So far I have only played the My Player mode of the game. While I am enjoying it for the most part, there are a few things that bug me:

• Your teammates are generally shit for defense (they leave their man way too open/rotate too much or rotate for no good reason)
• Your teammates are generally shit when you pass them the ball on a fastbreak
• Even with a supremely high rating for pull-up jumpers, shooting in traffic, 3pt shooting, clutch offense, etc., you will STILL miss on WIDE OPEN 3s and mid-range shots
• Coach gets replaced every year, even if the team does really well/wins championships
• Off-ball defense is a little touch-and-go... sometimes I can deny my man the ball/path pretty well.. other times he's able to just blaze past me without any effort... even with my guy having capped quickness/speed/defense
• Dribbling moves getting streamlined can be a little annoying, as I can't really have the same kind of dribbling control as I did last year
• Collision detection for players can get a little too much sometimes - a little bump and your guy is taken completely off defense
• Teammates get in the way a lot as well... on both offense and defense
• Buzz rating is a little sketchy - sometimes even after winning a lot of games or doing really well (and getting lots of highlight plays), as well as scoring points on all 3 categories in the press conference interviews, the buzz ratings won't go up
• Statistics can get messed up at times - I was shooting 60% for the season in one year, then out of the blue, it listed my FG% as 1% in the game... and stayed low until the next year... in the menu options though, my FG percentage was correct
• Graphics aren't as good as they seem like they should be, or they're on par/worse than last year's version. There are various glitches too, where you or your teammate's jerseys are really messed up in the match-up logos. Also, I seem to remember my player getting more sweaty as the game progressed. It doesn't seem to be the case this year... he starts the game already sweaty and doesn't change for the better or worse.

All that said, however, there are some things I still like about this game:

• Replays and animations are done a lot better this year, and are quite enjoyable to watch. I like how they slow down the time at various points, highlighting the dramatic effect a particular play has
• Dunks look extremely awesome this year.. especially those supremely clutch ones
• Taking charges and pulling the chair out from guys is a lot more easier this year
• The importance of making plays makes the game a lot more enjoyable than the gameplay that we had last year (could almost single-handedly score all the baskets last year... you still sorta can this year, but you gotta make good plays)
• A lot of cool pump-fake and other fake-shot animation chaining makes things look very smooth
• Various things are streamlined effectively, like fake moves and spin dunks, etc.
• My Player mode still is fun to play - getting your guy up from the lowly rookie to a superstar status is pretty awesome, especially now that money plays a role in the game
• Teams do more trades now - it's great to see your team making changes - makes it more interesting
• An actual Hall of Fame "ending" (as far as I can tell - haven't retired yet)
• Commentary is still pretty good - it does eventually get boring (same phrases and such), but it's still good. They keep track of stats from previous games and years too... better than last year
• Actual basketball physics ie. the ball isn't actually linked to a player anymore - it seems like it's a seperate entity on its own - this leads to some interesting moments where balls are blocked with elbows, arms, and yes, even FACES.

Overall, I think this is a pretty good basketball game. It's a lot more sim-y than last year's version, but it's still a lot of fun. I'm just hoping that playing the Legends will be awesome as well.

So far I have only played the My Player mode of the game. While I am enjoying it for the most part, there are a few things that bug me:

• Your teammates are generally shit for defense (they leave their man way too open/rotate too much or rotate for no good reason)
• Your teammates are generally shit when you pass them the ball on a fastbreak
• Even with a supremely high rating for pull-up jumpers, shooting in traffic, 3pt shooting, clutch offense, etc., you will STILL miss on WIDE OPEN 3s and mid-range shots
• Coach gets replaced every year, even if the team does really well/wins championships
• Off-ball defense is a little touch-and-go... sometimes I can deny my man the ball/path pretty well.. other times he's able to just blaze past me without any effort... even with my guy having capped quickness/speed/defense
• Dribbling moves getting streamlined can be a little annoying, as I can't really have the same kind of dribbling control as I did last year
• Collision detection for players can get a little too much sometimes - a little bump and your guy is taken completely off defense
• Teammates get in the way a lot as well... on both offense and defense
• Buzz rating is a little sketchy - sometimes even after winning a lot of games or doing really well (and getting lots of highlight plays), as well as scoring points on all 3 categories in the press conference interviews, the buzz ratings won't go up
• Statistics can get messed up at times - I was shooting 60% for the season in one year, then out of the blue, it listed my FG% as 1% in the game... and stayed low until the next year... in the menu options though, my FG percentage was correct
• Graphics aren't as good as they seem like they should be, or they're on par/worse than last year's version. There are various glitches too, where you or your teammate's jerseys are really messed up in the match-up logos. Also, I seem to remember my player getting more sweaty as the game progressed. It doesn't seem to be the case this year... he starts the game already sweaty and doesn't change for the better or worse.

All that said, however, there are some things I still like about this game:

• Replays and animations are done a lot better this year, and are quite enjoyable to watch. I like how they slow down the time at various points, highlighting the dramatic effect a particular play has
• Dunks look extremely awesome this year.. especially those supremely clutch ones
• Taking charges and pulling the chair out from guys is a lot more easier this year
• The importance of making plays makes the game a lot more enjoyable than the gameplay that we had last year (could almost single-handedly score all the baskets last year... you still sorta can this year, but you gotta make good plays)
• A lot of cool pump-fake and other fake-shot animation chaining makes things look very smooth
• Various things are streamlined effectively, like fake moves and spin dunks, etc.
• My Player mode still is fun to play - getting your guy up from the lowly rookie to a superstar status is pretty awesome, especially now that money plays a role in the game
• Teams do more trades now - it's great to see your team making changes - makes it more interesting
• An actual Hall of Fame "ending" (as far as I can tell - haven't retired yet)
• Commentary is still pretty good - it does eventually get boring (same phrases and such), but it's still good. They keep track of stats from previous games and years too... better than last year
• Actual basketball physics ie. the ball isn't actually linked to a player anymore - it seems like it's a seperate entity on its own - this leads to some interesting moments where balls are blocked with elbows, arms, and yes, even FACES.

Overall, I think this is a pretty good basketball game. It's a lot more sim-y than last year's version, but it's still a lot of fun. I'm just hoping that playing the Legends will be awesome as well.

I think the big draw for many of people is the My Player (since the online is perpetually broken) and part of it is the difficultly as well as your position.

I always play a Magic Johnson style Point guard so he's 6 something, and when I dump the points into vert I can block and pull boards down without the points in it. I agree though that on the fastbreak they'll either stop at the 3 point line or instead of a wide open dunk they'll miss a lay-up. Can't throw an oop either since the AI always intercepts it.

I tend to drive and pass the ball to the open man instead of take many jumpers but turning on the shot release feedback is pretty helpful to me. In any case, I agree with a lot of your points.

One thing that I didn't see mentioned is that how CRAZY some of the My Player trades are. I was drafted to the suns and in a deal package for myself and Steve Nash the Lakers gave up Odom and Fisher. Then they traded Gasol for Gilbert Arenas. THEN Metta World Peace for TJ Ford and Roy Hibbert. THEN Bynum for Turkoglu and Danny Granger. I keep waiting for them to trade Kobe away and be done with it.

Still a pretty fun game despite the issues, and they've added a lot more grinding into my player so you can keep playing that indefinetely

@AlwaysBeClothing: Haha, yeah some of the deals they make... leave you scratching your head. When I first got drafted, then subsequently traded to the team I wanted to play for, the team traded away almost all of its original members... very weird indeed.

I also forgot to mention another thing that bugs me: the collision detection between players can get silly sometimes.. as well as teammates getting in your way a lot =/.

PS: Speaking of Magic Johnson, I really wish there was a way to perform flashy passes on cue, like how you can do various shot moves with the shotstick.

@JCTango said:

Correction...

• Your teammates are generally shit
• Your teammates are generally shit
• I got drafted by the Knicks and they/we've won 1 game out of the 23 I've played...and not because of me. Im averaging 14 pts a game(2nd on the team) cause I'm 62 overall and cant get any better because you get skill points taken away for losing and other generally dumb reasons...which you cant really control when your so crappy(player wise, not game skill)

I hate how the PC version hasn't gotten a patch yet. The way they've reduced the effectiveness of on-ball defense (harder to stop scoring or block shots), the pathetic defense of the AI, the seemingly random unstoppable drives to the basket, etc etc just takes far too much control away from the player. Although it is Basketball The RPG it does not reward the player enough for good play or their stat investment. Also the messed up trading that destroys the character of a team almost instantly.

Although 2k12 has made some improvements in making the player work harder to score and defend, so you can't blow by your man and take endless open 3s, they've fucked up some of the systems and it results in a rather hollow experience.

@owl_of_minerva said:

...far too much control away from the player...

Yeah, I agree. That's probably the biggest thing I disliked about the changes they made from last year. It's still pretty fun though for me, despite that.