NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Off-Ball, AI, Badges, Takeover & Much More

[illwill10]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

Looks like they shortened the players to make the courts bigger. If you were to stand a crowd member next to a player they would be the same height.
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I was just going to say something about this. Looking at 2k14, the courts looked bigger. It does look like they shrunk players to make the court look bigger. Hopefully it helps with spacing. If not, hopefully with next gen, they get a balance between court and player size

[Baebae32]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

1. Paint defense. Hopefully, the new animations will make it harder to score inside vs. a crowded paint. However, the main problem I had with paint scoring was how easy the ball could be passed to a guarded player in the paint. I hope we have more errant passes when forcing paint passes.

2. Bigs guarding smalls beyond the 3 point line. With the new switch mechanic its a must that Boban can't guard Kyrie beyond the 3 point line. That should be a 2k18 blowby animation.

3. Fouls at the 3 point line. It was a huge issue in the NBA. Its one of the reasons you cant guard James Harden. Hopefully, that is in 2k20.

4. My personal belief after hours of playing the cpu is that every open shot by HOF cpu was a perfect release. So any change to that is welcome.

5. It sounds like 2K did a ton of work as opposed to just focusing on Next gen 2k21. I applaud them for that. Looking forward to playing the game.

6. I love the new layup branching. Being able to pull floaters out of gathers is big.

7. Creating a favorite 8 plays. Great addition.

Yes. Paint defense is something that needed drastic improvement. Too many times in the past offensice players can just wiggle around you to the point where you cant even contest the lay up because your defender and other would be help defenders are forced to face the opposite baseline. Hopefully this rectified with much needed contextual animations. If the player scores on me despite my “wall up contest” the fine. But i cant stand giving up easy buckets just because my center cannot pivot to face the offensive player

And you are passing into the paint is on the easy side of things. On ball pressure in not taken into accouny when passing on 2k. You just pass right over the guy no matter how tall the defender is. Once this is addressed the smart players who know how to work the court to create passing angles will be rewarded. Czar responded to one of my tweets a few months back that the passing system is something that is difficult to get right but we will see what changes have been made for this year.


Closing remarks:
Please stop making all defenders face the opposite baseline if the are not involved in the play. They should be crashing in to help on drives/anticipate rebounds unless they are guarding elite shooters/set to deny ball

[simbayless]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

I have no problem with them copping Live but I scratch my head why don't they copy Live 10 crowd audio realistic atmosphere you know Mike was the one that introduce.I guess we have to wait to the new consoles next year��*♀️

[illwill10]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

I wonder what badges they added to the game. I see Mike on twitter answering questions. My theory is they added more badges to reflect a lot more aspects of the basketball plus park badges.

My hope is that they aren't trying to overshadow ratings with adding more badges. I feel that with some aspects of the game, the rating should suffice. I always felt that the badges were more powerful than ratings. I don't think every aspect of game should be reflected in a badge. It should be specific instances. Like there shouldn't be a badge for Free Throw(even though it is just for MyCareer). Mike just said it was gone, so good

[Tunechid]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

I was just going to say something about this. Looking at 2k14, the courts looked bigger. It does look like they shrunk players to make the court look bigger. Hopefully it helps with spacing. If not, hopefully with next gen, they get a balance between court and player size

They didn’t shrink the players 2k19 vs 2k20 comparisons

Spoiler

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[Junior Moe]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

Looks like they shortened the players to make the courts bigger. If you were to stand a crowd member next to a player they would be the same height.

Sounds like Mario running is gone? Yes, that's my takeaway from this blog. Nothing really wowed me. The word balance was used for badges and with 80 badges I'm wondering is if its mostly offensive badges. So I'm not really seeing the balance there.

Guess I get the feel for this on the 21st.

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I still cant tell but I really hope that's the case. Spacing felt so much better last gen. Smaller models along with the new motion tweaks could open the game up immensely.

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[Caelumfang]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

I like this change A-lot actually. It just means that every shot the AI shoots is no longer a perfect release. Before, if the AI perfect shot release had them shoot 50% form a certain area on the floor. Now, there is a variance to their shot release just like with a human so sometimes he has an early release and that 50% shot is only 40% for him on that particular possession.

The AI's timing is worse on lower levels so you can make more defensive mistakes and not pay as much. As you raise the level of play they get more accurate with their release timings. It is a dope change IMO.

My main problem with this comes from what you guys have stated with previous iterations: The ‘balance’ of the game is structured and built around All-Star. When you get to HoF difficulty, I’m willing to bet that the OPPOSING AI (not your teammate’s AI) will have an error window for shot timing that is almost nonexistent. I can just picture the opposing AI shooting an astonishingly unbelievable percentage from the field with just about every player.

[El_Tercero]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

2. Bigs guarding smalls beyond the 3 point line. With the new switch mechanic its a must that Boban can't guard Kyrie beyond the 3 point line. That should be a 2k18 blowby animation.

We should also be able to create an open shot off the dribble easily in this matchup scenario if we don’t always want to get to the rim.


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[WarMMA]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

Man it all sounds so good. I can't wait to actually see it in action though. A write up is one thing, but I hope it plays out as good as it sounds. Especially footwork...if that plays out the way it sounds, that's gonna be a game changer. But everything sounds good so far.

[ataman5]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

Thanks for the good read, i can't wait to see it all in action.

[Marty Funkhouser]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

[Kushmir]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read & React Defense, Of

I liked some of what I read but like many Vets it would have been much more useful to add video so we can see the changes in action, case in point:

1. Motion Changes and Footplanting? Sounds good. But the real test of this is can defenders still double down and recover to the 3pt line or lunge for a steal but still recover instantly since the steal button warps them into perfect defensive position?

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4X-q7b_Vkd8" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/e2GeXMCEZBE" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

2. We cant abuse Turbo? Cool Story. Again--what will it look like in actual gameplay?

3. Exploiting Screens - Users exploiting zig-zagging screens until defenders get sucked into screens is a legacy issue. What do the changes look like? More importantly: Will consequences be nullified after the inevitable complaints from casuals come in?



4. Transition Defense - Anyone familiar with me knows this is my #1 issue and a deal-breaker going forward. We've been dealing with this since 2K15. A mixture of alert defenders, slowing the ball over distance, deflections out of bounds and bad pass turnovers makes this a non-issue, how EXACTLY was the transition module rewritten? Fancy terms are cool but no NBA defense struggles to get back after a score/defenders get back facing the ball and find their "covers" immediately...was any of that done?

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/enAraTgbIDY" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/niM7fpBYOTc" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mUPTJ230ecc" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Read/React defense - I'm always more excited about defensive upgrades as we know the game is still in search of catching up to the offense, buuuuut we saw how bad defensive solutions can ruin the game (2K19 steal mechanics) would like to hear more about what happens when we guess wrong on steal and blocks, honestly. Are there actual consequences or more Neutral Outcomes that encourage SPAM?

Paint D - Sounds really nice but a proper right stick contest based on timing makes both perimeter AND post defense more user-friendly (including the dreaded dropstep) bodying up sounds nice tho...hopefully it will allow us to counter pump fakes and static offensive players baiting you to jump like below:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/aSEByASMmiI" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Nothing about a "No Switching" option on defense, the option to keep a play on Repeat or make a play-call in the huddle? UGH. Those are letdowns. What about Paint Passing? Are blocks and other good defensive plays still going right back to the offensive player? Floaters and a Body-Up Ride system are a nice touch, but i'd have really liked to have heard about core stuff like Offensive Fouls and whats being done to make sure passing lane steals require timing instead of spam.

[SteveQ]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read &amp; React Defense, Of

I ain’t finished the article yet but signature dribbling and running styles getting looked at again makes me extremely happy, can’t wait to test it out.

[mfdoom911e]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read &amp; React Defense, Of

Is this the blog where they should be talking about having realistic foul numbers?

i was looking for this also and calling perimeter and 3 point fouls. hope they improve this as well.

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: NBA 2K20 Gameplay Blog - Motion Engine Upgrade, Handles, Read &amp; React Defense, Of

The defensive arrows (and other on ball mechanics like a meter) have been in previous 2K games. Pretty subtle though.

I loved a lot of what I read..

As an offline player I have the same question about the CPU's use of the meter though. What exactly governs how accurate they are with it? We can still back off of Ben Simmons even on Superstar right?

The references to riding the ball-handler plus the indicators of where they're going and stuff reminds me of one of the recent NBA Live games tbh. I wanna say it was Live 18; I picked it up when it was like $2-5 and thought the on-ball defense system was actually kinda good. Thought that was one of the few areas Live might have been better than 2K personally so I'm really curious to see this in 2K.

Edit: I now see that other people have drawn the same comparison as well