NBA 2K11 Review

By Brad Russell

This franchise has been the model of sports games, and nothing changes this year with #23 making his grand return to the virtual hardwood. You get the updated features you would expect: current rosters, improved graphics, less hiccups, sleeker presentation, supposedly refined controls, and a few other minor additions that help suck you into the NBA experience. But the reason that non-fans or NBA fans who don't play the video games would play this game is for the Chosen One, Michael Jordan. His addition to the franchise helps elevate this game from the best basketball sim to the best basketball sim plus homage to the past.

Anything to do with this game starts and ends with His Airness. In a nice surprise, the game starts with a classic NBA matchup featuring Jordan – just throwing you right into the action and letting you know that the The #23 is available to play. From the intro game you can choose from a long list of possible scenarios to play. For offline, there are three main modes to play: The Association, My Player, and Jordan Challenges. The intro game is almost a misnomer in that you may be tempted to jump into the Jordan Challenges immediately, such as in the case of a progressive, story-driven game. But even old vets of this franchise should probably reel it back and ease into this game.

The Association is a beastly, fully-immersive experience as you assume the roles of GM, owner, coach, scout, and players - or maybe just the players if you so choose. Your league takes on it's own identity with headlines and news on what could be a daily basis. With three-team trades and a long list of options for your league you can have a casual experience of just playing games or control every detail. And those looking to add some spice to this mode can always start with a fantasy draft. In short, there is almost no stone left unturned in this mode, and you can even make leagues online.

My Player starts with a very deep customization session, and thanks to the graphics you can have almost exactly whatever look you are going for. Your height will decrease your skill points and you must decide what kind of player you want to be and even tendencies within your chosen role. All that sounds good if there was fun to be had, but you start out as a scrub - probably someone who shouldn't be drafted. It doesn't help that the game fails to help you understand the what and how you should go about building your stats. The biggest example is that the game doesn't tell you what the drills are until you're in them, and if you don't play to your strengths you could be wasting a drill. Ultimately, My Player requires either advanced knowledge or trial and error in order to get the most out of it. Otherwise you may be stuck with a poorly-built player who rarely sees the court. This mode lives and dies on whether it can hook you early, but it's the early part of this mode that is the most boring and most difficult to get excited about when you could just be playing a quick game as MJ.

To put a bow on the whole concept of playing as a scrub and taking him pro, this mode has been seen in Madden and other NBA games, but in practice it only fails to live up to expectations. One idea is that you are allowed to play out your fantasies of you yourself playing with the big boys. That's fine if you were a deadly 3-point shooting sniper on the wings, but as a part-time brick-layer who can't play defense and is costing his awful teammates the game as much as they are, it's hard to keep playing these modes. That is where the unlockable mode of using MJ in this way is a real joy…. if you can unlock it that is - you have to beat all 10 MJ Challenges first. Sure, Bosh, LeBron, Wade, and Jordan on one team doesn't make for many close games, but it's fun. Any time you have a mode of starting as an amateur, the best option would be to start out as a third or fourth tier kind of player, not as someone who should go undrafted.

The most intriguing aspect of this game are the Jordan Challenges. Think again if you believe you can take MJ and cheese him all game long. You're playing against NBA legends who don't exactly play their worst just because His Airness is supposed to win. The games are usually in 8 minute quarters and your tasks are usually to score just as many points as Jordan did, and to also achieve a few secondary objectives such as assists or holding your rival to some limit. Before jumping in you probably think it's not going to be that hard with a player rated 99 and well known for being the best to ever play the game. The reality is that even in the virtual world it's hard to live up to Jordan. Contributing to this level of difficulty are a number of factors: the improved AI, the difficulty of the objectives, the number of objectives, the quality of the opponents (think multiple legends on the Celtics), and in no small part to the fact that you are not playing 48 minute games. There were situations and scenarios - the little details that add up - that helped Jordan to achieve his stat lines. Putting you in shorter games going against virtual legends at full strength and not having the games unfold as they did in reality, that makes it pretty tough to say "go do what he did". 60+ points in 32 minutes plus a few other goals would be tough for a veteran of the 2K franchise to achieve, much less for someone less familiar with this series.

That's all fine and good, just have the new guys play a bunch of other games before taking up Jordan's challenges. But one common theme with NBA 2K11 is the lack of support. Where the Madden games often go over-the-top to help people play well, this game sets a new standard in telling you to "figure it out for yourself!" The controls are a bit different from last year's game. The pick and roll is pretty much the game of basketball, and the system in place this year has led me to many more turnovers or shot-clock violations. The isolation controls are improved and much simpler than they appear, but everything besides the one-on-one play is very difficult to execute. Again, good luck to the new guys. And something must be said for this game having one of the smallest and least informative booklets of any game ever. I suppose that signing Jordan forced Take-Two to make cut-backs somewhere - it doesn't even acknowledge defense and even the in-game controller setup doesn't correctly display all the control options. Hopefully later editions have a bit thicker booklet.

Adding to the control frustrations are the quirks in the AI. On offense your teammates often run plays and reposition in ways only they can understand and usually clogging the lane or bunching up on your side of the floor. Your team runs defense a bit better, but usually it's more a choice of the enemy AI just not taking advantage of every single mis-step you take. Often your defense will fall when one person gets out of position (usually you) and another defender leaves their assignment which leads to the open man and the bucket. What the game considers a blown assignment and what may really be something less than wide open matters little. The main failure is the game no longer has the lock-on defense being locked-on, it's more like a spring of defense as your subtle movements are translated into huge over-runs. Basically, it's the equivalent of having your ankles broken every play, and if you don't use the lock-on button you pretty much get run by; though at times the CPU can run straight through you if it so chooses.

The biggest change to the AI is in how often the CPU will force turnovers, much like the change in the Madden series a few years ago. This is compounded by the passing button not always picking the best option but the option you're technically pointing to. Add in each player having a passing rating and you may have to better think who will and when to pass the ball, rather than assuming what will happen. And other than that blatant change, the old complaints about sports AI still apply: players with eyes in the back of their heads, rubberband AI, and the computer being a little more magnetic in the things it does.