NBA 2k14

Ed Ropple wrote:

Did they take offline mode out of the GM/Player modes? I never okay then online because I have no interest in the IAP abuse.

You can make an offline save, but I don't remember getting prompted to do so when creating the MyGM files. It's the kind of thing where if you're offline they'll let you, but they don't push you in that direction.

In any case I prefer to play them in online mode, so I can use VC from MyGM games to build my MyCareer guy.

Blind_Evil wrote:
Ed Ropple wrote:

Did they take offline mode out of the GM/Player modes? I never okay then online because I have no interest in the IAP abuse.

You can make an offline save, but I don't remember getting prompted to do so when creating the MyGM files. It's the kind of thing where if you're offline they'll let you, but they don't push you in that direction.

In any case I prefer to play them in online mode, so I can use VC from MyGM games to build my MyCareer guy.

It would've been nice to have had an option from the start.

I've been addicted to this game lately. To sum up my feelings, playing in career mode on this game actually feels like you're playing basketball from the motions to execute moves to how you have to play on the court. The play grading system really forces you to be a team player and make smart moves if you want the maximum rewards.

My PG was drafted 12th in the 1st round to the Mavericks. Through the first half of the season we weren't even close to .500 and I kept pushing for the GM to trade for a better center. We eventually got Larry Sanders and then we went on a massive winning streak eventually winning the title in my first season. Yeah, the player character is still going to be a beast compared to most of the AI but it's still fun and you can still lose games. The worst part, to me, is when it's the 1st quarter, we're up by 6, the coach takes me out and when I go back in in the 2nd quarter we're down by 20. That hurts.

The servers are okay now, but y'know... with the draft looking like it does this year and a downright SHOCKING interest I have in the Bobcats since they're becoming the Hornets again (I grew up in North Carolina in the 90s, y'all) I'm tempted to minimize my play until next fall.

A story to relate:

So I was playing in MyCareer last night (a PG drafted to the Kings). I'm about 65 games into the season in which the team got off to a good start, sank to the bottom of the division, and is now in the middle of a month-long resurgence to get back into playoff contention. Last night I was playing a game against the Wizards. We'd just come back from something like a six game road trip in which we'd won five games, including four straight; now just one game off a .500 record. So I'm hoping this'll be an easi(ish) win.

Instead it's a dogfight down to the wire. We led most of the way, only to fall back six with about three minutes to play. My 3Pt specialist PG could hit nothing outside the paint. With the settings I'm using, combined with a 92 3pt shot skill rating, I can typically knock down about half my 3s. In this game nothing was dropping that wasn't a bunny near the rim.

So, with about 30 seconds on the clock, down three, I took an in-bounds pass, dribbled a bit and found myself letting fly from the top of the arc. With everything rimming out I had zero hope it was going to drop as pull-up jumpers from range in this game aren't high-percentage shots in my experience. Instead - string music! Tie game!

The Wiz bring the ball up court, drive the lane and get stripped in the paint (not by me) with about 10 seconds on the clock. Landry tosses me a pass at mid-court with the clock down to about 5 seconds. I mad rush to the three point line, three Wiz defenders really just kind of standing there like they weren't sure who should step up and contest, and let another fly. Game-winner, Female Doggoes! Five game winning streak. Take over possession of the eighth seed in the West. Back to a .500 record. If my fiancee and kids weren't all sleeping nearby I would've been shouting and jumping all over the place. Quite a moment.

Two thoughts occurred to me. I *hate* the VC system in this game -hate it-- but when the on-court game is clicking, it's still incredibly good. Also, I could barely keep my lid on over a game of NBA2k14 and everybody and their brother is wagging their finger at Richard Sherman? Riiiiiiight.

I'm still plugging away on the last few games of my 2nd season though I've started playing only key games instead of every game. It's interesting to see the differences in my player's stats during the simmed games. When I play I'll end up with around 30 points, maybe 4 or 5 assists, 5-6 steals, that sort of thing. When I sim a game he may come out with 14 points, 12 assists and 2 or 3 steals. Of course we also lose half the games as well. When I still played every game we were in 1st place in the west, I started playing only the key games around January of the season and now we're 5th in the west. Oh, and we also picked up Paul Pierce at the beginning of the 2nd season and he's spent probably 1/4 of the season out with one injury or another. Lovely.

I also started up a second career as a center and only played a few games. I don't think I'd have stuck with the game this long if I'd chosen that position for my first go-around.

The realism in this game in so good.

I was playing a game at a friend's house. Thunder vs. Heat. Lebron drives, doesn't get touched by anyone... foul called. REALISTIC!!!

Online is driving me nuts right now. I'm really confused as to how things are going the way they are. The microbumps that cause my passes to be off. The bumps on the way to the hoop that cause chippies to miss. The players who step 3 feet behind the line and because of that extra space they always hit the 3. With LeBron or Channing Frye. Doesn't matter. I feel like there's a style of playing online that I never learned and thus I just can't compete right now. And it's really little stuff. The way the other team's AI gets into passing lanes constantly while my team doesn't. The way the other team seems to always draw a foul and I get bumped just enough to miss the shot, but not enough to draw the foul. I feel like there's an entire school of play that I've failed to learn how to play and that there's no point in bothering with it any longer.

I'm not complaining about cheese. It's been part of online games forever. I don't like it, but it is what it is. I'm literally asking for help with the thing people often say in response to a question like this. How do I stop sucking less? What am I doing wrong? It's not that I want to cheese, but I feel like I'm getting outclassed in every way possible and I don't understand why. I understand basketball. I just don't understand NBA2k14 online play right now.

I find that using motion offenses and space-the-floor opens up my shooters a lot more. I spend most of the game driving hard with my best 2 or 3 and kicking out.

I grabbed this when it was on sale on Steam the other day but it has crashed twice on Windows and my xbox controller frequently freaks out. Is this a known issue?

Ed Ropple wrote:

I find that using motion offenses and space-the-floor opens up my shooters a lot more. I spend most of the game driving hard with my best 2 or 3 and kicking out.

You mean you go into the coaching settings and literally choose an offense where the floor is spaced more? Keeping in mind that these things reset themselves between online sessions. The main thing that's driving me nuts (I know I mentioned a lot of things) is that players I play online have their team setup to constantly anticipate passes. Like jumping into the passing lane right as I'm hitting the passing button. Pretty close to the "psychic dbs" that used to drive people nuts in EA foootball games.

I wish there was an obvious way to counteract this cheesing, but I've tried everything. Say I'm playing as the Spurs, Duncan is posting up and I have Tony Parker. Their opposing power forward is not only going to shade Tim Duncan to deny the ball, but he's going to jump the pass and tip it or pick it off. So then I fake and go over the top or swing the ball to the swing swingman and throw the ball over the top. His defensive player is also going to react to this immediately and knock the ball away. This can start to drive you insane because even if it's not going to remotely play basketball it would be nice to know how they were cheating so I could at least stay in games.

Like this game, no good at it, but relaxing from the couch on xbox one for me.

Ha, for me it's the other way around - this is one of the only games I have real trouble playing from the couch. I get alarmingly into it.

$7.49 on Steam yesterday. 3 hours left in the deal.

Got the e-mail that game on my wishlist is on sale. Probably as cheap as it will get.

Picked this up on the Steam sale. And I'm really bad at it, so I have ton of questions.

I'm coming from FIFA, where I only play the player career mode, and was gonna do that with this game. How does a rookie start out here? I mean, with FIFA you can become pretty good rather quick (which is kind of a flaw, I think). What kind of numbers should I be looking at? Or is it something that the more comfortable I get with the controls, I'll be better no matter what my skills?

On the topic of controls...wow, I have no idea what I'm doing there. I thought FIFA had a ton of stuff to remember. I've never gotten used to modern console controllers (the last console I played regularly was the Sega Genesis) even after a year or so with NHL on my Xbox and FIFA using and Xbox controller on my PC. But all of the stuff I have to do just to make a shot. Can I just use the X button? Or should I try to remember one or two moves with the right-controller and do those over and over? Is there a way to reset the Training Camp mode? I went through all of those one time, but would like to try it again. However, since I did them all, now it only gives me one shot at a skill and then kicks me back out to the menu.

I play PF, and feel like on offense I get pushed around and can never get position to get the ball or get a rebound. On defense too, rebounding seems off. Any tips? Or does that get easier as you get more skills?

Are there any mods that I should be using?

Ummm...that's all I can think of right now, but I'm sure once I fire the game back up, I'll have a bunch more!

mwdowns wrote:

Picked this up on the Steam sale. And I'm really bad at it, so I have ton of questions.

I'm coming from FIFA, where I only play the player career mode, and was gonna do that with this game. How does a rookie start out here? I mean, with FIFA you can become pretty good rather quick (which is kind of a flaw, I think). What kind of numbers should I be looking at? Or is it something that the more comfortable I get with the controls, I'll be better no matter what my skills?

It takes a while. Doing the drills helps. They almost tempt you into paying money for the in-game currency to then purchase attribute upgrades for your character. I didn't take that bait, though. What I did instead is I played a LOT of online MP. Probably the most online I've played since Battlefield: Bad Company 2. I think I've played 170 online matches. I enjoy the game online a lot. Even if there are quite a few a**hats out there. It might be better on PC. I don't know. But earn money in other ways while you learn the game, boost your shooting, etc. and eventually you get skilled. It will be slower, though.

mwdowns wrote:

On the topic of controls...wow, I have no idea what I'm doing there. I thought FIFA had a ton of stuff to remember. I've never gotten used to modern console controllers (the last console I played regularly was the Sega Genesis) even after a year or so with NHL on my Xbox and FIFA using and Xbox controller on my PC. But all of the stuff I have to do just to make a shot. Can I just use the X button? Or should I try to remember one or two moves with the right-controller and do those over and over? Is there a way to reset the Training Camp mode? I went through all of those one time, but would like to try it again. However, since I did them all, now it only gives me one shot at a skill and then kicks me back out to the menu.

You can use the X button to shoot (assuming you're using an XBox controller with your PC). That's what I do a lot of the time. I use the right thumbstick when I'm shooting long jumpers to get more accuracy. But you can do either. You eventually get the hang of the controls. You just have to play it a bit. I can't give you a rundown on the timeline because I didn't go from Genesis to 2k14. I played NBA 2k (the original Dreamcast game) on through this one. So I have a lot of practice since the NBA is my favorite sport and thus this is the sports game I generally play the most.

mwdowns wrote:

I play PF, and feel like on offense I get pushed around and can never get position to get the ball or get a rebound. On defense too, rebounding seems off. Any tips? Or does that get easier as you get more skills?

It definitely gets easier the more you play. I will say, though, that the way the AI works it's harder to score points and make an impact if you're not a ball handler. I started as a PF (since that's what I played in school) and re-rolled a character who was a point-forward type small forward. That way I get shifted to shooting guard frequently, get the chance to handle the ball, make assists, etc. I put LOTS of my points into shooting in the paint, layups, dunks, etc. That way you can get easy buckets to start with and then work on your outside jumper, etc. later. That would probably track pretty well with someone just learning the game. Get the easy shots down first. Raise your "team grade" by setting screens, playing good defense, etc. Like, set screens constantly. Eventually you get more points and your skills go up. I didn't see a sharp ramp up until I was towards the end of my first season.

mwdowns wrote:

Are there any mods that I should be using?

Ummm...that's all I can think of right now, but I'm sure once I fire the game back up, I'll have a bunch more!

Not sure about mods. If there are mods to let you cheat the skill system I wouldn't hesitate to bump your guy up slightly. You do start off WAY underpowered for a first round draft pick.

What's the deal with free-throws? I keep reading that there's a glowing circle to look for, but I only see that after my shot it gone. I don't understand what I'm supposed to do to make the shot go in. Do I use the x button or the right-stick? Do I hold on to the button for a long time? Or just tap it?

Still banging my head against this game.

Time it to the release. The release will also be synced to the flash beneath your dude's feet (this goes for jumpers too). By the time you see it, you're late, so learn to anticipate it. I find the 'Cue' free throw motion to be the easiest to anticipate, with many of the other big-man FT motions being too bizarre to predict.

A better FT skill increases your shot percentage for an off-time FT; a perfect release always goes in.

I don't remember seeing a flash beneath the feet. Did I miss an option somewhere?

As far as I know, it's the default. Your player indicator flashes at the optimal time to shoot.

Seems kinda like a bad design choice. I thought the different free-throw choices were cosmetic, but I actually have to know when I should be releasing the ball? Should just have some sort of meter thingy.

I think meters are a worse design choice than letting you experiment with your player's shot and figure out the optimal solution in different instances. Some players have a quicker shot that's more useful in spot-up; others have a later release that works well against post defense or over-eager lunging defenders. And since regular shots use a timing mechanism, it seems perfectly obvious to me to use it for FTs.

"Hold Square, release Square when it feels right" is how I've played NBA2K since 2K12 and it feels very natural at this point to do so.

Wish there was a way to practice my free throws before getting in the game and going 0 for whatever. I'm worse than Shaq on one of his off-days.

mwdowns wrote:

Wish there was a way to practice my free throws before getting in the game and going 0 for whatever. I'm worse than Shaq on one of his off-days. :D

I play NBA 2K14 so casually and infrequently that I just set free throws to real life percentage.

Will that work on MyCareer?

mwdowns wrote:

Will that work on MyCareer?

My bad. I never play the my career stuff in sports games. My interest in sorts games are in the team strategy and assembling rosters.

Your career dude has an apocalyptic FT skill to start, so, yeah.

If you dump points into it (80 should be fine) you can miss the optimal point by a lot and make the shot.

Ah, OK. I got a style that I think I understand, but keep missing everything except the perfect timings. So, I guess I'll be sinking my next batch of SP into free-throws.

Ed, do you use any particular mods or slider settings?

I play the next-gen version now on PS4, but I've never found interesting mods for the PC versions. I usually tweak success on open shots down somewhat because it's ludicrous (especially when you learn how to run a pick and roll), but other than that I think the stock sliders are OK.