Predictions for 2K12

I've been writing up a prediction article for the past month or so and finally narrowed it down enough (and made it less wishlisty) to post on the main page yesterday before the teaser was released. You can check it out here but I was curious as to what you guys think about my predictions and if you had any to make before E3 (hopefully) gives us more information.

Last Updated 9/29/2011 - Correct Prediction - Wrong Prediction

With E3 giving us our first look at NBA 2K12 next week and our first teaser coming tonight (with 2K11 footage), I wanted get some of my predictions for NBA 2K12 public before the information begins rolling out. Here is my list of predictions followed by my reasoning behind them, feel free to discuss my thoughts in the comments.


Derrick Rose on the Cover - wrong, MJ, Bird, Magic...honestly, who could have called that?

More Historic Teams - correct, although we are still getting a lot of repeat teams

Challenges for other Historic Players - correct, right on the nose

Start My Player as a College Star or as a Scrub - you start the game in a college all-star game, not the draft combine

An Online League expanding on Crews - Crews have been removed from 2K12

Removal of Blacktop Mode - wrong, never been so happy to be wrong

TNT Presentation Package - early gameplay footage confirms this is wrong

Direct Uploads to YouTube - confirmed in the manual, Facebook uploads too



The Cover

For the cover of NBA 2K12 I see 2K going with the MVP of this season Derrick Rose. Rose has shown up on the cover for 2K10's standalone Draft Combine and was involved in 2K's advertising this past year. I don't think Jordan will get the cover for a second year (even though Shaq and Iverson had multi-year covers) but 2K would be silly to drop Jordan from the game, which brings me to.....

wrong all over, strike one

Historic Teams

The inclusion of historic teams in NBA 2K11 was one of the best selling points for 2K gearing towards both the casual gamer and hardcore basketball fans. The Jordan challenge, covering 10 of the greatest Jordan moments (thankfully not crossing over to MLB 2K11), should be seen as a great success despite the historic teams only having 6-8 players licensed and only having 10 different teams (not including duplicate Bulls and Jazz teams). I want to see 2K expand the historical content this year with a similar Jordan challenge mode that extends to more players. Reggie Miller, Kobe, Bird, Magic, all have defining performances that could translate to this mode. 2K made a huge splash with Jordan this year they should build on that momentum into next year's game even if it overshadows the (possibly locked-out) 2012 NBA season.

the people wanted challenges for Kobe, Miller and Barkley, too bad we didn't get them

My Player

My Player saw a nice improvement over 2K10's initial offering but nothing can explain why my 44 OVR, 2nd round drafted, rookie is the 6th man of my team. I hope that in 2K12, if you are 44 OVR, then you are in the D-League for the foreseeable future. Making the mode tougher and more realistic would be a fantastic change to some players, but many people complained that 2K10's mode was way too hard, and despite having wicked stats in their combine, they still got thrown down to the NBDL. 2K should give us the option next year of either being a scrub who is working their way into the NBA, or a one-and-done college star who could realistically play a major factor in their rookie year.

you start the My Player mode playing in a College All-Star game at MSG. gotta be a star to get in the ASG right? also, looks like we start around 65 OVR for a rating.

2KBA

One of the most exciting features in the canceled NBA Elite 11 for me was the EASBA. Playing off the success of the EA NHL series' EASHL, you take your created player, create a team with your friends, and play in a fictional league where every player is human controlled in a Team-Up mode. This kind of online league has been a success in EA's hockey and fighting games, so 2K should capitalize on the off-year for EA's NBA series and get this mode out for basketball first. Earning skill points in My Player by playing street pick up games is already fun and 2K already has their Crew system to build upon. Speaking of pick up games....

Confirmed by those who have the game early, Crews have been completely removed from 2K12.


Blacktop Mode

I realize that most “sim heads” hate the Blacktop mode and think that the disc space would be better used on more animations. Personally, I play more pick up games in Blacktop mode than I play NBA Today games, but I know that I am in the far minority when it comes to that. Many people still play the Blacktop mode, especially locally with other people on the couch, but I don't think that will save the mode. Unfortunately I think 2K will cut the mode completely and finally integrate the dunk contest and 3 point shootout into Association mode.


Presentation

Presentation-wise 2K has been a juggernaut. The “live” commentary through the NBA Today mode and integrating it with Association mode finally was a brilliant move. Unfortunately, this didn't prevent me from turning the commentary off again this year. The same team or player specific stories get played game after game, which like 2K10's commentary, was very refreshing and cool at first, and now is just plain annoying. We already know that Steve Kerr will be coming over to the 2K series for the first time so hopefully a new voice (reading new lines) can freshen up the commentary. I think 2K will also bring TNT's license with in as well, finally giving 2K a non-generic broadcast for the first time since 2K5.

early impressions are that Kerr has freshened up the commentary but there is no sign of a TNT license

YouTube

Finally, my last prediction is that we will be able to upload our reelmaker videos straight to YouTube this year instead of uploading them to the slow community website. You may remember this tweet from Ronnie2K in December that where he mentioned talking with YouTube representatives. Yes, that makes this a very safe prediction to end this article but YouTube integration will allow 2K12 fan videos to get much more popular than the community videos that we've been uploading since 2K9.

confirmed in the manual

Nicely done.

Derrick Rose is my pick for the cover as well. He's established himself as a star, he's the reigning MVP and as you noted he has a prior working relationship with 2K. Maybe they put MJ on the cover for the second year running, perhaps the tag line of the greatest returning with a vengeance is a clue after all, but I'm guessing they'll go back to a current player and that it will be Rose.

The "vengeance" tag line may certainly allude to more historical content and that would be a great move, especially if there is a lockout (but would be most welcome regardless). It doesn't seem far fetched at all that we'd see more Jordan content and other historical teams and scenarios included. Those improvements/additions to My Player and online play seem quite likely as well, they're certainly good ideas moving forward.

I'm not sure about them removing Blacktop Mode. They probably won't do anything significant with it but it works well enough and I'd say there's a decent number of users who are interested in it, so it'll probably be left as-is.

TNT presentation seems very likely with them bringing Steve Kerr in. Teaming him up with Marv Albert would be fantastic; if they do have Jordan content, I'd love for them to have separate commentary with Marv paired up with Mike Fratello as he was in the early 90s.

Direct uploads to YouTube would be awesome but I'm not so sure about that. I have a feeling they'd rather keep things on their own server where they've got more control over it and don't have to come to an agreement with anyone else.

Yep, nice.

Going with the Cover as Derrick Rose and the TNT presentation too.

Play My Player mode with NBA Players

Returning the 2k10 Sprite Slam Dunk Contest

Cant think of more

"The greatest will be back, with a vengeance"???

You should be able to see college (or euroleague/domestic league) stats of draftees in association mode. I really hate drafting an excellent player who turns out being able to play 25 minutes max cause of foul trouble.

"The greatest will be back, with a vengeance"???

That's the tag line they've gone with.

"The greatest will be back, with a vengeance"???

That's the tag line they've gone with.

what's that mean?

Whatever you want it to mean.

The greatest (Jordan) will be back, with a vengeance
The greatest (Historic Players) will be back, with a vengeance
The greatest (2k) will be back, with a vengeance

And that's about all we can do for the moment, speculate.

You should be able to see college (or euroleague/domestic league) stats of draftees in association mode. I really hate drafting an excellent player who turns out being able to play 25 minutes max cause of foul trouble.

Decrease his commit fouls tendency.

DRose or Dirk on the cover, unless MJ makes a return, hoping for much more detailed my player, as it still basically is just player lock mode

I just hope for better contact animations and stuff. When they added this in 2k11 it seems live'ish, and we all know live ain't 100% realistic. I like them, but I sure hope they work on them.

I believe they will continue to improve presentation, add new features to association and my player, new and improved moves and animations, hooopefully all star Saturday night, and... D Rose and MJ on the cover together





P.S. Heat should've won last night

Heat should've won last night

They did. Didn't you see LeBron and Wade celebrating? Then Dallas went to work...

Like they said, that was no celebration

You should be able to see college (or euroleague/domestic league) stats of draftees in association mode. I really hate drafting an excellent player who turns out being able to play 25 minutes max cause of foul trouble.

Decrease his commit fouls tendency.

I know I can do that, but I don't want to cheat - if the player is prone to fouls, then so be it, but before I draft him I'd like to be made aware of his fouls.

You don't have to cheat. Improve his defensive awareness through development drills or off-season workout, which at least gives you a justification to decrease his foul tendency a bit; or wait a few years for him to 'gain experience' in the league and then decrease the tendency.

It's also hardly cheating when it's 2K's system that's screwed. The game uses the commit foul tendency to limit scrubs' and rookies' playing time. A commit foul tendency of 50's-60's is already sufficient for 3-4 fouls per game in association sim stats, which is pretty much like irl. Having commit foul tendency in the 75-90 (max I've seen was 98) range is stupid.
I had Gilbert Arenas once with a foul tendecy of 51 or 57 (can't remember exactly) and he was already getting 3.5-4 fpg, which is pretty much what he was getting when he was with the Wizards. Of course I could be wrong since I don't exactly know what 2K bases it commit foul ratings from (foul %? foul per x minutes?) but the point is 2K has got to find a better way of limiting rookies and scrubs playing time instead of relying on the commit foul tendency to do that.

I'm running a 50% average (kinda), 2 right, 2 wrong. 4 left.

I think we pretty much all got the historical content predictions right in some way, I guess looking back that was a given. I was wrong on the cover; my "Maybe they put MJ on the cover for the second year running" doesn't really count.

I'm going to give myself at least half credit on the My Player prediction, I feel that is deserved.

Fair call.

I'm surprised they didn't go after the TNT license, with all the work that's going into presentation (not to mention bringing in former NBA on TNT producers to help out with it), I figured they would.

I still think that Sony might still have the rights to it extending from their defunct NBA series, hopefully that runs out before next year.

never been so happy to be wrong, Blacktop is making a comeback and is "cleaned up" w/e that means.

Nvm. Read wrong.

I think I only got right "My Player with NBA Players" thing

I figured Blacktop would still be around. Removing popular modes has been an unfortunate trend with NBA Live moreso than NBA 2K.

Crews have been removed from 2K12 (leaked by early lucky peoples). So there goes a negative for my 2KBA idea.

Nothing has been mentioned about the community site at all yet, or about YouTube uploads, but I'm starting to have doubts....