NBA 2K18 Gameplay Blog

[trekfan]

SO many things to break down. The highlights as I saw them.

Quote:

To put it simply, movement is no longer driven by animations in NBA 2K18. Now, the stick input and a player’s attributes are the sole components driving how your character moves around the court. This gave us the ability to control exactly how quickly a given player can accelerate, decelerate, cut, and turn, as well as his speeds for different states (walking, running, shuffling, sprinting, etc.) simply based on his attributes. The new motion engine then takes this data and dynamically finds and stitches together the animations it needs, in real time, to animate the character. Nothing is canned, nothing pre-determined, everything is done on the fly. The results are night and day and something you’ll notice as soon as you pick up the sticks this year. Movement with and without the ball is way more consistent and predictable, which impacts the play on the court in just about every facet on both offense and defense. We’ve even implemented new movement sliders, so you guys can customize acceleration and speed of the ball handler or offball players if you prefer a quicker or slower paced game.

New movement system? Very nice. That's a change that should improve the game from the ground up, from a fundamental level.

Quote:

Now more than ever, it’s important to take high percentage shots with the right types of players, while also mastering your player’s release. We removed shot aiming, implemented a new shot meter positioned vertically near your player’s upper body to improve visibility, and added improved Shot Feedback information that shows your release timing and the coverage of your shot (Smothered, Heavily Contested, Lightly Contested, Open, Wide Open.) Green releases are still in the game but aren’t solely based on release timing. Without going into detail on how everything works under the hood, I’ll just say that the design for Excellent Releases is much smarter than before and can say with confidence that “Green hunting” won’t be a problem this year… something our focus groups and playtests have confirmed.

Oh, we'll see about this. I love that they say how badly 2K17 suffered from the constant tweaks to the shooting -- the confidence here is good, should (hopefully) severely decrease the amount of tweaking and patches we get to the shooting side of things in game, assuming the devs don't cave to the twitter pressure that's inevitably going to come.

Quote:

This year when you hold Sprint and move the Pro Stick in the same direction of your movement when driving laterally, you’ll get these really nice (and explosive) hop jumpers. Holding in the opposite direction of your drive will trigger these cool snatchback jumpers.

Better jumpers that don't take forever to pull off? I'm on board.

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It’s never been more fun to be a post scorer in a basketball game and I’m excited to see the highlights that you guys pull off as you learn the ins and outs of the new systems. There’s so much you can do, it’s crazy.

Please be true. Playing a post-scorer last year was difficult. If I can do some bully offense, without constantly abusing the AI on pick and rolls, that'd be great.

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The logic for ball vulnerability is much better this year, rewarding you for reaching at the right times while punishing you with reaching fouls when you don’t. For blocks, we have a new limb collision system. Now a dunker going up with one hand is much more vulnerable to getting blocked than a stronger dunker going up with two. You’ll also notice that we significantly reduced the number of multi-actor layups in NBA 2K18 and that was intentional. It felt a bit in past games that you could get really good shot defense just by being there and getting pulled into a contact shot. This year, we wanted to make playing defense as a rim protector much more engaging so the onus is now on the gamer to recognize guys attacking the rim and timing their shot blocks accordingly. We made significant changes to how we call fouls too, so if you’re in good position when attempting a shot block and you have a good shot blocker, you’ll have a much lower chance at being called for a shooting foul. But on the other hand, if you’re in bad position (trailing the play) or have a bad shot blocking rating, expect to see a lot of fouls.

This is SO good to hear.

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The AI team has been hard at work this year cooking up some goodies for you hoops heads. So stay tuned, Da Czar and OG will have a blog breaking down all the X’s and O’s for Simnation soon.

^Biggest piece of news. No muzzles for Da Czar or OG. The AI will determine whether the gameplay advancements in the blog really come to fruition. If the game feels responsive, plays well, and doesn't have braindead AI, we might have something.

[isdatyt]

This is why I say I'm in an abusive relationship with this game. Every time I'm ready to pack my **** and give up on it they flip the script and remind me of the good times.

I was so geeked for that trailer this morning that I scheduled my work break around it, and it was super uneventful and I was let down. By the time my lunch was scheduled, we had this beautiful passage that insists the game has fixed nearly everything I've hoped for. I wish there was visual to accompany this and show that this isn't just empty promises, or that there was some way to guarantee they wouldn't cave to the 14 year old kids who want to play the game like an And 1 mixtape tour, but I still couldn't help but be childishly giddy while reading these improvements.

If everything they wrote is true, this may be my favorite game ever, but we won't know until Sept 8th at the earliest, and we won't even be sure if it stays true until around next May at the latest.

I'm still optimistic though, and I'm steadily counting the days down to that prelude. Hopefully we get some real gameplay footage & breakdown videos in the meantime.

[VDusen04]

Did the layup packages mentioned mean there's going to be no individual signature packages this year? I always thought we'd be so deep into the signature movement game by now but it seems like we're always taking steps in different directions. I'm looking for more specific individual player dribble packages, specific dunks, specific layups, specific celebrations.

Then again, if I think about it, maybe I could just call those packages by their player examples and make myself feel better about it (Kyrie package, Wade package, etc). And actually, I'm pretty happy to see a Giannis type of layup package there. I've been hoping for something like that (and a dunk package for his type as well).

Either way, here's hoping there's specific animations for a lot of the players who deserve them. I need my Tim Hardaway killer-cross to be markedly different from Allen Iverson's cradle.

Quote:

Many people complained about “stonewalling” defenders that were able to clamp down ball handlers regardless of their ratings and, somewhat unrealistically, stifle the dribble drive game. The interactions and logic for ball handler/on-ball defender collisions were reworked and it feels MUCH better. In NBA 2K18, if the ball handler can get a step on his man or is a Westbrook or LeBron coming downhill prepare to see a blow-by for a clear drive to the hoop. It feels really good now to get your defender leaning one way, attacking his drag foot, and seeing your ball handler quickly swim by the defender without getting snatched into a heavy bump animation. Sure the Kawhi Leonards of the league can still clamp down slower ball handlers, but for the most part, you’ll see a lot of “hip riding” this year compared to the knockbacks and dribbler stuns from the past.

Seeing is believing (as in, we'll have to see for ourselves how much has changed when we see the game in action), but I'm encouraged to read an acknowledgement and hopeful solution to a gameplay featured that drove me away from 2K17 pretty quickly.

[JustCallMeSleepy]

Quote: Originally Posted by Mrcabone

I have a feeling that "tank" package will be pretty popular

Lol no, the kids in the community is gonna love screaming JELLYYYYYYY!!!!!, as that's the trend right now.

[MoodMuzik]

Absolutely stoked.

Now just don't make my AI teammates play like **** lol.

[Dyslexicphish]

This all sounds great but it's something I really need to see in action (hint hint )

[MackZillaTV]

Quote: Originally Posted by Mrcabone

I have a feeling that "tank" package will be pretty popular

Nah, everyone will use Jelly layups, it's been popular for the past 2 years now, especially here in NY

[33JAF]

My two biggest problems with 2k17 were movement (always felt like I was fighting the game to do what I wanted, too much suction/magnetism/stuck in animations), and the help and transition defense. Seems the movement has been adressed. Can't wait to read OG's blog. Thanks for this, Mike.

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