Do basketball video games focus too much on the hoop?

[Nodima]

What I mean is, do they put too much emphasis on getting to the rim rather than the ball? On both offense and defense, it kind of seems like what the ball does isn't based as much on sliders and tendencies as the animations in the game. Now that the 2K game is so polished, to me it seems like they're pushing their engine too hard and it just can't handle being as fair as it used to.

I was just imagining if in the next few years (say 2K11 or 12) 2K were to tie their Signature Style into the Euphoria Engine, so that the animations could modify on the fly and react to the ball, rather than the hoop. In this case blocking animations would be ball-oriented instead of just putting a hand between the player and the rim. Going for steals would be with the hand nearest the ball, no more random right-hand swats (well, a lot less, games aren't perfect). Players wouldn't run into open spacing on the floor (ie. my video of Rudy Gay twice running in front of Mike Conley's open lane on youtube) because their A.I. would be constantly reacting to the ball, rather than the hoop or pre-set screen and roll animations. This would also instantly emphasize weight, since the engine measures weight to scale and takes it into consideration in its physics.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see how Backbreaker pans out, though...shame 2K doesn't have EA's resources, or EA hasn't tried implementing it yet.

[agentk009]

I really think that the 2k team really just needs to work on the freezing, glitching, and random hiccups as well as tendencies and points in the paint. Right now I want them to get the fundamentals right because I don't see the point in implementing a new physics or graphics engine until the next xbox and playstations come out.

[Nodima]

That's true, some basic stuff is starting to slip so it might be hard to transition ala Live or Madden/NCAA


But I would also have more faith in 2K to get back to their current level quickly

[RainZ]

I think that over the next few years, say 5 or so, once next gen systems release and physics aren't taking such a taxing toll on CPU's I think you will begin to see what you are after..

Gradually if you look back over the years it has improved, heck I can remember only a few years ago when there was no such thing as even a loose ball. Now we have at least some loose ball play and to a certain extent the ball is an entity of its own.

Once the power is there in consoles, and I guess on PC as well (it is probably there now if you spend the money) we will see drastic improvements, and I think guys like 2K who are at the forefront of sim ball, will be amongst the first to really implement realistic physics into the game. For now though, im happy where we are as I've seen it come a hell of a long way from the start!

[Nodima]

Another negative I thought of are 2K's servers - if they can't handle this game without having totally different shot release timing between offline and online (for jumpshots, and then even a difference between the 1st and 2nd FT) along with other minor/major lag issues, how would the game play online if they were processing all that physical information also? Yikes.