I just got this game for free on playstation plus. I normally play these games on PC but hearing how god awful Spike Less story is, I decided to skip this year as my career is almost the only mode I play. I remember Alex saying after the story reaches its conclusion you return to the older format of my career. Is it all possible to skip straight to this?

You need to play through the high-school / college games (about 8 of them total), along with the ~8 selected games in your first season. The cutscenes, though, (barring the 1/2 minute long opening) were totally skippable in my experience, so it's not really TOO big of a hinderance, and I actually enjoy the HS-->college-->draft progression (minus the cutscenes & overlong draft process).

The main issue for me, though, is that your first season being mostly simmed (barring those 8 games) means your first REAL season is after an offseason where the AI does its usual dumb drafting/signing/trading that can leave some teams looking pretty silly. You also come in preeeeety weak rating wise, so if you're not willing to buy VC to jump-start yourself, the build up can definitely take a while (a bit longer than past years, in my experience). If you're okay with all that, though, the career mode from there out is about as good as past years have been, and actually has some decent improvements that go along with it.

You have to play the games but its not that many, but they steal your rookie season and ypu can only play like 8 games. Playing through highschool and college is pretty cool though

You can skip the story entirely. You have to play through games but they're games that establish your draft position. Then you play with that team for a year (only actually like 10 or so games?) then get a choice to go wherever (barring fitting on the roster). I have restarted since realizing how dumb the story is and skipped right through it. It's just a straight run of games to get through that first season then but it's decent time to get a feel for your player and go from there. Replaying, I chose a PG and after the first year, had free reign to go wherever really and went to the T Wolves with all the young talent there (including a fake Draymond Green type player at PF/SF). It's been fun.

After then it's their best career mode yet but it still is flawed. Hate the upgrade system but it is unchanged from the previous year. I think the Spike Lee stuff was dumb but so was the story stuff the year before (at least the idea was good that year). To me the game is just better and I enjoyed the way height and length feel important. I don't think it was worth skipping for the Spike Lee stuff because after it's business as usual. Trust me I think the Spike Lee stuff was awful but I realized that early into it.

Here is to hoping the mode gets a lot better next year because it still has some of the same annoying mechanics and attempts at story telling so far have been lackluster. At least a couple years ago it also was more dynamic. They need to go further with that because at the end of the day its a sim. Also about time they give you more choices like they do in other modes. I want trade veto for example so you don't end up with crap like @jkz mentions from the AI GMs. And let me set the season length and more. It's probably because they want to monetize it but about time to just make that for the card mode and just visual items.

@artisanbreads: Do the games influence your stats as well your draft position?

High School is da best:

This was the last year I put into the my career I think. The whole mode is just bogged down and held back by their VC microtransaction bullshit. The Spike Lee stuff, while bad, is probably the least offensive thing about that mode. Having a lot more fun with mygm

Is this career mode worth playing if I've really enjoyed the stat progression in previous football/golf/wrestling games but I barely know anything about basketball (i.e. I watch some of the playoffs most years but I couldn't tell you who plays what position or what a pick and roll offense or zone defense look like in more than super vague terms)? Would the progression and gameplay (I've never played a basketball video game aside from, like, NBA Street/Jam) be enjoyable for someone who doesn't know any better?

@mems1224: how so? The only VC sinks are the cosmetics. Yeah you need to pay VC to upgrade your character but the progress rate is reasonable, and no slower than gaining skill points in older 2k games.

Its over after the first year if my memory of Alex talking about is correct.

@dystopiax: well, there is a lot of lack of customization because the mode is tied to real money. You can't adjust gameplay sliders and I don't think you can even change your sock length. Also, the accessories being tied to it is also stupid. I also don't like how dumb the coaching is. I don't want to play 45mpg.

And just a bunch of dumb legacy issues. If I'm a top 3 pick I should start my career rated in the mid 60s or low 70s

It's hard to say, I for one love basketball and basketball games but could never get into football. Madden makes 0 sense to me and I've tried to get into those types of games since like gameday 98 or something like that. That said, i think basketball is a much less complicated sport to dive into on the video game level you can set the difficulty down a bit and really just worry about offense and probably have a good time. Also there are a few franchise type modes that are fun to play that you don't really have to play a game at all and just do the strategy elements. Maybe pick up an older 2k with a cheaper investment and just see if you could get into it.

@fredchuckdave: No. They will give you the points you need to upgrade your character but everything in the game does that.

2K16 is free on PS+ this month!