More news: AI, deep threes, defense and more [UPDATE]

[ThePointForward]

Link to the article: http://www.polygon.com/2016/8/22/125615 ... mpressions

Update: http://www.popsci.com/nba-2k17-improves ... and-gaming
Some interesting bits:

On deep threes (range rating for players?)

"Steph and [the Warriors] started doing all that crazy stuff, and we weren’t really ready for it," said Jones. "So we didn’t want people to be able to shoot those shots. That’s obviously something that [we] thought about and fixed for this year."
The key was to ensure that other skilled long-range shooters couldn’t match Curry’s ability to hit 3s from way, way out — not even his fellow "Splash Brother," Klay Thompson.
"And so we didn’t want to make that change without being able to individualize that to the one person currently who’s doing it."

On shooting:

You’ll have to pay more attention to the sticks when you’re shooting the ball, too. Visual Concepts introduced a shot meter in NBA 2K15, and last year, the player’s release timing only mattered for jump shots and shots in the post. Now you’ll need to time layups properly as well, and aiming is a factor in addition to timing — a jump shot will fly true only if you pull straight back on the right stick.

On freelance offense:

NBA 2K16 brought in authentic "freelance offenses" for clubs like the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs, but NBA 2K17 will have them for every team.

On defense and AI:

Jones told me that Visual Concepts did a lot of work on AI for coaches and players in NBA 2K17. That manifests itself in coaching decisions like the personnel on the court, and in the action itself, it means that players move with intent — they go to a spot on the floor for a particular reason, such as to help out with defense in the paint or to set a screen.
Jones pointed out that blocks are more realistic this year in the way they come about — namely, from help-side defense, which is a fundamental basketball philosophy. I saw teammates leave their assignment to stop someone from getting an easy basket in the paint.

On steals:

"If I can expect you to make a move and show the ball unprotected, I can time my button press" and knock the ball away, said Jones, who did this exact thing to me when we played each other. This applies to passes, too. Jones acknowledged that throwing the ball willy-nilly into the key was almost a "money" play last year. In about half an hour playing NBA 2K17, I saw multiple passes to the paint get deflected and even picked off. The ball just felt more live, whether on passes, steals or rebounds.

On ball control:

This year, you’ll still be able to re-create those signature dribble moves, but NBA 2K17 will offer one-to-one responsiveness to your movement on the analog sticks, according to Jones.

On contact layups (and dunks?):

In NBA 2K17, the direction in which you move the left stick will make a difference, so contact won’t necessarily come from the defensive side alone.
"There’s a level of physicality near the rim [in NBA 2K17] that’s never been part of 2K, in the sense that 2K, for me, has always felt like if I got hit going to the basket, the defender was always the initiator," Jones explained.

On stamina:

The new system in NBA 2K17 is designed to penalize people who lay on the sprint button all the time, because that’s simply not a realistic way to play basketball; you’ll have to bring in backups from time to time so your starters can catch a breather.

Also, USAB Coach K will be narrating 2K U (tutorials).

UPDATE:

On clipping:

To make the game more realistic, the team made sure you could no longer run or jump through an opposing player’s limbs, which was a complaint they heard repeatedly. This also means that the ball will actually ricochet off of a player’s arm or leg, making you fight for better position.

More on stamina:

In the previous 2K games, when your player would be low on energy, his attributes would suffer and he would have to be subbed out of the game. If you watch basketball, you know that this isn’t how professional athletes work. Yes, they need rest, but they often play just as well in the closing minutes of the game as they do at the beginning.
To replicate this, NBA 2K17 strayed away from a long-term energy tank and refocused on short term maximum energy use. What this means is that you can no longer sprint constantly, just like an NBA player doesn’t sprint the length of the court five times in a row. This prevents players from riding the turbo button, making you use your energy more wisely.

[Book_Gazette]

Wel stopping Curry and the Warrior are probably the number one thing I have to learn to combat opponents on Online. I hate this team so much, it got me on my nerves all last year. They don't even play basketball and they are ruining the league. I read about spacing and found a way to Anti-warriors strategy in NBA Live. It's to take jumpshots that are smart and open and make the weak Warriors defense weak so you can hit them just like Curry does it. Since a bit of Live will be implanted in this year's game this strategy will might as well work against the Warriors CPU. At first it will probably be noobs attempting 50 or so half courters and I won't contest a single one as he will make like 2 or 3 of those. Also since I'm on PC noobs are less frequent and more experienced players should be there.

[ThePointForward]

I'd pick Curry at halfline anyway.

[Book_Gazette]

In that case we should probably play each other using the Warriors online and see who can hit more half courters with Curry

[ThePointForward]

I meant it as a defender. The article made it sound like Curry is going to be the only one shooting somewhat reliably from very deep distances, so I'd have defender on him at the halfcourt or even sooner.

Still, I think they'll be beatable with Cavs. Put Kyrie on Curry, LeBron on Durant and lock down the perimeter. They somewhat lack depth and rim protection though.

[ThePointForward]

Also just seen different article with some complementary info, so I edited it into the first post.

[Andrew]

I'm not sure I like that change to the shot stick. That approach to aiming jumpshots didn't really work in NBA Elite 11. Admittedly, I still prefer to use the Shoot button unless I want to trigger a certain dunk or layup anyway but still...going to have to see how that one works out on the sticks. I'm leery, though.

One-to-one responsiveness on dribbling controls sounds good, as does improved physics and reduced clipping. I just hope that the CPU can't get away with clipping through defenders; it's always had an easier time of doing so than us users.

Accounting for Curry's crazy threes must have been challenging. He should be difficult to stop of course, but certainly not impossible. Hopefully, he's not cheese in the hands of users, or in the control of the CPU. I also hope that users can indeed be as prolific as the CPU when it comes to those shots, as long as they have a good grip on the shooting controls.

Cutting down on the abuse of sprint is definitely going to make things more sim online, since point guards won't be able to just run in circles and zig-zag cheese. I think it's a fine change for offline too, because neither the user nor the CPU should have infinite stamina and magically disappearing fatigue. No problems there, at least in theory.

Good to get some clarification on steals. That does sound like an improvement on last year, where all too often it felt like it was a case of "press steal to foul", at least in my experience. Once again, hopefully it's balanced and not overpowered, but it sounds like a more worthwhile improvement than the IGN article made it out to be.

[fjccommish]

So nobody but Curry can ever hit deep threes like Curry hits?

If people run a franchise for 20 years, nobody will ever again match Curry in that regard?

Hopefully this won't be a trend - abilities that are not match-able and are keyed to single players.

[Andrew]

I took it to mean that no one else currently in the game will be as proficient from that range, as is the case in real life (for now, anyway). Adding that variable to player abilities obviously allows for them to account for those shots. Presumably, that ability could be given to other players. It would be good if it showed up rarely in generated players as well, though.

[Uncle Drew]

Not one mention of improved box out rebounding intelligence, especially offensive. Guess it wasn't addressed.

[ThePointForward]

Speaking of boxing out, I hope there will be some clear explanation how to battle the box out. It was done well in 2K11 (triggers), but in 2K16 I'm totally lost.

[fjccommish]

"I took it to mean that no one else currently in the game will be as proficient from that range, as is the case in real life (for now, anyway). Adding that variable to player abilities obviously allows for them to account for those shots. Presumably, that ability could be given to other players. It would be good if it showed up rarely in generated players as well, though."

If the gamer, the person who paid for the game, can't add it, then it's a bad thing. I took it to mean the same thing you did, and extended to it isn't something editable. So 2K can add it, but the lowly customers can't add it.

It's the same as plays. Without a play editor, gamers are more reliant on 2K for changes to team styles. But in a multi year franchise, team styles should change, either at the hands of the gamer or by the game itself as teams change players.

That's one of the major flaws with the current game. The Cavs, 20 years down the line, still play the same style, same system, same plays, even though their team is totally different.

Your thought about the Curry-like three range showing up with generated players is good. But if it's not something I can add to a player, that's bad.

[Andrew]

Deeper roster editing functionality would be nice. It's pretty deep these days compared to what it used to be in basketball video games, but there are things that we can't change, and it certainly would help us if we could access that data in-game.

[ThePointForward]

Alright, finally got some time to formulate my opinion on the announced changes.

First off, the AI changes. I was often feeling that the defensive AI of my players was simply dumb. I could set opposing shooters to "tight" coverage, have denying threes as one of the points of emphasis and AI defender would still leave great shooters wide open while "helping" in the paint.
I really hope this means that the AI was improved o the point where this won't happen. That bigs are going to contest wide open layup happening one meter away from them. Etc, etc...
If that is the case, I'm pretty much sold now on this alone.

Next: clipping!
They make it sound like clipping was eliminated. Even if they eliminated "only" the most obvious clipping (player going through defender or ball going straight through body parts), it's a huge improvement. I love it more than the Lapsang Souchong tea I'm drinking right now. Because this could also result in better foul detection - we can only hope there will be no more fouls called with huge visible gap between defender and fouled player. Note that this is pure speculation right now, but I can see it happening.

As far as player offense (mostly shooting) is concerned, I'm pretty happy with the changes. Layups now need to be timed (kinda makes me feel dumb actually, because I was always timing them), which sounds fine to me. This could erase the "missing wide open layup with low OVR players" issue - it will be based on skill of the player more than before.
The shooting accuracy based on right stick position... Let's just say that I'm interested in seeing how it will work. Because right stick was mainly used to determine if you wanted to take various momentum shots, fadeaway, etc... So if we're now supposed to pull the stick back (back from the basket? camera relative?), how will we do momentum shots? Because I didn't see it in the "advanced controls" pictures, just gathers. Will the game automatically select which momentum shot I want when I pull the stick back?
And the "initiate the contact as attacker" is a nice addition as well. Because I want to be able to bully smaller defenders with players like LeBron. He just leans into the defender as he's driving towards the hoop and is still able to make a good layup or even dunk.

The improved responsiveness for ball control sounds great too - sounds like it's gonna be very fun breaking down Curry with Kyrie.
Steals has me worried a bit though. If it's more about "pressing the button at the right time", more online players will probably be trying to steal the ball from the ballhandler all the time. I think there needs to be also a bigger punishment for this.

And the stamina: sounds great. Punishing players that sprint with everybody all the time seems like the way to go. Players that bring the ball up at regular pace on standard possessions, playing basketball like it's supposed to be played, should be fine. Still, lots of online players often throw to ball to near the halfcourt line and then turbo all the way.

overall these news sound really, really nice and I hope there will be even more.

[sticky-fingers]

Well, i try another time if 2K read this forum ( and they should) :

For many year if there's contact during a spin, that's an automatic loose ball : FIX it 2K !

[Nick]

Curry might actually end up being too good in the game, which is mildly concerning. 2k do have a habit of over-compensating for complaints of casual fans. The fact that Curry didn't shoot threes like Curry was a big one last season.

A lot of this article is fluff and buzz words. I've been playing NBA videogames for a looong time. It's the same old promises and spinster talk every time.

Jones told me that Visual Concepts did a lot of work on AI for coaches and players in NBA 2K17. That manifests itself in coaching decisions like the personnel on the court, and in the action itself, it means that players move with intent — they go to a spot on the floor for a particular reason, such as to help out with defense in the paint or to set a screen.

That's...not a new concept to 2k games.

Jones pointed out that blocks are more realistic this year in the way they come about

More realistic than ever before! Wow!

"If I can expect you to make a move and show the ball unprotected, I can time my button press" and knock the ball away, said Jones, who did this exact thing to me when we played each other. This applies to passes, too. Jones acknowledged that throwing the ball willy-nilly into the key was almost a "money" play last year.

What? No it wasn't. It never has.

last year, the player’s release timing only mattered for jump shots and shots in the post. Now you’ll need to time layups properly as well.

That's actually an interesting idea. I never thought of that.

and aiming is a factor in addition to timing

And aiming too? Oh god. I can already see myself getting frustrated at all my missed layups.

You’ve been able to select a layup type before, but couldn’t truly convey whether you wanted to use a straight-ahead power move or go around someone. In NBA 2K17, the direction in which you move the left stick will make a difference, so contact won’t necessarily come from the defensive side alone.

Another interesting one. Looks like you can draw contact then? That's cool.

The new [fatigue] system in NBA 2K17 is designed to penalize people who lay on the sprint button all the time, because that’s simply not a realistic way to play basketball

This pleases me.

At some point, everyone who plays NBA 2K online seriously is going to have a high-rated player, just from having put in the time to upgrade their character’s attributes. So the way Visual Concepts sees it, giving players more control on the court is the only way to determine who has more skills on the sticks.

And also because E-Sports is a huge market and would be a huge opportunity for 2k.
Not complaining though. Gearing the game towards control over gameplay rather than the attributes/cpu sounds like a great initiative. I wonder if they can pull it off.