NBA 2K21
Making the Case That 'Perfect' Green Releases Should Be Removed From NBA 2K21 and All Future NBA 2K Games
As has become the yearly norm at this point, people have spent an inordinate amount of time discussing shooting in NBA 2K21. The normal NBA 2K launch discussion basically goes like this:
- Why don’t the servers work? Are the servers working yet?
- Why can’t I shoot? Shooting sucks.
- I have to pay how much VC for that?
- What’s the fastest way to grind badges?
- 2K releases patch/hot fix for shooting
On the bright side, the servers have not been a major debacle this year. But shooting discussions are as all-consuming as ever. Now, it took on added focus this year with the “aim” system being implemented, but really we’ve been having these conversations since NBA 2K15. Why? Well, in large part due to green releases. In fact, I would say green releases have been breaking brains since NBA 2K15.
Yes, there was a brief respite during NBA 2K16 when green releases went back to not being mostly auto makes, but I think even then they were somewhat patched back in to things (though my memory could be off here). Regardless of the exact specifics of that one point in time, green lights have been a mainstay since NBA 2K17.
So after five-plus years with this system in place, I don’t have any hope that flashing green lights and “perfect” releases are going to vanish any time soon, but I still want to make the case for why green releases should be removed from NBA 2K21 and all future NBA 2K games.
Green Releases And Flashing Green Lights Are Popular
Before I get into picking apart this game mechanic, I want to start with the obvious here and say I understand I’m in the minority. As big as OS is, we’re a drop in the bucket when it comes to the NBA 2K ecosystem. So while I know I’m speaking to my audience here saying “green releases are bad,” this opinion has in no way reached critical mass. In addition, I don’t blame the developers for not taking the “green release” system out if it’s popular. I’m sure some of the developers don’t like the system, but being a big-time sports game developer isn’t just about what you want to make, it’s about what people want to play.
I also don’t think Twitter is a great barometer of the real world or even a good polling mechanism, but it’s still instructive to point to a poll by NBA 2K developer Mike Wang as it relates to just one specific component of perfect releases:
Do you want to be able to see your opponent’s green lights online?
— Mike Wang (@Beluba) August 27, 2020
100,000 people responded to that poll and 85 percent wanted to see an opponent’s green light online. 85,000 people wanted to know the result of a shot before it went into the hoop. That’s wild to me.
Some of the best reasons I read for this rationale were things like “I want to know if I have to rebound or not.” In baseball terms, they wanted to know what a pitch type a pitcher was going to throw during the windup. Let’s all agree that is a very video game reason to want green lights, but also let’s realize this is the sort of opposition we’re up against here. Some people simply want to know whether they even need to box out or they can just start sprinting up the court for a long outlet pass.
To me, seeing logic like that tells me Pandora’s box has been opened on this front and it’s hard to go back now. The online push back would be immense. After all, the 2K development team already has to try and fend off Twitter zombies when trying to avoid making shooting easier during the launch week when players stink and have no attributes. Just imagine a world where green releases no longer mean (mostly) auto makes and everything is back to being purely “random” and “luck-based” with no “skill” involved.
Being Able To Green Release Does Not Create “Skill Gaps” On Its Own
As it relates to the idea of “skill” and skill gaps, when discussing these sorts of things it’s hard to talk about these concepts and not get bogged down in lots of drawn out arguments that go nowhere fast. There is certainly a substantial sect of the 2K community that just does not like change even if they say they want that change. A tweet by DBG sums this up as it relates to “aim” shooting during the launch of the game:
2k community "2k is a joke, it's the same every year"
-2k changes multiple key gameplay mechanic which fundamentally changes the entire game
2k community "2k is a joke! Why did they make a change to the game" https://t.co/sX8R5YYEZ8— DBG/BBALL Daily (@DBGyt_) September 5, 2020
Any change that makes users “worse” at the game is a bad change to some of those same users. Even if 2K tries to create “skill gaps” with something like aim shooting, they have to deal with feedback that basically makes them question the decision. It’s a normal human response to get frustrated when learning something new, but it’s also yet another obstacle in the way of making sweeping changes in yearly sports titles.
Beyond that aspect of things, defining a “skill gap” is hard to even pinpoint for something like shooting. Shooting in 2K is one part dice roll, one part timing and one part shot quality. Even when you’re a Tyceno-level dribbler and shot timer, there’s still a component of randomness that plays into things.
Even with that randomness, yes, the best players generally are going to rise to the top. But this idea that “green releases” somehow create this massive skill gap isn’t really true. Removing green releases would not suddenly make Tyceno some dumpster-level player because it’s just one aspect of the game. Does being able to consistently time up a jumper make people very good at certain modes in the game? Yes. But, again, it’s just one component.
So pushing back against the idea that green releases create a skill gap, I would say instead green releases really more just stunt creativity and force people into this small room where they’re searching for the same 3-4 releases that are meta, and hunting the same shot over and over because they’ve boxed themselves in with muscle memory and specific “combos” of moves/on-ball picks to get that same open shot. Perhaps some people like labbing one jumper for hours on end and then doing the same couple things over and over — probably more than some people since green lights clearly make our baby brains go “yay!” too — but it’s not creating an interesting ecosystem out there.
“Aiming” Was Supposed To Change This A Bit — In Theory — But It Has Not
I was high on the “aiming” system in the demo, and honestly I still believe in the mechanic in the long run for the reasons I wrote about then. Namely, I do think it’s a good counter for the online latency inconsistencies because aiming is not as impacted by that as trying to figure out a timing window on a button release when you don’t know what the lag will be like game to game. On top of that, a consistent aiming window to strive for means you can take more shot types — and dribble into more types of shots — while not having to be so obsessed with learning the timing of one sort of jumper and never really straying from it.
Ironically, now it’s the faders and leaners no one ever really wanted to take that have become “meta” in a lot of ways because you have a longer amount of time to aim during those shots. That being said, I don’t really want to pick apart the aiming system because it’s not the point here. Rather, I want to simply point out 2K has already begun tuning things and it’s lead to the usual hit-or-miss feelings from people — and these are all the same sorts of discussions that existed long before the aiming system.
To me, there’s a host of reasons for why this happens just about every season, but I think it still comes back to either you’re perfect or you’re not. We can spend hours debating “full white glitches” and everything else, but when shooting is about being “perfect” then it consumes everything else. To put it another way, as soon as you know there’s a “perfect” way to do something, then immediately the conversation is only going to revolve around that and discussing why you’re either not able to get perfect, or you’re making too many/missing too many shots when not perfect.
When you then factor in the multiple different ways to shoot, plus badges, hot zones and ratings, it all becomes a nightmare of tuning and balancing.
Green Releases Lead To Unrealistic And Inconsistent Percentages
Is it really worth all this effort to tune all these elements when green releases still lead to unrealistic percentages either way? I don’t think so.
Even when we factor in people screaming out “full white glitch!” and whatever else on perfect releases, the reality is shooting percentages are absurdly high once you reach a certain level in this game. And, to be clear, I’m not saying everyone even gets close to approaching this level. On OS and beyond, I see people discussing how they still can’t shoot and so on, so I’m not out here saying shooting is “easy” for everyone. But what I’m talking about are things like this chart from NBA 2K Labs:
From yesterday's video.
200 shots taken in the middle of the green window with every 3pt rating from 60-99. White and green makes to make the total make percentage at each rating. Further explanation in the video herehttps://t.co/weHAtYedHl pic.twitter.com/wYbLE9ZWeP
— NBA2KLab (@NBA2KLab) September 18, 2020
This was a test they did with a modded controller while testing players with no hot zones or badges. This showed off the percentage of green releases and “full whites” and what they shot on those attempts. Looking past the possible issues with tuning here between the attribute levels, the point here is that while hitting the green window every time does show you can’t be “perfect” even with a modded controller (at least not without badges/hot zones), the percentages are still very high.
And yet this is still what so many people want to complain about? A lot of these folks are the same people who get upset when they don’t green every open shot in the corner when they have maxed out players, or they somehow think an open shot should mean you make it 70-90 percent of the time. And, again, I get it. You grind out this player and have this shot you think you’ve mastered, and you want to see the fruits of your labor. But that conversation only starts up because we know “perfection” is possible and we’ve now been trained to expect certain results even though it’s not remotely like real basketball.
Shooting Does Not Exist In A Vacuum, But It’s The Only Thing You Can Be “Perfect” At
Perhaps the conversation about green releases and why they should remain in their current form would hold more weight for me if “perfection” could be reached elsewhere. But it can’t be. No other aspect of the game involves something where perfect timing or whatever creates these one-to-one results. Pressing the steal button in certain timing windows, or timing a dribble move or whatever else does not incorporate this concept to the same degree — nor does it give you the same feedback mechanisms.
So really we’ve just created an environment where shooting is on its own special island with all these special rules that are then catered to and chatted about while so many other aspects of the game lose out because shooting sucks up so much of the conversation.
There Are So Many Other Problems Worth Spending Time On Instead
Finally, I want to end by talking about something that’s in a sense only tangentially related, yet still hammers home the overall point I’ve been making that shooting is playing by its own set of rules and hurting everything else. There are bigger problems here than green releases, but green lights and everything about them sort of dilute and obfuscate these other issues.
To put it another way, we talk way too much about results rather than process. We talk about green lights rather than how we got to that green light.
Books put out a video yesterday showcasing the issues with screens, and it’s not a new issue. Moving screens and suction screens are longstanding things 2K players know about. It’s one of many reasons why green releases can be frustrating to go up against. You’re playing defense, and you know giving up an open shot is death in some games, and yet you get sucked into a screen or nailed by a moving screen and it’s all over.
The video also showcases bad help defense on a corner shooter, and this is another thing that just highlights the helplessness you feel as a green release occurs — AI defenders can’t be trusted and you pay for it because you know a shot is going in the moment it leaves the shooter’s hand.
These are not new issues. I spent hours and hours way back with NBA 2K16 highlighting AI 2K defenders being overly eager to help on D. I showed off overly aggressive on-ball physicality and two-man interactions that were not enjoyable. I talked a lot about transition defense being bad (it’s in a really rough spot once again this year).
But I also spent far too much time breaking down contested shots here and here. At the time, basically contested shots in the real NBA went in far more often than they did in NBA 2K16. If I did this testing for NBA 2K21, it would be different because “shot quality” has been replaced by contest percentage and a whole contest system.
However, this also leads me to my point about contested shots. They’re, generally speaking, a mess when it comes to tuning and being graded by 2K’s feedback system.
@NBA2K_MyTEAM @DBGyt_ @TwoBrosGaming @NBA2K @Ronnie2K
This was 7% contested pic.twitter.com/xct5bnms2b
— Danny Wriggles (@DannyWriggles) May 14, 2020
That Twitter clip is from NBA 2K20, but it’s still one of my favorite examples of contesting gone wrong. The differences in what made a shot smothered vs. what didn’t, and then also factoring in how strong certain badgers were made contests in NBA 2K20 a special kind of bad. However, the contests issue last year still served as yet another example of why the idea of “perfect” was so frustrating. It would be one thing to see a shot go in if there was no “perfect” shot system in place. But to see a green light flash when you think you’ve smothered someone based on the visuals, yet the game says it’s an open shot, is when you find a level of rage you didn’t know existed in yourself over something so petty and meaningless.
There Has To Be A Better Way
Was shooting so bad when we didn’t have green lights? We loved 2K plenty before green releases, and I know I was having a good time even back back in the NBA 2K10 or NBA 2K11 days (as the above video shows). So I’m sure we’d still love 2K plenty if they went away.
Shouldn’t good quality shots trump perfect releases? Wouldn’t it just be better if we went back to something like early/late/good releases beating out the days of chasing “perfects” or having to test out “base” Dwyane Wade with “release 13” or whatever for hours on end? If the equation were simply shot quality + shot timing + attributes + badges and now just left out the idea of perfect or “green light good nights,” couldn’t we spend more time on just tuning shooting and complaining about general RNG rather than discussing why it’s so unfair you couldn’t get a perfect release that goes in every time?
After all, pobody’s nerfect.
You said it best, its the only mechanic that has a perfect result. There isn't another aspect in 2k that we can perfect with a button release or flick of the stick.
As the game is now, there’s almost no way to truly excel if you can’t time/aim your shot as well. It becomes 75% shooting and 25% everything else. If one guy can hit 75% from 3 because he can green most of his shots and the other guy can only hit 45% with slightly early/late/left/right, it’s curtains. Doesn’t matter if the second guy has superior IQ, a better handle and takes smarter shots. The “skill gap” for shooting is so pronounced that it basically eclipses all the other elements of the game. Shrink that gap a bit and everything else becomes meaningful again. The easiest way would be removing greens.
Totally agree with your points, definitely fundamental basketball and good open shots should always beat perfect release robots...
Greens are the worst and most arcade thing that happened to NBA 2k saga and it is a clear switch from "sim" to "fun", wriggling away from realism... and that is probably a good decision from a business perspective (to content the masses)... but a bad and wrong one from a simulation standpoint...
I have not an issue with these things in the park and its different game modes, I even like the new shot aim concept (but without greens and without the requirement of been almost perfect to hit a shot, that's not basketball... basketball is more about finding the right spots and shots, not executing them perfectly with a mini-game).
My problem with all of this is that the core 5 vs 5 NBA simulation is getting more and more affected by these green fever and all its arcade connotations (hell I don't want the spoilers, I don't want to know if a shot is gonna go in or not just after release), and it is not fair for us the long time hardcore fans who mostly love the real NBA part of the game: MyLeague, MyLeague Online, My GM and PlayNow (off and Online).
If they are hell bent on keeping green releases. We should just have a percentage. Example. Perfect release 50 % make chance. Slighlty left or right 30% chance. For 90 rated shooter.
Or
Include turn off 100 percent green release as a game option.
Ratings should be more important the shot timing/aiming.
Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk
If they are hell bent on keeping green releases. We should just have a percentage. Example. Perfect release 50 % make chance. Slighlty left or right 30% chance. For 90 rated shooter.
Or
Include turn off 100 percent green release as a game option.
Ratings should be more important the shot timing/aiming.
agreed, keep the Green Releases to show the User he did everything right, but please go away from 100% success rate
very Good article!
Simple: There should be no guaranteed shots under any circumstances because once you master shooting, the percentages will trend upwards and it becomes ridiculously unrealistic. In the past several years I've had to eventually move to Real % shooting because once I get down the timing of the shots, I was rarely dropping below 55% for every game, even on HOF. At least with guaranteeing that there's always a chance (even if small) that the shot will miss, this will help in curbing the super high shooting percentages we tend to see during the normal course of a game.
Granted, there's always the case where people will cheese their way to ridiculous shooting percentages anyway, but for us who tend to not exploit the game, it would be a big deal to have at least some margin of error with every shot we take.
I guess what Im also saying is why do none of the people who dont like it seem to play without real %? That's all I've ever played so no matter how good I get, most players I use have different success rates. Just like most batters I use have slightly different swing mechanics and most hocmey players I control have shots that work better. I dont get why you wouldnt just use the real % option to begin with?
I think using the real time mechanics provide an added challenge during the game, and Real % hasn't always been reliable, right now its a mess pre-patch (I'm on PC, no patches yet). Also, the guaranteed shots still exist for the AI even with Real %.
Even if you have greens, the fact they are visible changes behavior. As the writer said, the moment you see a green, you start going back on defense, and defenders can try and leak out for a long outlet because they know they don't have to crash.
Also, playing with real % is not a thing for many online scenarios. I'm not sure people care *that* much for purely offline play.
While they're at it, they need to separate my career and the park, and get rid of the bullsh*t badges. Or at least make it something we can turn off.
When you hit the shooting machine and figure out the your rhythm, you can tell when it's a miss and your whole mission is to make that as repeatable as possible.
Now it's not often in the game you are able to replicate that, i mean compared to what he did in practice, Currys record is 12 3's.
As much as NBA Live was "terrible" with creating a good basketball game, their shooting percentages were good.
Apart from that is the fact which clearly seems to make a huge difference which is that those most bothered by this green issue play with others online. I never do. I don't know exactly what it is about playing with others in a my player type environment that makes this worse but it doesnt affect my offline Season play. Or if it does, I'm too ugnorant to see how.
Another reason I only play offline.
The saying , "don't play videos, play basketball" is no longer an option.
When you hit the shooting machine and figure out the your rhythm, you can tell when it's a miss and your whole mission is to make that as repeatable as possible.
Now it's not often in the game you are able to replicate that, i mean compared to what he did in practice, Currys record is 12 3's.
Practice you talking about practice? You are100% correct.
Practice shooting vice a real game is COMPLETELY DIFFERENT and some don't understand that..
NBA players talk about shooting an uncontested shot, no pressure in an open gym is different from a real game.
There're numerous stories about Dwight Howard, Shaq, and others shoot an extremely high percentage of FTs and 3s in practice.
but defensive movement and contests were 10x more consistent...so you'd have to at least but a tenth of thought into shot selection.
2K isn't there.
Practice shooting vice a real game is COMPLETELY DIFFERENT and some don't understand that..
NBA players talk about shooting an uncontested shot, no pressure in an open gym is different from a real game.
There numerous stories about Dwight Howard, Shaq, and others shoot an extremely high percentage of FTs and 3s in practice.
Very true. We're making the same point. I never said how easy or frequent they should be.
Only thing I'll say...
Rating and shot selection should hold more weight than ANY aspect of shooting.
If i have a 99 three and take a WIDE open three, a "bad" release should still have a high percentage. A LOT of great shots come at the end of the shot clock and people have to almost HOIST them up and the great shooters can still drain them in the NBA.
It's almost like the system is backwards. Badges/timing should NOT be the bread winner here.
Shot SELECTION should be king. And its not just WIDE OPEN either. A GOOD shot could be a late closeout from a great shooter. A GOOD shot could be a couple feet behind the line. It's all about situation. Is this catch and shoot or off the dribble?
These metrics are what EVERY analytics crew goes by. CNS vs. Off the dribble are the primary shot metrics when talking about great shooters.
At the same time... Cut percentages in HALF across the board.
A GREAT shooter in the NBA hangs in the .40s, not the .80s.
Rating and shot selection should hold more weight than ANY aspect of shooting.
If i have a 99 three and take a WIDE open three, a "bad" release should still have a high percentage. A LOT of great shots come at the end of the shot clock and people have to almost HOIST them up and the great shooters can still drain them in the NBA.
And, from Chase's article: "Shouldn’t good quality shots trump perfect releases?"
As a reality basketball purist, green definitely is a spoiler I do not want in my basketball story.
I am strictly MyLeague and accidentally found out a little about Shot IQ a couple of years ago. It does a little of what howardphillips214 describes above. Experimenting with Progression/Regression, I had 2-3 players on every team in the league evolve to 99 Shot IQ a few seasons in. Highlight shotmaking against seeming impossible smother defensive coverage was a norm. First few times I saw an incredible shot it was cool, then the sim-mind kicked in and it got old.
The Shot IQ allowed for a larger release sweet spot which meant high IQ players knew how to "get a basket" even against great defense. I definitely liked that, so I toned down Progression to limit the number of players to realistic levels.
I would like to see recreation and simulation separated in all modes. I do not play online, but it would seem that if courts or gyms were designated as green-light fun-zones with bouncy floors for recreation, and other areas labeled for sim or for skill, that might be a step in the right direction.
2K is able to manipulate game rules for their various weekend promotional events: Why not also enable players to separate and find the basketball social setting best suited for them? Every gym I have been to in reality usually has an "A" court for future college players up to former pros; a "B" court for serious guys who played varsity in high school; and a "C" court for games of 21, warming-up, and just messing around.
You said it best, its the only mechanic that has a perfect result. There isn't another aspect in 2k that we can perfect with a button release or flick of the stick.
oo I dunno about that. haha. There are always bread and butter things. I think shooting in general needs to be balanced. I think green releases suck, but they aren't ruining the game. They just need to give more love for good release shot that aren't green. Greens are so "OP" that they have to nerf other release and then it becomes finding a good green window. To me, I don't wanna pick one of the EZ releases, but it just seems like cheating.
The whole meta imo isn't based as much on greens. It's just shooting. L*ve had greens and it didn't feel as imbalanced as this, cuz you could body people inside on the same level.
Shooting is important but it's not that important. There isn't anything stopping green releases from being in a good sim game, but the way the greens happen and the way that you can kind of 'set yourself up' to gain more greens is basically cheesing the system and ruins game play.
-Smak
Never done that before 20. Ever. Didn't have to. So now, picking up to just play is not a want anymore. You have to study. My friend said out loud the other day, if you want me to make a perfect release, make a perfect game. That it will probably never be.
I have played every 2k ever. I'm 50. It's a game. In shouldn't have to "lab" for hours to find a shot for all the players I use. In franchise. Online is a joke. They rationale this by getting you to use my player who uses the same shot over and over so shooting can become easier. But what if I play franchise only?
Then I have to learn every shot for every player. And in 20 and 21 it just isn't easy or fun. Irs become a juvenile game. Spam this spam that. Where did the fun go? Cuz this ain't it. At least for me and my friends.
My best friend I watched play online the other day. Just a random game. He made zero 3's. His opponent made one. With curry. And that was at the end of the game. AND my friend was only using the button to shoot. Lost respect for this game. It's made Madden more enjoyable. If you can imagine that.
Looking at the 2klabs, they devined there is some RNG involved even if you time it right you might still get a white instead of a green.
And the lower your shooting stats, the lower your chance to green.
I’d say that’s quite an improvement compared to previous years.
That’s why online, you know see a lot of builds with a green pie chart. You need a 75 3ball to hit a decent clip.
For reliable shooting, you need an 86 or higher.
And you need to have the right badges.
But with an 90 3ball and the right badges, it’s easy to shoot lights out
Verzonden vanaf mijn iPhone met Tapatalk
Will be interesting to see how 2k responds to this
Or doesn't. That's usually how 2k deals with negative things about their game. Act like it doesn't exist.
Those of who who know better knew how bad the green release concept was.
We also knew it was only a matter of time before THIS happened:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wg9rioLzmPk