No sports video game series has displayed more ambition in recent years than "NBA 2K." It would be easy to point toward innovation and expansion of the feature set as the reason it's grown into the second-biggest sports game in the world. But fans have also recognized the continued effort to produce the best and most realistic gameplay along with advancement of legacy modes that have arguably been somewhat neglected by other sports game franchises.
"NBA 2K18" is another entry in the series that succeeds by offering both flashy new features and significant under-the-hood improvements.
Though long known for its excellent gameplay, one of the few gripes fans have expressed over the years has been its animation-heavy nature, which at times would take control away from the player and make things feel somewhat scripted. For "NBA 2K18," a new movement system has been put into place which reduces the reliance on animations. Movement and interactions now feel far more organic, and the flow of the game is considerably better because of it.
MORE: New Nike jerseys revealed for all 30 teams through "NBA 2K18"
While "NBA 2K17" suffered from a number of fundamental gameplay problems last year that were never fully resolved, "NBA 2K18" plays a much cleaner, smarter and more authentic game of basketball. CPU AI is not exploitable in the manner it had been, and users are better rewarded for playing strategically and utilizing play calling, space, mismatches and movement in a realistic manner.
The only issues that have really stood out are with body parts that on occasion clip through the body of another player, directional passing being inadvisable in pick-and-roll situations (it'll throw to someone cross-court or directly to an opposing player more often than the guy you wanted cutting to the basket) and the shot meter being on the small and quick side, which makes it tough to identify in shooting situations and more difficult to adjust for timing purposes.
Marketing for "NBA 2K18" has heavily pushed its new open-world "Neighborhood" as revolutionary. It's something akin to a cross between "Grand Theft Auto Online" (Take Two is the parent company of both 2K Sports and GTA's Rockstar Games) and the defunct PlayStation Home. Essentially, the "Neighborhood" acts a hub for all MyPlayer activities related to MyCareer story mode and the MyPark and Pro-Am online modes.
While it's neat to interact with other actual players and their characters in a common space, functionally the "Neighborhood" only hampers progress from being made. Between frustrating load times, and now actual travel time with a professional athlete that can't seem to move any faster than the pace of a leisurely jog, completing simple tasks takes far too long.
Say, for instance, the player is inside his MyCourt. In order to change his hairstyle, it takes over two minutes to simply get from there to the barbershop. In the past, this would have been accomplished with a selection from the menus instead. Spreading everything out within an open-world area has created a grander scale for characters to reside in but at the expense of efficiency.
Unskippable cutscenes are also burdensome. While understandable when they are tied to important MyCareer story events, there are far too many segments that seem to simply be covering for hidden loading times. 2K desperately needs to find ways to allow skipping of any presentation elements or cutscenes to preserve time that is so valuable to so many people.
There is one critical issue facing 2K Sports right now, as thousands of MyPlayer characters have vanished and more are continuing to disappear from users' accounts. Lost with the characters are the many hours spent with them and the money that had been invested into them. As critical as this issue is at the moment, and as important as it is to inform consumers about it, there's a high likelihood it will be resolved in the coming days. (When and if that comes about, this notation will be removed from the review as it will no longer be relevant.)
MORE: Breaking down the top-rated players by position in "NBA 2K18"
The MyCareer story for this year may the most unbelievable and insufferable yet, but it still finds a way to be an enjoyable experience as a whole. With the exception of the agent and team mentor, few characters are even tolerable. Ironically, those two could easily have been the most stereotypical, but within the story they seem to be the only ones who express any sense of reality through their words and actions.
The structure to MyCareer feels more in line with the traditional career mode of the past than the story mode of recent years, and that actually seems to work better here for more natural MyPlayer progression. The story weaves its way in without being too intrusive to that process. Expanded options on how you want to shape your player's skills and the visibility of progress towards "badges" are positive steps forward. The create-a-player system has taken a big step back this year, however, with the ability to sculpt faces having been removed and the number of options in areas like hair styles and facial hair more limited.
MyGM mode joins MyCareer featuring a story-based experience. In playing as the GM, your character now has a backstory and has to deal with ownership demands, ownership changes, the press and even potential relocation on top of regular management duties. While not completely different from what MyGM had been before, the scenes do bring some life to the mode that had been missing. It's just a little jarring there is no voiceover audio, but rather all the dialogue is text-based.
For those uninterested in playing through the narrative-driven MyGM, MyLeague remains as the more traditional, ridiculously deep and customizable franchise mode. MyLeague has implemented all the new changes from the latest CBA, plus features like international draft pick stashing and advanced analytics tools.
By leveraging the many historic players under license through the classic teams, "NBA 2K18" has been able to introduce all-time teams for the current 30 franchises. Putting aside that the Thunder's team is made up of mostly Seattle Supersonics players, and the absence of a handful of big-name players, it's a welcome addition to the series which also offers a total now of 62 classic teams from the past.
MORE: The best players of all time join forces in "NBA 2K18"
The series' tactics with in-game currency have drawn some criticism over the last four years and will continue to do so given the way in which it infects almost every area of the game. It feels necessary to spend money simply to get characters to a point where they're enjoyable to play with, and certainly getting those ratings up is required in order to compete with them in any of the online modes. In "NBA 2K18," it even costs VC simply to change a MyPlayer character's hair style for example. Payouts that are earned from playing games have also been reduced.
This is all in an effort to maximize pressure on consumers to spend real money to bypass the grind that has become the norm in free-to-play games. "NBA 2K18" isn't free-to-play however, as it ranges from the standard $60 to a special edition that sells for $150. While other sports game franchises have isolated revenue-generating methods to specific modes, 2K continues to apply it aggressively throughout. To this point, consumers have grumbled but ultimately accepted it, so it remains to be seen at what point the growing sentiment may end up influencing a shift in development philosophy when the model has been so financially successful for the publisher.
It's a testament to the the compelling nature of "NBA 2K18" that there's any such concern over time being wasted, time that could instead be spent playing more of such an exceptional game in any number of satisfying ways. "NBA 2K18" shines in the areas that matter most to basketball fanatics, through excellent gameplay and presentation, a variety of modes all with considerable depth and its celebration of the league's history.
"NBA 2K18" was reviewed on Xbox One and is also available on PlayStation 4. A digital code for download was provided by publisher 2K Sports for the purpose of review.
Bryan Wiedey posts sports gaming news and analysis daily at Pastapadre.com, is co-founder of the sports gaming site HitThePass.com, hosts the "Press Row Podcast" and can be reached on Twitter @Pastapadre.