Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

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Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Andrew on Sat Mar 11, 2017 8:56 am

UPDATE: The visit took place, and the interview was conducted. Part 1 has been posted on OS' YouTube channel.

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Operation Sports will have the opportunity to visit 2K Sports next week, and chat with some members of the community who are now working on NBA 2K. Chris is taking questions from the community, which you can submit in reply to the post I've linked to. I'm happy to pass along questions that get posted here as well.

IMPORTANT NOTE: As clarified by OurLEFTOS here, the conversation won't be touching on any issues related to NBA 2K17, nor will it preview NBA 2K18. It's about developer stories, such as what it's like to go from the community to the development team, what it's like to work in the industry and on one of your favourite game series, and so on. In other words, these interviews will be about the people behind NBA 2K, rather than NBA 2K itself.

With that said, questions can be posted below, or over on OS of course.
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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby StyxTx on Sat Mar 11, 2017 11:48 am

Well it figures. They don't listen to users anyway about the game itself, so why change. They just keep messing it up more and more with each 'update' and patch, damned what the users think. Personally, I don't care about the stories of the people behind 2k. What I want is a game I can sit down and enjoy that doesn't cheat and have more cheats built in as time goes by.

As far as operation sports, I was banned cuz I had the audacity to disagree with someone. They only want people who agree with them all the time.
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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby Book_Gazette on Sat Mar 11, 2017 2:22 pm

I wonder if they can do some more stuff to PC users and what is their future with that platform?
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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby Andrew on Tue Mar 28, 2017 9:52 am

Part 1 has been posted.

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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby deodorantthief1 on Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:14 am

Does READING reviews and paying SPECIFIC attention to game scores help motivate you guys in your work? Or do you choose TO JUST NOT PAY HEED or EVEN COMMENT on them altogether? Kicking a football at a beehive sorta speak.
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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby Andrew on Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:24 am

A bit too late for questions at this point.
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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby deodorantthief1 on Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:29 am

Oh crap. Didn't read thoroughly.
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Re: OS visiting 2K next week, taking questions

Postby Andrew on Tue Mar 28, 2017 10:51 am

I should probably update the thread title to avoid confusion.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby I Hate Mondays on Tue Mar 28, 2017 11:26 pm

Really enjoyed watching this. Leftos looks exactly like his sketched profile pic, lol
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Andrew on Sat Apr 01, 2017 11:10 pm

I realise it's not of interest to everyone, but I'm certainly proud of Jon and Leftos, so it's cool to see them interviewed (and for the NLSC to get a shoutout, obviously).
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby [Q] on Sun Apr 02, 2017 7:54 am

Ha it's cool we got a shout-out but EA went missing in Scott's history for obvious reasons
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Andrew on Sun Apr 02, 2017 9:17 am

Indeed. I think they handled it well, though.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Andrew on Tue Apr 04, 2017 11:22 am

Part 2.

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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby I Hate Mondays on Tue Apr 04, 2017 9:11 pm

Even though this episode was a "stop hatin' on us, guys, we are all human", I don't mind it. Still enjoying this series and glad to see the guys behind the game.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Dee4Three on Wed Apr 05, 2017 4:52 am

I agree with Leftos, to a degree.

My complaints towards the game have nothing to do with me thinking it's "Easy" to make changes, or easy to create the game, or easy to produce it. My gripes have to do with grasping the reality of certain gameplay issues that are obviously major game interrupters. And, the fact that they don't seem to be addressed. It's easy to fix the portrait issues with Charles Smith being assigned to Matt Bullard for the 3rd year in a row, and Adrian Griffin having his portrait for himself but 2k also giving an Adrian Griffin portrait to Walt Williams, for the second year in a row. And copying all of Lebrons signatures to Isaiah Rider, and not giving Nick Van Exel Shawn Marions FT, etc. Those are easy ones, and they should have been fixed for this years version of the game considering they were known issues with last years version.

The gameplay issues like the players not holding onto the ball securely, floating passes, charging issues, forced animations, broken defense, speed issues etc are obviously going to take more work and expertise to fix, but we as consumers absolutely deserve that thread I opened awhile ago that has over 120 comments on it about these issues, because feedback is vital, especially consumer feedback.

When we see reviews from other sites like IGN not addressing any of these issues, and when the consumer (us) is ignored or feel ignored, that's when we start to get really frustrated.

Nobody said it was easy to fix, and I have nothing but respect for Leftos and JaoSming, but I havn't seen one comment of someone saying "THIS IS AN EASY FIX!", but just that they want it to be fixed for this version of the game or next years version.

In regards to roster signatures/tendencies/attributes, I have to say that I am completely and totally underwhelmed with the effort put into the classic teams. This is something that requires a person who just needs to know about the game, and how the game works (sim stats and how the ratings/tendencies impact how they play on the floor). That is something I am quite a bit more unforgiving on, because it doesn't take coding or anything. It literally is just knowing your stuff, and applying it.

And the comment about playing for "hundreds of hours" or whatever, and the way it was said, like it means nothing.... irked me. The people who put that many hours into the game DO know a lot about the gameplay, and absolutely give great feedback. I certainly believe I know the gameplay inside and out by now, with yes, my hundreds and hundreds of hours of gameplay. We are the loyal ones who love the game of basketball, and for better or for worse, stick with the NBA 2K series.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Andrew on Wed Apr 05, 2017 9:18 pm

To be fair, I have seen quite a few comments from people over the years claiming that fixing certain problems (or indeed designing the game itself) is a simple process. Those people have often gone on to describe solutions that indicate that their knowledge of programming and game design isn't as strong as they perhaps think it is. I know I had misconceptions until I attended community events and played games that were still in development, so I can only imagine there are more surprising revelations for people who go from the community to actually working on the games. It's always going to sound defensive and like an excuse, but I can see, and to some degree relate, to where they're coming from.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Dee4Three on Thu Apr 06, 2017 12:01 am

Andrew wrote:To be fair, I have seen quite a few comments from people over the years claiming that fixing certain problems (or indeed designing the game itself) is a simple process. Those people have often gone on to describe solutions that indicate that their knowledge of programming and game design isn't as strong as they perhaps think it is. I know I had misconceptions until I attended community events and played games that were still in development, so I can only imagine there are more surprising revelations for people who go from the community to actually working on the games. It's always going to sound defensive and like an excuse, but I can see, and to some degree relate, to where they're coming from.


Fair enough, I can agree with you on that.

I love the time ive spent playing 2k/modding 2k over the years, it's been a great hobby.

I'm looking forward to seeing what they can do!
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby StyxTx on Thu Apr 06, 2017 3:11 am

Maybe they could get some people from SD Studios as advisors.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Dee4Three on Thu Apr 06, 2017 7:13 am

I think they did a good job grabbing a couple people from NLSC (Leftos and JaoSming), obviously the people who spend a ton of time on NLSC have a true passion for basketball and NBA 2K. Vlad as well, so that's three that I know of.

I wonder how many people they have actually working on the rosters (Player updates), like attributes/tendencies and whatnot.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Leftos on Thu Apr 06, 2017 10:40 am

Andrew wrote:To be fair, I have seen quite a few comments from people over the years claiming that fixing certain problems (or indeed designing the game itself) is a simple process. Those people have often gone on to describe solutions that indicate that their knowledge of programming and game design isn't as strong as they perhaps think it is. I know I had misconceptions until I attended community events and played games that were still in development, so I can only imagine there are more surprising revelations for people who go from the community to actually working on the games. It's always going to sound defensive and like an excuse, but I can see, and to some degree relate, to where they're coming from.

This.

My point wasn't "boohoo, game development is hard, woe is me, if there's any problems I'm going to pretend they're too hard to fix and use that as an excuse". It was about my own misconceptions about how simple the systems implemented in NBA 2K must be (e.g. the simulator, trade logic, etc.) and how easy it should be for me to go into them myself and just "fix them", and my befuddlement at how complex they were and how much harder they are to tune and improve than I imagined once I started working there. Others that have gone from similar positions of experiencing games as gamers for hundreds or thousands of hours and believing they've figured out each game's inner workings to actually working on the games have expressed similar sentiments. That was my point. It's a challenge, but one I'm taking on every day I work here, and gladly so.

I'm not making excuses for myself, or anyone on the team. Yeah, this job is hard (what a surprise!), but that's the whole point.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Dee4Three on Thu Apr 06, 2017 11:09 am

Leftos wrote:
Andrew wrote:To be fair, I have seen quite a few comments from people over the years claiming that fixing certain problems (or indeed designing the game itself) is a simple process. Those people have often gone on to describe solutions that indicate that their knowledge of programming and game design isn't as strong as they perhaps think it is. I know I had misconceptions until I attended community events and played games that were still in development, so I can only imagine there are more surprising revelations for people who go from the community to actually working on the games. It's always going to sound defensive and like an excuse, but I can see, and to some degree relate, to where they're coming from.

This.

My point wasn't "boohoo, game development is hard, woe is me, if there's any problems I'm going to pretend they're too hard to fix and use that as an excuse". It was about my own misconceptions about how simple the systems implemented in NBA 2K must be (e.g. the simulator, trade logic, etc.) and how easy it should be for me to go into them myself and just "fix them", and my befuddlement at how complex they were and how much harder they are to tune and improve than I imagined once I started working there. Others that have gone from similar positions of experiencing games as gamers for hundreds or thousands of hours and believing they've figured out each game's inner workings to actually working on the games have expressed similar sentiments. That was my point. It's a challenge, but one I'm taking on every day I work here, and gladly so.

I'm not making excuses for myself, or anyone on the team. Yeah, this job is hard (what a surprise!), but that's the whole point.



Sorry if I came off like a jerk Leftos, wasn't my intention.

I value you guys a lot, thanks for continuing to work on the game.

My apologies.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby PeacemanNOT on Thu Apr 06, 2017 11:12 am

I don't have a huge saying on the whole gameplay side of things but for me atleast I've noticed over the past couple of years there are parts of the game that get completely ignored (the retro part of the game in particular). I know you don't deal with this certain part of the game Leftos but the art in this game is quite questionable. There is no excuse with the art as there is with actually coding the inners of the game.

I won't bash you guys too much but some of the stuff your art team produces is down right terrible, and yes you could say that it comes down to time constraints/working on the next game etc. but if a normal modder like me, an amateur can produce something ten times better through GIMP, a free image editor in a couple of hours surely people with actual experience in that field of work and possibly even degrees of that nature can produce better artwork. I applaud some of the stuff you've worked on however, if I'm not mistaken you worked extensively on MyGM and MyLeague, the whole expansion feature was a brilliant addition and I never had any problems with it.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby hedop on Thu Apr 06, 2017 10:12 pm

Tbh I simply don't care anymore. There are so many legacy issues especially with the offline modes that have been mentioned again and again and again since 2k14 and well before that that have not been adressed. Neither has the issue been adressed that MyCareer is getting more rubbish each game, becomes more and more online focussed forcing people like me, who simply do not want to play in the Park to still grind like crazy for a pair of shorts or a headband, being forced into more or less unplayable archetypes, not being able to try them properly because it requires committing a serious amount of VC to really know how well one archetype plays, animations and attire getting more and more expensive each year while the VC reward per game is dropping and dropping and the price for VC is going up and up.

Yeah those guys are developers and don't really have anything to do with the monetisation of the whole game but how on earth can you defend this rubbish business practice of draining people of more and more cash each year while still shelling out a game full price every year that is hyped to no end by Scott OG and the boyz while basically being a roster update. How about getting to work on those legacy issues? How about giving players who don't want to play in the park a proper non corny career mode without having to pay through the nose to enjoy the game without grinding 200 hours per career just to get an 80 rated player? How about getting to work on half the faces of the old school teams that still look like they were taken from the N64? How about making legends available through MyTeam available to play offline? How bout da? Seriously how about getting to work on this game properly? Maybe take a break for 2-3 years and really iron out stuff that has been persistent for years now? How about giving us a proper editor in game that doesn't force us to use chinese tools? I would love to create some coaches for the coaching pool but I can't. I'd love to download specific players from a community creation suit but I can't. I'd love to edit the Arenas of teams, jerseys, who has which pick and so forth but again... I can't. Give the offline features some love and stop wasting all the energy on the Park and Park after dark and all that rubbish.

Yeah I get it that that is where your money is made mainly but at some point people will stop buying the game because a lot of us do actually play season mode and want to experiment with old school players with proper faces and tendencies and do want to have Phil Jackson on the sideline for the Bulls or even if we aren't into oldschool we want to start our own team with at least the city name being called during games and the game playing like a proper basketball sim if we use the right slider set. Not everybody who plays this game is a 15 year old with ADHD whose mission in life it is to break every single season and career record with Russel Westbrook.

Btw. I disagree with the expansion feature. Yeah it's great but what isn't great is that there is neither a list of city names nor of team names that you can pick from that the announcers will actually call out which is basically the backbone of this feature. If the announcers won't call my team anything what's the point of playing in Seattle? How hard would it be to include some obvious city and team names from the past and throw them in there? Bullets, Royals, Spirits, Renaissance etc. How hard is it to throw some old team designs in there to choose from? The NBA holds nearly all the rights to these legacy team names and images so why not put them in the game? Why can't I just change the uniform of my team from time to time or throw together a cool new special uniform myself if my team only has 3 or 4 options instead of 10 like the Lakers?

And how hard is it to use the face scanning feature of WWE 2k? Sure the overall result if you have like a killer phone with cam, killer lighting, killer everything might be better on 2k17 but seriously... who has that? And who has the time to take like 50 attempts to get one halfway decent one? WWE 2k has the more user friendly and better system so use it!
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby Dee4Three on Fri Apr 07, 2017 5:41 am

When you said "How bout da", I cringed... UGH.

And in regards to not having some coaches/players, that's not 2k's fault (atleast I don't think it is). Its a contract thing, they have to get the player/coach to agree to be in the game. So, if Phil Jackson didn't agree, or a player like Sheed, they cant be put in the game. I am very forgiving of this aspect of 2k, because they can only do so much in that regard.

The legacy issues do need to be ironed out, and I do have a feeling they are being looked at, judging by what they said about the next patch coming through.
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Re: Operation Sports' Visit to 2K Studios

Postby I Hate Mondays on Fri Apr 07, 2017 6:14 am

Let's get episode 3 out alreeaaady. Trying to fantasize about getting contacted by 2k and making the team based on the stories presented in the videos. Sweet, wet dreams
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