The NBA 2K video game series has left a mark in history in the sports video game industry. The series, which held dear to the hearts of many fans in the early and mid 2010s, became one of the most hated sporting franchises on the market.
The rise of NBA 2K
Visual Concepts released their first game titled NBA 2K in 1999 for the Sega Dream cast. NBA 2K, along with many of NBA 2K’s following releases, would be largely overlooked, with many sports fans heavily favoring their number one competitor – Electronic Art’s NBA Live, for the majority of the early to mid 2000s. From 2007 to 2009, NBA Live reigned on top of NBA 2K, but NBA Live saw a significant drop in sales and popularity. Around this time, EA shifted their focus to retaining their player base rather than developing quality games by improving gameplay and fixing the core issues within the game. While EA was slowly beginning to neglect NBA Live over the years, NBA 2K made great improvements with every release, improving the raw mechanics and gameplay. In 2009, NBA 2K introduced the “MyPlayer” mode, later named “MyCareer,” a story mode that gave the players the ability to create and follow their own character while building their skills as a rookie. MyPlayer would explode NBA 2K’s popularity, quickly becoming the NBA game of choice for fans and critics. In 2009, EA with the help of Mike Wang would release one of their best NBA Live games to date, however, Wang returned to 2K shortly after the release of NBA Live 10. In 2010, EA made a fatal mistake for the future of NBA Live games, instead of improving the gameplay and mechanics of NBA Live 10, the developers decided to go back to the drawing board, eventually changing the name from “NBA Live 11” to “NBA Elite 11”, as well as altering all the controls, making the game difficult for newer players to pick up. EA then released a demo of the game, however, the game was littered with bugs and glitches. On Nov. 2, 2010, EA Sports confirmed the cancellation of NBA Elite 11. The NBA 2K franchise capitalized on their competitors’ downtime, producing 2K11, one of their greatest and most beloved games out of the entire series. NBA 2K continued to explode in popularity while releasing amazing games for the next 3 years, eventually overtaking NBA Live. EA wouldn’t announce the creation of another NBA Live game until 2013. In 2013, NBA Live 14 and NBA 2K14 were both released, however NBA 2K continued to dominate NBA Live with the introduction of the revolutionary game mode “The Park.” The Park gave the 2K community an opportunity to use their MyPlayers to play casual games of street basketball together. In the following years, 2K was considered the best franchise for basketball games over EA Sports. EA continued to cancel releases and eventually completely gave up on the NBA Live franchise in 2019.
The fall of NBA 2K
NBA 2K18 was arguably the worst game to be released in the series, and marked the beginning of 2K’s fall from grace. In 2017, NBA 2K18 was full of broken promises, but it also pushed microtransactions to its limit, as $60 no longer bought players the full game experience. MyCareer, the highlight of 2K games, was locked behind a paywall. Players who simply wanted to enjoy playing with their characters were essentially forced to spend money to improve their stats to compete with the other players. The characters’ haircuts, clothing, shoes and tattoos in MyCareer were also blocked by microtransactions. Fans became frustrated and disappointed with the state of the game, demanding for a better alternative. Fortunately, microtransactions were improved in 2K19, however, with little to no competition since the disappearance of NBA Live in 2018, 2K started to become complacent. Very few changes were being made to the gameplay of new releases, even the centerpiece of the game. 2K20’s version of The Park” was practically identical to “The Park” in 2K19. 2K was taking advantage of the lack of competition, annually producing incomplete games that seemed nearly identical to the releases prior. MyCareer in every release following 2K18 would be filled with bugs and glitches that were easily exploited by many people in the community, making the mode far less enjoyable for the average player. Despite all the terrible reviews, bugs and glitches, 2K still manages to retain some of their player base since there are no other quality titles for basketball fans to turn to.
