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Books Nelson Simnation
OVR: 43
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Queens, NY
Posts: 10,922
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Chase's Answers so far, all in one post
Hopefully keep the repetitious questions to a minimum. All of the questions aren't there, but most of the times where Chase says "I didn't think to ask" or, "I didn't see it", it's in response to:
1. How are the celebrations(he was talking while playing, and looked away when this would happen)
2. Various accessory/arena questions
3. AI(he didn't play the computer)
4. Alley-oops(he wanted to ask, but forgot)
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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So obviously I know this is a death trap, but I feel like at OS, we got to go the extra mile for you psychos since you're so f'ing passionate about your sports video games. So basically what I'm doing is starting threads for the various games I've played over the last week, and this is one of them.
First I'm going back through the E3 questions and answering them in this initial post since I owe it to those folks. But with most of them done, please ask away.
I want to make it clear though that I didn't see Association mode (the 2K folks are going to talk about that at a later date) so no questions about that because I simply won't be able to answer them. Otherwise while I hope most are gameplay or gameplay-related questions (no I don't know how many headbands are in the game etc.) I do at the very least have info on some other stuff outside of gameplay, though I didn't really get to witness all of it first-hand.
Also I only got to play 2 games since the meeting started late/ran late etc. Unfortunate but still it was a great session nonetheless.
So here are the E3 questions I can answer below (I didn't answer the really general ones because it's hard to just talk about what are the improvements for example -- I'll speak more about big improvements in the preview that will come out during next week), and commence asking:
Wouldn't be fair to me to say it definitely has, since I'd need to see how it reacts over a set number of games. But I did ask them about it, and they did say the sub system has been reworked, so stuff like that shouldn't happen now.
1. I didn't run one play, ha (see below why). However, I did ask Rob Jones about the play-calling system, and he did say it should be easier to get into the called plays now. Also due to the new player tendencies/adaptive AI, if a human player cuts off a play at like the 2nd step, the AI teammates apparently won't just sit around and stare, they'll just go and run a set depending on who has the ball/where the ball is on the court at the time the play ended.
2. I don't remember the NBA 2K3 system at this point, but the practice mode has been overhauled. You can run plays in it now, make subs, have 5-on-5 (I believe), and just in general in functions more like a normal practice mode should. I only saw it as a 5-on-0 session for a minute or two, but I did see that you could tweak how it's set up.
3. Yes. Sliders, full teams, individual players for example can all be shared.
1. So I talked with the 2K folks about dribble animations, because I've always said I thought it would be cool if CP3 for example was bouncing around on his two feet after coming off a pick. Basically it seems like while that won't be happening due to difficulties making it look natural or smooth, they definitely went back and focused on bringing in more signature layups, dunks, dribbles, the whole nine yards. How much of that is in there, I can't say yet, but I think it's a safe bet to assume that they love doing signature animations and so they like to do them whenever they can.
1. I get the buzz words mixed up, but basically player tendencies and Adaptive AI play into this. So now basically depending on where you are on the floor, certain sets will just occur. So like when I was the Jazz, Boozer would just normally come up and start a pick and roll with Deron (depending on where I was on the court) without me even calling for it. Other times maybe AK would come off a screen for the ball, then look for a cutting Brewer, just naturally (the Jazz only run about 6 plays in real life anyway, there's just like 10000 different variations during each of those 6 sets). Other times I could just naturally notice that there was a clear out for Boozer, so I'd get him the ball in the post and the other 3 players not named Deron would be on the opposite side of the court. Okur would come set the pick and roll sometimes; he would pick and pop more, while Booz rolled for the most part. Essentially I didn't call one set play the whole time just because I wanted to see the new system, and how it was working. I came away mostly impressed, I just want to see how other teams do their sets, and if they really vary from team to team.
2. So I spoke with Rob Jones (I guess he's still the project manager? or maybe he's lead producer, I don't quite remember) but anyway, I told him how I didn't like to play against the AI much because I always felt it was too hard to get around defenders. He definitely seemed to think it would be more fair this year in terms of beating defenders off the dribble, but since I didn't do any AI vs. human games, and considering this game felt rather foreign to me due to all the changes, it would be hard for me to say how that will all break down at this point. Someone will ask about lockdown D at some point in this thread, I'll dig into that more when it's asked since obviously that relates to on ball D.
1. They've definitely changed Boozer's at the very least. His shot looked more spot on as he took the ball back behind his shoulder/head in a more normal fashion, and now had a quicker shot. Also while I didn't see it, they did say Boozer had his goofy FT animation in the game now. They added more sig shots, sig fts definitely, and obviously did at least the one recapture, so more would follow I would think.
It's not being delayed. Basically (and this goes for Live too) they are going to be the Oklahoma City OKCs, or something like that. The NBA has informed both groups that in general you should probably have these colors in for jerseys etc. but in both games there's just going to be a generic stadium in place for example -- nothing they can really do about it.
There are more natural leaners now. I didn't see any pump and lean into the defender for a foul moves like a few years ago -- my guess is they probably aren't in since they were just taken out like 2 years ago, for a reason I would think. The pull-ups, I'd say it's too early to tell. I used the Jazz during one game, and Deron seemed to more smoothly go into his jumper when I pulled up, but I would need to see more before saying pull-ups look better etc.
I did human vs. human games. I will say that there will be hedging this year though, also backing off the PG and picking off that dreaded down the gut lead pass was witnessed during my session, so there is hope. As for the post. I didn't see any fronting during my session, but what's cool is now those guys in the post battle for position. So before you know how basically the offensive big would just go down and get whatever position in the post he wanted? Now basically the defender won't just give him the paint, and let him set up where he pleases always.
Like I said, I didn't dig too into this, but resident OS forum poster/2K employee "SimBaller" -- that's the nice way of saying I forgot his real name somewhere between the 3rd and 5th hour of my red eye flight last night -- said "for the first time I can create someone that looks human looking in 2K9."
I believe the producers from the CHoops series were moved over to the NBA 2K side of things.
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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I think they were greatly improved for sure. It seems like since everything is locked in at 60 fps now, and they really went back and worked on the textures and player faces, that everything was brought together nicely. Also the locomotion of the players and how they're jostling with each other and banging into each other looked nice. In general everything in motion was just smooth, if I had to sum it up in one word.
1. Well what did you hear? Maybe I can be more helpful from there. The sound was down on the TV for the most part, since I was bouncing questions off all the devs while playing so my brain was doing a lot of things at once and I needed to hear them and all that. Plus since I'm a courteous fellow, I was always trying to make eye contact when there were stoppages etc. so I probably missed some stuff there during the pre-game. The one new thing I saw for sure was when the game was loading up the matchup, they showed real-life Deron Williams highlights since I picked the jazz.
2. Nope, sorry.
3. Na, I mostly heard a little about the CAP, didn't really think this time was the best to dive into CAP/CAT though.
4. I'm not sure, but that would be cool if it was there. You guys have seen things like KG pounding his chest and going wild after the and 1 though, so they definitely tried to add more sig stuff during the gameplay at least.
It looked similar. The transition seemed to be a bit smoother when I would pull up though, so maybe the lower body motion was worked on a bit. Could have been my imagination though.
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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As I said right before, I missed a good amount during stoppages. I did ask if the highlights would get messed up still when there were too many plays, and they said that would be fixed. Also you will only see big rebounds, so like it won't be boring watching a guy who had 20-13 -- aka it won't show all 13 rebounds anymore. Also I noticed that after the game I saw the winning team walking back down towards the tunnel for example.
It's funny to say (I've played like 150 days of NBA 2K8 according to my profile) but the game felt really foreign to me -- in a good way. The visuals first off were just light years ahead of NBA 2K8, and I think everyone is now realizing that as they see new screens etc. But the gameplay, just how the players were interacting, and moving, it was a culture shock of sorts all over again. I think most veterans will definitely have a readjustment period with NBA 2K9 since it feels so different, even if you don't notice the differences in the videos to this point. It's kind of like NHL 09 in that way. It may not look different in motion (sans graphics) but when you get your hands on it, you realize man this has changed.
So I think I should make it clear that off ball fouls will only happen when the user is in control. I don't think the it will be happening to your user controlled team just by itself. I spoke with the Live guys and the 2K guys about off-ball fouls and they both basically said the same thing: we'd love to do it, but people tend to get mad when something happens that is outside their control. Now whether or not the AI opponent will get off ball fouls while defending you is perhaps a good question, I can't answer that at this point.
The feature in general I was just told about. I didn't get to do any 5-on-5 this time around so couldn't see how tugging on jerseys works first hand.
It's tiered now, which should help it. Basically let's say I'm guarding Rondo. I can lay off him, and lock on from farther away and keep that distance: so I'll give him the shot, but I'm not going to let him drive by me. In that same way, bigs won't be able to come up and lock on to guards and stay with them tight; and a big who is dribbling the ball up the court better get rid of the ball if a guard comes running at him, because the guard will pluck you. They know that the lock on D was pretty cheese -- I refused to use it last year because it just felt so unfair. However, I can't say for sure how much it's improved until I play some of those diabolical folks online and see if it's easier to not get stuck in animations and so forth. I didn't feel like I was getting stuck in too many animations when playing this time though.
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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I didn't dig into that stuff unfortunately. Sorry. I didn't like that either though, for sure.
-I didn't notice the refs, but the coaches look much better now.
-Don't know
-Don't know, both are more Association Mode questions which they weren't getting into. The only thing I really know about Association Mode is if like you don't want to scout the incoming draft class during the season for example, you can have the CPU do it for you.
It has been revamped. Don't know what's defined as "next-gen" menus though.
Korver was tricky last year because you basically had to let the shot go a little earlier than expected. I did shoot with him, and I did make some shots with him. Much like with Deron, it could have been my imagination, but it seemed like the release point was just a bit more clearly defined, though the shot wasn't really changed.
No clue.
Yea for the Jazz game it was just various Deron clips, nothing too specific for the situation. I think I maybe heard how he was the key player for the game or something too as it loaded, don't remember exactly. Basically real highlights are shown of him and it seems like some guys talks about him over the highlights, didn't recognize the voice though.
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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I want to say no. Like I said before I wasn't looking much when the action wasn't going on, but I think it was just the announcers talking, and then it would go to the lineups screen like last year. I could be wrong, but yea.
When I asked about that, basically it seems like everything that was there last year will be there again. Besides new online ish, I think that's it for new portions like that.
Well I was told the Boozer one is in now. Otherwise I didn't notice too many new ones with the teams I was.
So I think some people might say that the players feel sluggish when they first touch the game, but I think this is because they've tried to make it more realistic in terms of how the players move. I still saw some skating, but the foot planting seems to be more improved.
1. I didn't notice Deron having a step back move, but then again I never touched the step back button with him I don't think. I was too in love with driving with him and doing the pick and roll. I can say though that tendencies kind of play into this. Two examples I remember being given: Pau Gasol may come up and look like he's setting a pick then, he'll suddenly (in his smelly stinky fashion) dive quickly back towards the hoop like in real life. Also Paul Pierce loves to pro hop/spin off either foot, so he will be going for that move quite a bit when he's on the move towards the hoop.
2. Hmmm it's hard for me to say how much control you'll always have. I mean I contested Paul Pierce's lay-up for example once and he went into an animation for a reverse lay-up. It's hard for me to say at this point how canned they will be etc.
3. I felt the pick and roll was toned down during my play session. I didn't see the lead pass through 3 defenders during my play time. I still saw one or two occasions where I would have liked to see the big man seal his defender after rolling. He would get position but then it just wouldn't look like the defender or offender had done enough to make it look completely natural. But yea I didn't see one time where like the big reached out and pulled the ball in under the hoop, then did that corny hammer from under the rim for example.
1. Love to help you, but yea, no dice.
2. See above.
3. See above.
4. I think the animations are improved, especially because after you beat someone it's not always so cut and dry, as in either A you got stopped, or B you got by. Now it seems like you might cross someone over and get by them, but that defender is still going to ride you all the way to the rim, he just might be on your side now.
5. They actually added touch passing this year. So if you already made one pass, you can pre-load the next pass to make quick passing around the perimeter or whatever. I didn't see any pinning blocks, but they've tried to improve the animations so like if you swat someone from behind it will look more natural than it did this year.
1. Yea I think it's probably hard to say at this point. There should be more fighting in the paint for position before the ball gets there, but how much interaction there is in the post is still hard to say. I didn't notice huge differences contact-wise, but I was doing quick lefty hooks with Boozer a lot of the time, or little up and unders -- playing a more dainty game, that Boozer tends to do.
2. No I know what you're talking about 100% but I didn't really see any for one, and I would think if you thought the KG thing looked good, perhaps that would translate to the team ones?
3. Ha, I hear you. I'd love to say I was playing really close attention during the in-between cuts to give a better idea.
How did you think the Celtics court looked in the E3 video? I would say the lighting is much improved in general for the courts.
Not really, but MomentousCeltic was there, and him and Rob told me that the Heat were pretty tough, and Beasley was real solid.
I'd say the coaches maybe quite aren't on the level of the players, but they look much better, and not so damn unnatural and scary.
1. So basically if you're out in front of the pack with a guard, you won't be caught this year -- at least that's what's being promised. I did some fast breaking with the Jazz, and during the one occasion I got the AK hammer on Rondo, due to AK running on the wing with me, I dished it off, he slammed it home on the 2-on-1. Not fair for me to say how well the system overall works though at this point.
2. I was hitting the little mid-range shots with Booz. KG likewise, got me a few times from mid-range.
3. I would think that's ideally the hope. But I don't know at this point.
4. That's what they're promising, seems like they really wanted to get that finally figured out this year. But I didn't have many mismatches where I could tell first-hand.
5. I'm not sure about that. The player tendencies play back into this somewhat though. So basically what they said was if you play against the Spurs, you should notice that from the start Bowen will be all over his man -- like you should be able to tell the difference between how Bowen is guarding someone off the ball, and how Manu is guarding someone off the ball.
6. Probably should have asked about this, slipped my mind though.
7. Be more specific.
8. Also should have asked about if alley-oops and fancy passes were toned down, just slipped my mind. I didn't see any oops during my play session in general. I think the fear last year was, if bigs could also dunk off the pick and roll oop, it would have been completely unstoppable.
9. In general I was impressed with the collisions in the paint, definitely some new animations here, and in general it looked good.
Oct. 7th.
I don't think much changed there.
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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Refresh my memory.
Someone asked this earlier. It would be cool if it was, but I wasn't paying attention.
If it's in, they weren't telling me about it.
So far the dunks I've seen look pretty good.
I'm not the person to ask about accessories stuff, I just don't get all that talk so I'm not a good judge.
I saw the Pierce reverse lay up like in that latest trailer -- he missed it this time though. Didn't see any MJ dunks.
1. Wasn't he somewhat solid last year?
2. Seemed to be about the same. Though I really want to see how players are shooting off the dribble now and off picks. I want to say it felt improved, but still a small sample size.
3. Can't say that I did since I wasn't always completely focused on the game.
I probably should have been looking for the bounce passes a bit more. When I was doing pick and roll with Okur it was most pops or fades so obviously not much bounce passing there. When I was doing the pick and roll with Boozer i was more on the wing and I would have it so he rolled off going towards the wing, so usually it was more conducive for a chest pass. I hope there are more bounce passes in though, and in general more animations like the one you described because that would be tight.
1. Yes I did feel like there was more jostling and battling between players on the perimeter.
2. Hard for me to say after just one game, and not playing against a bunch of other teams.
3. You got to give me a bit more than that to say....
4. I think at first there will be lots of interceptions as users try to force passes that were gimmies last year. You definitely need to make sure there isn't a defender playing a passing lane and so forth, more than in the past.
5. I want to get more time in with before saying anything too much positive or negative. It felt different, but they were talking about how they added a lot of new moves and ways to defend the post etc. and I just don't have the time to really dig into that. The double teams are quicker to come though, but that doesn't mean you'll get stuck in a double team animation. The good players can still get through them etc.
6. If someone did them, I didn't notice. So that either means A no one did them, or B they were smooth enough that I didn't notice.
Haha, you know I can't do that.
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Originally Posted by ChaseB |
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I can't speak for your experiences, so probably not fair for me to say. I've never had too much trouble with the controls.
You mean like when the ball handler gets into the lane and goes for a layup? I couldn't tell you, but yea I didn't like that animation either.
1. They definitely wanted to work on the sucked in double teams. Can't say I know for sure if it's perfect, but they did speak about how they weren't fans of it, so I would they'd like to see it changed.
2. I think I just talked about Booz and KG hitting mid-range shots. So at least in those cases, yes.
3. Did you see the E3 video?
4. Not sure. Basically Rob said a focus this year was making it so the bigs were now bigs. So essentially if a big is trying to bring the ball up the court, a guard will steal it from him as he should. So I would think it's harder for bigs to do moves as well, but I'd have to test it out to say for sure.
I wasn't looking too closely, but I didn't notice anything like the pasty/ogar looking Deron Williams of a year ago. I wish I had looked to see if they got more of his tatts in this year though.
Celtics, Pistons, Jazz.
1. Hard to say at this point since I was just trying to play solid post defense and contest the shots. Didn't really go for a steal or anything. With charges back in the game though I would think that would be a new weapon.
2. I wasn't really trying to hack, either was my opponent.
3. The Stuckey one and the AK one I talked about previously were the two I witnessed that I completed. I didn't see anything too insane.
No I didn't, but yes I do agree that was an issue.
1. Like I said earlier, I'm mad I didn't ask about that during my play session because it was my biggest pet peeve last year -- shocked I didn't ask about it. I do have a request in asking how the overly fancy passes and alley oops have been tweaked though, so hopefully those folks get back to me.
2. Didn't see any dunks in the paint that didn't involve being on the move already (see: no standing dunks). So I'd have to wait until I saw them to judge how much of a pain they were.
-I forced some tough shots, might need to describe a situation you want to see mimicked in the game though for that one, so I could better answer.
-Collisions felt good from what I can tell. Players were colliding in pretty realistic fashion.
Don't know much about it at this point.
Would have to be something you look at over the course of many games to really tell for sure.
It's hard to say. I felt like there was more space out on the court, but whether that's because the players go into sets now -- therefore spacing the court -- or the court has been enlarged, or the players are smaller I can't tell quite yet.
No I didn't, sorry.
1. I've talked about the spacing in a few posts. And see above for the other questions.
2. Hard to say, but like I said earlier, if you are ahead of the pack on the break, you won't be getting caught all the time like in previous years -- that's the promise at least from the devs. There weren't too many turnovers so I didn't get to see too many fastbreak opportunities.
Wouldn't be fair to say after 1 or 2 games for either.
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08-16-2008, 10:44 PM
