NBA 2K14 News Post

The Tough Road of Being a Sports Developer, Featuring Mike Wang

06:48 PM - August 19, 2013 by Steve_OS

The grind of a yearly sports videogame can work the nerves in so many different ways. GameSpot has posted an interesting look behind the scenes with NBA 2K14 lead gameplay designer, Mike Wang. Make sure you give it a read, you might learn a few things.

Quote:


	Wang believes that developers given multiple years to fulfill their vision have an inherent advantage over those who work on a yearly schedule. "[Sports developers] don't have the liberty of a two- or three-year cycle," he said, "so you don't get to see these big jumps." Because there isn't an obvious technical leap from one entry of NBA 2K to the next, a layman may not recognize how dramatic the improvements are. But if you compare every second or third entry in the series--putting NBA2K on the same development timeline as other franchises--you can see a jump that's on par with its more respected peers. ..."If we're at that point where we feel we can't innovate any further, we can't take the game any further, then we shouldn't be here."

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Member Comments

# 81 iLLosophy @ 08/22/13 02:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 23


	One thing I loved about the old CH was that they had another studio working on the game (Kush) and when 2k took over the project, you didn't see a drop in quality. I promise if these guys could get involved with someone that allowed them to switch off between years like what the COD games did we'd probably get a chance to see what Mike is mentioning here. I understand why people say nuh uhn, it aint gonna happen...its just something I wish they could do.

It's unrealistic to expect sports games to keep their games as polished and state of the art as the rest of the video games, and not allow the same development cycle that those games have. With every new system, games are getting more complex to develop. Furthermore the bugs and imbalances that come with every game are way more amplified, and those "How did they miss this?" moments occur more than in a battlefield or gta. Perhaps with formidable competition, the powers that be might consider changing to two different software groups like COD. But as long as they are the only kid on the block, we're going to keep buying the game, what's the point in changing anything?

Maybe this article is Mike's way of trying to get attention of the higher ups (or others in the industry) to make a change as he probably knows all too well how unrealistic this situation is.

# 82 23 @ 08/22/13 02:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iLLosophy


	It's unrealistic to expect sports games to keep their games as polished and state of the art as the rest of the video games, and not allow the same development cycle that those games have. With every new system, games are getting more complex to develop. Furthermore the bugs and imbalances that come with every game are way more amplified, and those "How did they miss this?" moments occur more than in a battlefield or gta. Perhaps with formidable competition, the powers that be might consider changing to two different software groups like COD. But as long as they are the only kid on the block, we're going to keep buying the game, what's the point in changing anything? Maybe this article is Mike's way of trying to get attention of the higher ups (or others in the industry) to make a change as he probably knows all too well how unrealistic this situation is.

Im not talking other games, im talking the best THIS game can be, and that example I gave was the closest one. People were worried about CH when 2k took the game from Kush games, but as you can see til this day folks are still clamouring for a CH game badly.

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