NBA 2K18 AI Improvements with video footage

[I Hate Mondays]

Check everything here :
http://www.operationsports.com/nba-2k18 ... gallagher/


I can't get a summary of everything without those excellent preview videos. I like how everything looks, I can really see some hard work and actual improvements in 2K18 on the first sight.

[volsey]

Honestly articles like these are what sells the games to me. This got me excited. Logical rotations, players responding appropriately (don't leave a 3 point shooter open on the 3 to cover a bad shooting C whose open outside the paint). Now I just need to hear that transition offense and defense is improved, and player speed/acceleration/momentum is no longer archaic and it sounds like I'll love this game.

[I Hate Mondays]

What got me pumped up over everything are the new 8 styles of coaching. In previous games, we simply didn't have the material to tweak teams to play like their real life counterparts. I really hope those 8 styles of play will make a difference between the quick paced Rockets and the slow and experienced Spurs.

[dare]

Blogs like this makes me excited, it's well detailed too. I'm excited about System Proficiency, I think this makes free agency a lot of fun.

[bluejaybrandon]

http://www.sportsgamersonline.com/nba-2 ... mike-wang/

Just a friendly reminder that this was last years blog of a similar style. While many of the things mentioned were noticeable improvements, there is certainly some understandable hyperbole on the side of marketing. Just a friendly reminder to take this all with a grain of salt. Last year's preview boasted "AI defenders now intelligently identify the most dangerous threats and move to their assignments accordingly". Additionally, many of the additions became burdensome like locked animations. I honestly don't expect that drastic of difference but hopefully will be proven wrong.

[Andrew]

Definitely a lot of promising information about the AI this year. The point about players not seeing the ball is one of the things that stands out to me. I hope that means no more blind interceptions from AI-controlled players. It feels very cheap when an AI player has their back to the play, but as soon as the pass is made, makes use of telekinetic powers to stick out their arm and effortlessly snatch it without ever looking in the direction of the passer. There's having active hands, and then there's that.

System Proficiency is definitely intriguing. If it works anywhere near as good as advertised, it's going to shake things up across all modes.

http://www.sportsgamersonline.com/nba-2k17-gameplay-blog-mike-wang/

Just a friendly reminder that this was last years blog of a similar style. While many of the things mentioned were noticeable improvements, there is certainly some understandable hyperbole on the side of marketing. Just a friendly reminder to take this all with a grain of salt. Last year's preview boasted "AI defenders now intelligently identify the most dangerous threats and move to their assignments accordingly". Additionally, many of the additions became burdensome like locked animations. I honestly don't expect that drastic of difference but hopefully will be proven wrong.

This is a fair point, too. I prefer to temper my expectations to "pleasing improvements and fixes for some of the most egregious issues", rather than "everything I ever wanted and no problems at all".

[bluejaybrandon]

I prefer to temper my expectations to "pleasing improvements and fixes for some of the most egregious issues", rather than "everything I ever wanted and no problems at all".

I actually really like that perspective. Keeping expectations in check is always something I've struggled with in 2k releases, then I got burned and cynical. Seems like a good way to strike a happy medium.

[Andrew]

The other thing to keep in mind, as others have pointed out, is the impact of patches. Last year's patches fixed some things, but caused other problems, and left other troubling issues unresolved along the way. Hopefully, there is better balance this year, and fewer glaring issues that can't be resolved without causing damage elsewhere.

[TGsoGood]

The other thing to keep in mind, as others have pointed out, is the impact of patches. Last year's patches fixed some things, but caused other problems, and left other troubling issues unresolved along the way. Hopefully, there is better balance this year, and fewer glaring issues that can't be resolved without causing damage elsewhere.

If you are on PC... BACK UP YOUR .EXE FILE with every patch.
I loved 2K17 on day 1, it was never the same for me after patches came.

[ThePointForward]

Fine, fine, just take my money already!

[Andrew]

The other thing to keep in mind, as others have pointed out, is the impact of patches. Last year's patches fixed some things, but caused other problems, and left other troubling issues unresolved along the way. Hopefully, there is better balance this year, and fewer glaring issues that can't be resolved without causing damage elsewhere.

If you are on PC... BACK UP YOUR .EXE FILE with every patch.
I loved 2K17 on day 1, it was never the same for me after patches came.

Definitely. Playing 2K Pro-Am on PS4, you're not so lucky.

That's the funny thing, though. As I've said before, while a lot of the tweaks were supposedly made to benefit the online experience at the expense of the offline experience, I don't think the online experience necessarily got better in a lot of ways. Certainly, some of the biggest exploits are still there.

[Nick]

Sounds promising. I especially liked that there's a "System match" element for signing players in MyLeague. I imagine that will exist for drafting players too.

[Andrew]

The thought occurs that with a coach's system and abilities being more vital to a team's success than before, I hope we don't see as many random coaching changes in MyLEAGUE, MyGM, and MyCAREER. That's something I wanted to see fixed up anyway, but it could really mess things up if coaches are changing teams too readily and unnecessarily. Gregg Popovich seemed to end up on the Celtics for a lot people throughout those modes in NBA 2K17, for example. That frequency needs to be adjusted, and there needs to be sound logic in place for when coaches do move on.

[I Hate Mondays]

The thought occurs that with a coach's system and abilities being more vital to a team's success than before, I hope we don't see as many random coaching changes in MyLEAGUE, MyGM, and MyCAREER. That's something I wanted to see fixed up anyway, but it could really mess things up if coaches are changing teams too readily and unnecessarily. Gregg Popovich seemed to end up on the Celtics for a lot people throughout those modes in NBA 2K17, for example. That frequency needs to be adjusted, and there needs to be sound logic in place for when coaches do move on.

Has anyone seen a good CPU logic when it comes to Sixth Man of the team? In my limited seasons I've played MyLeague, it seems that the better players always get a start and there is no team going for that off the bench energy. It might not occur in the first season but the moment a team trades a player or does a new signing, the sixth man like Eric Gordon, Zach Randolph, Patty Mills etc. gets a start immediately. Maybe I've been unlucky and this thing doesn't happen to everybody but I'd love to see an improvement in this area in addition to the new coaching logic Andrew is expecting. This combo would make the experience ten times better for me.

[timmyd]

The thought occurs that with a coach's system and abilities being more vital to a team's success than before, I hope we don't see as many random coaching changes in MyLEAGUE, MyGM, and MyCAREER. That's something I wanted to see fixed up anyway, but it could really mess things up if coaches are changing teams too readily and unnecessarily. Gregg Popovich seemed to end up on the Celtics for a lot people throughout those modes in NBA 2K17, for example. That frequency needs to be adjusted, and there needs to be sound logic in place for when coaches do move on.

Has anyone seen a good CPU logic when it comes to Sixth Man of the team? In my limited seasons I've played MyLeague, it seems that the better players always get a start and there is no team going for that off the bench energy. It might not occur in the first season but the moment a team trades a player or does a new signing, the sixth man like Eric Gordon, Zach Randolph, Patty Mills etc. gets a start immediately. Maybe I've been unlucky and this thing doesn't happen to everybody but I'd love to see an improvement in this area in addition to the new coaching logic Andrew is expecting. This combo would make the experience ten times better for me.

You can, you have to edit players and change something to "force non-starter" lol or do what I do, control 30 teams haha

[I Hate Mondays]

You can, you have to edit players and change something to "force non-starter" lol or do what I do, control 30 teams haha

So that's what that option does? Never figured it out lol, I thought it was about forcing non-starters to guard that specific player. It was that easy all along.
But basically, what we have now is a On/Off Switch. However we have it in the day 1 roster of MyLeague, that's what we have to stick with the remainder of the mode. For the basic player that is too lazy to control 30 teams, I'd like to see those change throughout the years. Like for example, Jamal Crawford was starting early in his career before his potential for a sixth man was discovered when he started to age. Maybe Klay Thompson is a starter now because he is a young stud on a great team, but when he hits 31 he realises his firepower is a better fit for a sixth man at that age and he wins 4 SMOY in a row, lol.

[I Hate Mondays]

Some more AI logic, this time on offense : http://www.operationsports.com/nba-2k18 ... g-da_czar/

[Andrew]

More great stuff from Da_Czar there. Sounds like they've gone back to a good control system with the playcalling and on-the-fly substitutions. AI improvements are promising.

[DANet]

More great stuff from Da_Czar there. Sounds like they've gone back to a good control system with the playcalling and on-the-fly substitutions. AI improvements are promising.

Was it just me...or did anybody else hear Da_Czar's voice in their head as they read the article

[I Hate Mondays]

More great stuff from Da_Czar there. Sounds like they've gone back to a good control system with the playcalling and on-the-fly substitutions. AI improvements are promising.

Was it just me...or did anybody else hear Da_Czar's voice in their head as they read the article

From the very first word to the last fullstop, lol. I want that man to narrate my life

[Andrew]

More great stuff from Da_Czar there. Sounds like they've gone back to a good control system with the playcalling and on-the-fly substitutions. AI improvements are promising.

Was it just me...or did anybody else hear Da_Czar's voice in their head as they read the article

You're not alone, there!

[ThePointForward]

No offense, but LongLiveQuebec would narrate better.

[Nick]

The thought occurs that with a coach's system and abilities being more vital to a team's success than before, I hope we don't see as many random coaching changes in MyLEAGUE, MyGM, and MyCAREER. That's something I wanted to see fixed up anyway, but it could really mess things up if coaches are changing teams too readily and unnecessarily. Gregg Popovich seemed to end up on the Celtics for a lot people throughout those modes in NBA 2K17, for example. That frequency needs to be adjusted, and there needs to be sound logic in place for when coaches do move on.

I might have imagined it, but i'm pretty sure i recall davez (2k ML dev) address this over at OS. I don't remember the details of what he said exactly because there has been so much information coming in, but at the least i know for sure that they're aware of that. They may have even fixed it.

[Nick]

There's a really good/friendly Q&A going on with Da_Czar over at OS if anyone's interested: http://forums.operationsports.com/forum ... _czar.html

Czar is a gameplay dev, he's the man behind all the plays-related stuff, and he keeps it real. If there's anything you're curious about gameplay, plays, tendencies, etc, now's your time

[Dee4Three]

There's a really good/friendly Q&A going on with Da_Czar over at OS if anyone's interested: http://forums.operationsports.com/forum ... _czar.html

Czar is a gameplay dev, he's the man behind all the plays-related stuff, and he keeps it real. If there's anything you're curious about gameplay, plays, tendencies, etc, now's your time

I like the new playing calling system, and that they switched the subs back to the D-Pad. I also like the new breakdown in tendancies (Assuming it functions right) as it related to shooting (Off-Screens, on the move, etc) and the new ISO tendencies.

Thanks for sharing this, pumped for this game.