Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

[Offballer4life]

FIRST and foremost... Im not going to address VC, $$ or micro transactions. This isnt about the "business end" of things. This is about what *I think* needs serious attention and what hopefully many others will be on board with...

Also, I love the game. I really do. But I feel like some of these things are an annual slap in the face to me and the rest of the community that spends their hard-earned money on the game AND all of the other cash spent on VC. People arent going to stop playing, paying, or complaining. But I hope that this thread offers some insight as to what would make the game itself BETTER. Period. And most of these are no-brainers.

Feel free to add to this. But keep it on topic please. I would hope that someone around here with some sort of connection to 2kSports will read this and take it into consideration and/or pass it along.

The "inspiration" comes from someone mentioning RPG heads....
As a fan of RPGs and similar types for most of my 3+ decades on this planet, 2k needs to really take some notes from those of us that play RPGs and know how a streamlined menu, buff and upgrade system works.

Im personally a fan of the Souls series. While things can get rather complicated on the upgrade end of things, their system is as close to flawless as Ive seen. Details are extremely important. People that pay money to play these games care about this stuff. NBA 2K isnt NBA JAM.

-Badges
--Having broken badges, badge slots, and badges getting used up but not applied.....absolutely unacceptable.
--Give us some details about what bronze, silver, gold and HOF badge levels actually do. Why do we have to rely on outside websites and 2kHeads to do the dirty work?

-MENUS and settings
--Legacy issue of settings being changed is really just pathetic. Im almost certain that this was an issue on last gen as well. This is something that should have been addressed AT ONCE upon the first complaint and confirmation of complaintants issue. Really not good. If I set my ACE to OFF (and other similar settings) in the main menu, it should absolutely 100% NEVER change until I manually change it.
--Related to above...Ball, coach, playbook switching/removing/2kING. Another absolutely unacceptable and ridiculous legacy problem. FIX IT! Cmon now...I should not have to ddouble-check this before starting a game...EVER.

-Duplicates
--I always thought quick-selling and/or AH was a simple answer to duplicate cards. Why not let us stack and apply a bonus (like the MyTeam Mobile app)? E.G. Have the option to stack and add a badge slot or hot zone, or quicksell/auction. Really, the possibilities with this are endless, and I think the current system is the easy way out.


------(I have to get back to work, so Ill continue when my boss leaves LOL)

[Offballer4life]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

PART II

--Non-green full bar releases
-Particularly when a shooter is wide open, not in a hot zone. I miss more wide open shots than I do fading in the corner off balance 3s with Curry.
-Free throws. A full white bar with a 85+ rated FT shooter should go in 85% percent of the time IMO. Especially in online games, where lag does in fact create a more difficult free throw.

--IN-GAME strategy changes
-On more than one occasion, especially as of late, I was in a 2-3 zone defense and it was automatically switched to man. Occasionally, I set my offensive play calling to auto, but never defensive. I use very consistent defensive settings at the start of every game, and adjust throughout the game. I LIKE TO BE IN CONTROL OF THIS. I really dont appreciate some glitch causing my players to play a defense that I didnt call, and then give up a game-winning shot. (In the argument for $$ ripoffs, we could talk about this loss being a chain reaction for loss of MT).
-In addition, it seems like when I call for Conservative defensive aggression, I foul like a MF. Could be in my head.

--Steals
- I find this to be the most humorous. I am constantly matched against lower-tiered players. With players of lesser quality. It seems like the worse the matchup, the more turnovers Icommit. YET, when I press square or flipp the right stick for a steal.....FOUL. THIS DEFECTIVE MECHANIC SINGLEHANDEDLY has me at 0-4 in Amethyst league. I finished it last night with a record of 7-3, and chose to redo for the token. first 4 games, losses to Emerald/Sapph squads that did nothing but mash steal and run PnR 3s with curry. My defensive settings (screen in particular) were not applied to players. I wish I had recorded this. Players going under when I set to go over, and vice versa.

--"Stuck" players and "slippery" players
- You know what Im talking about. Some guys just get stuck behind another player. Happens more often than not when the opponent is bringing the ball up the court, and your PG gets shoved into the paint. If this was a screen, fine. but even the animation looks like its a glitch. Players get stuck, and totally throws off the D, especially if you have players set to switch.
- Slippery....basically the opposite of the above. Brick Wall on James Edwards or AD. Sets a pick at the top of the key on a small PG WITHOUT Pick Dodger. Pick ineffective. Rinse. Repeat. Fail. Obviously, this isnt an "every time" thing, but it happens WAY more than it should.

--Pause cheese. Limit each player to 3 pauses in a game. 2 minute pause time is fine. But that would give an opportunity to set up before tipoff, after half-time, and then a freebie. Its distracting, frustrating, one of the communitys biggest complaints, and has to go.



CONCLUSION. 2k SPorts is a sports game company. I get it. Most of my gripes here arent even RPG-based recommendations, but very simple fixes. And quite frankly, they are fixes that should have been addressed AS SOON AS the problems are confirmed. No "wait till next year" or whatever. Fix it now. You work all summer on the game, then leave 1 employee in the office for the rest of the year, to update Moments cards, and drop a new pack once a week.

As a community, we deserve a little more respect and consideration. Other games, genres and companies do not have the same repetitive issues year after year, while the peoples' words are spoken to deaf ears.

PS....I rage quit ONCE upon release. Got the warning. And the W.
FIGURE YOUR **** OUT 2K

[phriscaul]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

i agree with a lot of this. I think there are a few more things they can do. they spend so much time worrying about exploits, and rightfully so........but people exploit because of these loose ends they always fail to tie up. They are so worried about starving us of MT, that they fail to sure up the little things and eventually add up to big things.


All of this is about the user experience. and if you continually try and starve out the user experience while continuously overlooking these nagging issues, it builds frustration and discontent.

nevermind the fact that they are charging $100 for boxes and you dont get a guaranteed good card that can help grow your MT or put in your team. if they wanna make you spend this much, just put out guaranteed 10 card player packs for box prices. would be much much better smh.

[Offballer4life]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

And can we get someone to teach simple mathematics to whomever sets pack prices?

Last time I looked, TB packs were 3625 (down from 4275), yet boxes were the same 67,500. And why cant we use MT to buy boxes? Complete nonsense.

[phriscaul]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

another huge issue, is acquiring legend cards, and them not syncing up with your playbook of choice. i have lou williams and he's knockdown but i cant run a lot of shooter player in my pb that would be there for current guys bc they dont show up for him. same for a lot of legends. i understand they played in different eras and their skillsets dont allow some things....but a shooter is a shooter. if i want to run elevator for him, it should be there.

Myteam. When we've applied a shoe to our player, why cant i ever see what shoe that was, after i've added it?

HOF badges.....why dont all diamond rewards come with one?

[KyrieAbuser]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

Hof badges is questionable, every diamond should have at least one, just don't make since why some don't even have that. Now the huge problems I have is blacktop, like why reward techs to people who win games, I'm winning and losing games at the same time due to techs. Now the dupes of a non sellable player from blacktop is very frustrating, I pulled amethyst Dennis Johnson three freaking times and had to quick sell him for absolute nothing, then the man don't come with no badges what so ever then they got his speed a 74..... there's centers in the game with higher speed and acceleration than him.

[KingTocco]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

I posted this on Reddit but I'll also add it here, I think it does a good job of add on to what you said but focuses more on the content of the MyTeam mode.

2K's version of the Ultimate Team game mode (MyTeam) is pretty decent. In my opinion it is nowhere near what Madden or FIFA has, even NBA Live has a pretty nice Ultimate Team but unfortunately that game is pretty rough.

2K did some things right with MyTeam this year IMO: The collections and their rewards, the weekly challenges with challenge tokens (although they are too spread out), MyTeam Online and the structure of it, and the rewards in general for just playing the game are fantastic this year.

MyTeam Blacktop mode is a solid concept with poor execution, the technical foul thing is terrible. The higher value reward cards (Team USA, sapphires, rubies, etc.) seem to be weighted far too low to get some of them. If someone wanted to collect all Team USA cards it would be EXTREMELY difficult and time consuming. I'm fine with a grind but that is too much IMO.

A few things they should take from FIFA Ultimate Team is the seasons concept, at least for Single Player. Not everyone plays online or wants to, and some would like both. I'd like 2K to implement a single player seasons mode where you can take your team through different levels of teams. Domination is okay but you really can only play it once and you have to play a certain way that is not appealing to me and most.

I think they could also add more challenges, if they want this to be one of their flagship modes and they want people to spend money on it, it needs a TON of content. (I'm looking at you Madden Ultimate Team) Maybe they could create community challenges, special holiday promos, continue with moment challenges, etc.

Online is far too laggy and catered towards the more casual player for it to ever be taken seriously as a competitive mode. 2K really needs to take a look at this and make it more realistic/higher difficulty level to increase the competition and cut down on the cheese. FIFA did a great thing with FUT Champions this year and it's completely blown up and people love it.

One of my biggest issues is the strategy component seems to be lost and it takes a backseat to everything IMO. I would LOVE to see 2K implement an option in the MyTeam menu where we can customize our team with the tactics we want to use and it will carry over into every game. Why do I have to set my offense and defense how I want it to be fresh for every game. The in-game stuff should be for adjustment purposes only.

I would also love to see 2K add a practice mode where you can have a full team practice to go over plays, strategies, different offenses/defenses, etc.

I like MyTeam but it could be so much more. For something that makes them a ton of money, I would really like to see them take it more seriously and put more effort into it.

[billiethetree]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

It really is ridiculous that there is no practice mode to run plays with your my team. You have to just practice whatever playbook you have as that team and hope that they're players are fairly similar to yours.

[lmamone]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

A custom playbook option, pretty please.
Make it unlockable after collecting certain amount of cards, or maybe after collecting playbooks for all the current and historic teams.

A lot more offline content, ideally with an option to select difficulty and quarter length.Some people want to plow through offline content just to get cards/MT pts, and some people want to play longer offline games all season long and get cards/MT pts. This way everybody wins.

[phriscaul]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

I posted this on Reddit but I'll also add it here, I think it does a good job of add on to what you said but focuses more on the content of the MyTeam mode.

2K's version of the Ultimate Team game mode (MyTeam) is pretty decent. In my opinion it is nowhere near what Madden or FIFA has, even NBA Live has a pretty nice Ultimate Team but unfortunately that game is pretty rough.

2K did some things right with MyTeam this year IMO: The collections and their rewards, the weekly challenges with challenge tokens (although they are too spread out), MyTeam Online and the structure of it, and the rewards in general for just playing the game are fantastic this year.

MyTeam Blacktop mode is a solid concept with poor execution, the technical foul thing is terrible. The higher value reward cards (Team USA, sapphires, rubies, etc.) seem to be weighted far too low to get some of them. If someone wanted to collect all Team USA cards it would be EXTREMELY difficult and time consuming. I'm fine with a grind but that is too much IMO.

A few things they should take from FIFA Ultimate Team is the seasons concept, at least for Single Player. Not everyone plays online or wants to, and some would like both. I'd like 2K to implement a single player seasons mode where you can take your team through different levels of teams. Domination is okay but you really can only play it once and you have to play a certain way that is not appealing to me and most.

I think they could also add more challenges, if they want this to be one of their flagship modes and they want people to spend money on it, it needs a TON of content. (I'm looking at you Madden Ultimate Team) Maybe they could create community challenges, special holiday promos, continue with moment challenges, etc.

Online is far too laggy and catered towards the more casual player for it to ever be taken seriously as a competitive mode. 2K really needs to take a look at this and make it more realistic/higher difficulty level to increase the competition and cut down on the cheese. FIFA did a great thing with FUT Champions this year and it's completely blown up and people love it.

One of my biggest issues is the strategy component seems to be lost and it takes a backseat to everything IMO. I would LOVE to see 2K implement an option in the MyTeam menu where we can customize our team with the tactics we want to use and it will carry over into every game. Why do I have to set my offense and defense how I want it to be fresh for every game. The in-game stuff should be for adjustment purposes only.

I would also love to see 2K add a practice mode where you can have a full team practice to go over plays, strategies, different offenses/defenses, etc.

I like MyTeam but it could be so much more. For something that makes them a ton of money, I would really like to see them take it more seriously and put more effort into it.

i sent all of this to LD 2 years ago. Practice mode, seasons, all that.

[KingTocco]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

i sent all of this to LD 2 years ago. Practice mode, seasons, all that.

I wish they would get on with it, it would be incredible.

[EarvGotti]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

They have done an amazing job this year in terms of rewarding people for actually playing the game, content and new features.

- I love the stat tracking. This is something that i've been asking for, for years and i love using it to decide which players i want to keep or let go.

- Finally they reward you for playing online and give you something to play for. I wish and hope they can/will update the rewards every few months or so like Madden does. But it's nice to get players for actually playing online.

- Seasons mode would be great for offline.

- Leaderboards are a must next year to see who the top My Team players are.


I can honestly say that they have made great improvements this year and i hope they keep it up.

[tt500]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

They have done an amazing job this year in terms of rewarding people for actually playing the game, content and new features.

- I love the stat tracking. This is something that i've been asking for, for years and i love using it to decide which players i want to keep or let go.

- Finally they reward you for playing online and give you something to play for. I wish and hope they can/will update the rewards every few months or so like Madden does. But it's nice to get players for actually playing online.

- Seasons mode would be great for offline.

- Leaderboards are a must next year to see who the top My Team players are.


I can honestly say that they have made great improvements this year and i hope they keep it up.

Hope they keep stat tracking of blacktop and MTO seperate. I cant tell whaat my stats are in MTO are cause its all messed up from Blacktop mode.

[Offballer4life]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

The entire "undefeated" thing is ridiculous. And for those that have completed rank 2 and are going to do a league again, only to lose the first game to some whacka55 cheese......Cmon now. I honestly think it should be win-based....or give a token for 200 mto wins or something. I'm NEVER going to go undefeated in the last 4 leagues. My 0-4 streak has extended to 0-5. Against someone in the emerald league. WHAT GIVES

[EarvGotti]

Re: Dear 2K, Some seriously constructive criticism

Hope they keep stat tracking of blacktop and MTO seperate. I cant tell whaat my stats are in MTO are cause its all messed up from Blacktop mode.

Oh i didn't realize that was the case. I never played blacktop and only MTO exclusively so my stats are fine.

The entire "undefeated" thing is ridiculous. And for those that have completed rank 2 and are going to do a league again, only to lose the first game to some whacka55 cheese......Cmon now. I honestly think it should be win-based....or give a token for 200 mto wins or something. I'm NEVER going to go undefeated in the last 4 leagues. My 0-4 streak has extended to 0-5. Against someone in the emerald league. WHAT GIVES

At first i thought it was gonna be impossible to go undefeated but its actually pretty easy. Maybe they could give a reward player each time you prestige and then give higher rated diamonds for going undefeated in the higher leagues.