It doesn’t matter how much you love FIFA or its tortured artist cousin eFootball; it just can’t compare to the real thing in terms of how realistic it looks. NBA 2K23 is different. Visual Concepts’ all-conquering, 2k mt-hoovering series doesn’t just look like you’ve accidentally switched to an NBA League Pass stream. This may be due to the fact that the series utilizes a 5v5 format and the fact that basketball is a sport that inherently seems to lend itself to closer simulation. It has an uncanny ebb and flows to the proceedings, which gives the impression that it plays just like the real thing.
Wang tells us that Visual Concepts has lowered the rookie difficulty level to the point where children who have very little to no prior knowledge of basketball can play the game and still be competitive while he is walking us through the most prominent gameplay features of 2K23. The difficulty curve has been smoothed out for anyone who is working their way up through the levels over time by adding a new difficulty level called semi-pro that slots in between the rookie and pro levels.
This is an important piece of housekeeping for any developer of sports video games who intends to roll out new releases on an annual basis. The emphasis is unavoidably going to be placed on making everything better, in some nebulous sense, by expanding on whatever was there before. As a result, it is prudent to conduct a fundamental review to ascertain whether or not the foundations continue to be accessible to newcomers.
According to Wang, the developers of 2K basketball have never really deviated from one simple fact: that it is possible to play the game by knowing only two buttons. This has remained the same for the entirety of my tenure at the company, which spans a significant amount of time.
If you show someone the left stick and the shoot button, they can pretty much understand how the game works. Regardless of how impressive the newly mo-capped Euro Hop or iso dribble might be, it seems important to maintain that simpler style. The only way to get by a defender is to perform six sizes, two stutter steps, and then throw a pass without looking at it, so we shouldn’t look for depth in the controls out of necessity but out of pure curiosity instead.
However, the rest of us aren’t going to get excited about a new release because the gameplay will be easier and there will be a new difficulty mode, so the more exciting news comes from the steps that Visual Concepts are taking toward greater authenticity.
On the surface, there are some nuances to it. As if it were a reworked version of the shot feedback indicator, this one only tells you how accurate your shot timing was after the ball has either gone through the hoop or been missed. In the past, as soon as you saw the green indicator, you knew that the shot was going to be successful, and you did not need to worry about rebounding or boxing out the opponent. Now the suspense is back in full force because nobody knows whether the buzzer beater will go in or not until it actually does go in or not. Wang argues that this is how NBA 2K23 Best Builds ought to be.
The gameplay of Team Takeover has recently undergone some significant changes, shifting away from its previous arcade-style mechanic and toward something that is more grounded in reality. It used to be that when one individual player was having a particularly good game, the rest of the team would get a boost as a result. However, as any of Carmelo Anthony’s teammates from his time with the Knicks will tell you, sitting on the bench and watching a teammate score 40 points does not necessarily get you razzed or make you play better. Now, in order for the team to get hot and receive the buff, everyone on the team needs to work together and perform certain actions.
In the interest of improving the game’s overall realism, the jump shot animations have come under increased scrutiny. Since quite some time ago, you have been at liberty to choose and use whichever signature jumper you prefer, regardless of how this may or may not impact the effectiveness of the jumper. It did not make a difference even if the animation had a slower release than most others as long as the timing was accurate.
Each and every jumper animation now has a set of values associated with it, which pretty much dictates the attributes that it possesses. One of these is defensive immunity, which places a value on how easily the shot can be popped off with a man in your face. An example of defensive immunity is Luka Doncic’s technique, which is slow but bizarrely unstoppable. In addition, the point of release and the degree to which the shot is dependent on accurate timing are analyzed. In a nutshell, the jumper animation that you select in 2K23 is important. (The hive mind will invariably discover the one jump shot that is superior to all others, and everyone will start using it. It will be interesting to see how Visual Concepts responds when this occurs.)
Moving on to badgesUnlocking badges by accomplishing particular tasks a predetermined number of times has been the most effective method for making your MyPlayer build overpowered ever since the introduction of attribute caps. Attribute caps prevent you from reaching a 99 OVR by having 99s in each of basketball’s myriad of individual offensive and defensive specializations. If you equip them and then upgrade them to purple by performing that action an additional number of times, you will receive massive, albeit highly specialized, attribute bonuses.