[moo2k4]

I'm going to come out and say this right now - 2K11 is the best b-ball game I've ever played, and maybe the best sports game of this current generation of consoles. And while it plays an overall sensational game of b-ball, there's one thing about it that has recently irked me, and I felt the need to write about this.

2K11, overall as I mentioned, plays a great game. However, it needs to do one huge thing better next year if it's going to continue to improve, and it's a very fundamental thing. It's passing.

While I won't say the passing game is awful, it's not good, and it doesn't stack up to the rest of the gameplay. First and foremost, unless you drop the CPU's hands down, it's almost impossible to throw a pass downcourt for a fast break. More often then not, that pass gets deflected because the CPU has eyes in the back of their head in this game. While it can be addressed by the a**usting the 'Hands' slider in the gameplay menu, it seems like something that should work relatively well out of box, and it just doesn't. I played months of games with it on default sliders, and it just wasn't working for me. I was turning the ball over far too often on downcourt passes alone before I dropped the slider to 30. While it works a lot better, the CPU still deflects a lot of passes that it shouldn't.

And while this is a bit of an issue, it's nothing close to the biggest issue in the passing game. No, that belongs to the overall passing logic this game has. Suffice to say, it's garbage.

The horrible logic comes down to two things. The first thing I'll address is WHO it passes the ball to. More often than not, if you push the A button (this is the 360 version, obviously), the ball seems to go to the wrong person. I understand that there's a highlight under the person you're passing to, but when you're in the **** of the game, you can't rely on looking down on the court to see who the ball is going to. Far too often when I'm doing a dribble drive, the CPU will collapse on me, and instead of throwing to my open shooter, the game will pass to someone who's got a defensive player standing RIGHT in front of him, and just like that, turnover. It happens all the time in every situation - pick and roll, running a play, being double teamed in the post - no matter what situation might arise, it's happened. Because of this, I have to use the passing icons far too often in game, and again, it's a pain to have to do that to compensate poor passing AI. I shouldn't have to rely on that as often as I do.

My second gripe about passing could actually help address my first gripe about passing. It's the type of passing. The game just doesn't choose the right pass. When you need a bounce pass to the post, it throws a chest pass; when you need a lob pass over defenders to get it to you man that leaked downcourt for the break, it again, throws a chest pass. It's flat out annoying, and it causes me a lot of BS turnovers.

I think this can be addressed though, and I think the game would be MUCH better for it. With the default control scheme (shot stick), get rid of the shoot button (X), and move the fake pass button (B) elsewhere, and give me three different pass buttons. Put chest pass as the A button, bounce pass as the B button, and lob pass as the X button. Now, you choose the type of pass and when to use it, instead of hoping the AI makes the right pass.

While it might seem overwhelming at first to have to remember which button does what, I think it'd work and improve the passing game leaps and bounds over what it is now. No longer would you be able to blame the AI for making the wrong pass, now it would be all on the user. You have a guy leaking downcourt on the break for layup? Throw the lob pass. If you throw a chest pass and it gets deflected, it's your fault, not the AI's. You need a bounce pass for an entry pass in the post to prevent a deflection? Use that button. It's simple, and I think it would work great.

Obviously that does take away a couple of buttons on the default control scheme that others might use, but that can be addressed. First, if you're using the shot stick...why would you be using the X button to shoot anyways? That makes no sense. As far as the fake pass button, that can be mapped to the right stick pretty easily by coupling that with the LT modifier. Hold down the LT and flick the right stick in the direction that you want the fake pass to go to, and that'd work like a charm.

So, while my gripes might seem minimal to some, since the game plays so great everywhere else, I think if they were addressed in the way (or a similar way) that I mentioned, I think the game would be better off. It'd give the user more control over the pass game, and gone would be the days where you'd have to rely on AI to make the smart pass. If this could be done, I think 2K could manage to top 2K11 with 2K12.