing against the Blazers, its just like TV. You catch the tail end of the starting lineups announcement meaning that the arena is dark and the Blazers logo and team name are flashing over the court. There is a quick overlay of the starting lineups and then Kevin and Clark talk briefly and present the players to watch in the game.
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Gameplay wise, the first thing that jumped out at me was the player movement. One of my biggest frustrations with the 2k series the last few years has been that I felt like I had to do too much to initiate the offense. If I wanted to get my teammates to move I had to call a play, for a pick or have them run off a screen. If I didn’t they just stood there. That is not the case in 2k10. Players are constantly on the move in this game. There were a number of times where I brought the ball up with Arenas and without calling a play Haywood came up and set a pick. I had other plays where Jamison would set a pick on his own and pop out to the side corner for a 3.
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I watched over 30 Wizards games last year (I’m a bit of a masochist) and I feel comfortable in saying that without calling plays, the Wizards ran their offense like they did last year. Caron Butler didn’t just stand around. On his own, he will run off screens and actually post up occasionally. I’ve never seen a small forward post up in a 2k game without calling a play. I can confidently say that it appears that the tendencies work this year.
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Playcalling has changed but not as much as I would have liked to see. This year instead of only being able to call 8 plays per team, you can call 24. The way it works is you press right on the directional pad and it brings up the play calling screen. The screen has 6 categories one for general plays and five for plays featuring each position. So if I want to call a play for Jamison, I have to press right on the D pad, then RB to highlight the PF plays and then select the plays. I’m happy that they added mre plays but the interface was a little clunky and will take sometime to get used to. One other disappointment was from a quick glance there didn’t appear to be any new plays. Keep in mind, this is based on one game but I called probably about 10 plays during the game. While the plays have new names, all 10 appeared to be plays from previous versions of the game. Its possible out of the other 14 plays that I didn’t call that there are new plays but I didn’t see them.
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It’s safe to say that help defense and defense as a whole is implemented right in NBA2k10. No more stupid random double teams. No more players randomly leaving assignments. This year, the CPU teammates will react intelligently when helping. For example, I was guarding Brandon Roy with Mike Miller and Roy got by Miller with his first step. Miller was beat but not so badly that he couldn’t recover. Now in last year’s game, two things would happen. Either Haywood (My C) wouldn’t provide me with any help or he would run over too quickly and Roy would pass it to the open man for an easy dunk. This year, Haywood stayed with his man until it was clear that Miller was beat and then came over to help. Defenders do a lot more shading this year where its clear that they are guarding their man but they are guarding them loose enough so that they can help if needed.
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I love the new dribble controls. They are simplified and easy enough for an old man like me to play. In NBA2k10, there is no button for dribble moves. You don’t use the right stick. You just use the left stick for basic crossovers and combine the left trigger for more complicated dribble moves. What’s great is depending on the player’s ability, the basic dribble moves can be enough to blow past a player. For example, Arenas’s crossover was good enough to beat Steve Blake off the dribble continuously. I tried the same thing with Deshawn Stevenson and I didn’t get anywhere.
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Random Impressions: Overall player control is better but still similar to NBA2k9. I don’t know if this is an issue but on one play I had a mismatch with Arenas being guarding by LaMarcus Aldridge on the perimeter. In my opinion, I should have been able to blow past him using speed alone but he was able to stay with me all the way to the basket and forced me to take a bad shot. Halftime show is shorter with just the team stats and a Player of the Half. There are some additions to the end of game menu. G Moments are the two-three top plays of the game and Pressbox is a slideshow of photos from the game. I saw some clipping in my game on layup attempts but nothing too bad. Sub patterns appear to be right on. The Wizards went 10-11 deep and the Blazers went 10 deep. Love the small addition of players with their warmups on. If a player doesn’t get in the game he keeps his warmups on all game. Looked at My Player for a quick second. Not much to add that you haven’t seen. Saw the Summer League arena and it looked nice. Liked that you could watch the game or sim until the coach puts you in.

[alsolidus]

first

[Goffs]

thanks! off to read!

[tcnumba10]

Good read, did u get a chance to ask about the PC version of the game btw?

And was it harder to penetrate the lane and score inside so that it resulted to many more off the dribble shots or mid-range shots taken?

[SageInfinite]

Good news about the defense. Glad to hear the controls are more refined as well. Still will have to get my hands on the game myself but I'm definitely looking forward to that and seeing more footage. Still definitely need to know how the AI plays. Loved hearing how active players are on offense. Thanx Aaron

[aholbert32]

Quote: Originally Posted by tcnumba10

Good read, did u get a chance to ask about the PC version of the game btw?

No.

[The GIGGAS]

Nice read.

[alsolidus]

Please tell me they removed the suction from the ISO crossover that was to effective...