is the official original translation
Hello everyone 2K basketball fans! After a year of busy life, I finally have time to stop and talk to you about what exciting content the gameplay team has achieved in this year's work. "NBA2K20" has taken a big step forward in the performance on the field, and there is a lot to talk about, so let's start now.
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Action Engine Upgrade
Correct footwork is the core foundation of basketball, and the complete reproduction of footwork is crucial to the balance of interactions between offense and defense. Without real action as the basis, everything falls apart.
In NBA 2K18, we introduced a new action engine that got rid of the "animation-driven" system of early 2K games. After these transformations are completed, the improvements in feelings and responses are immediately revealed, but the new technology has also triggered some new challenges, causing us to lose some control over animation selection and sacrifice some action authenticity. All in all, some aspects of the action have a much more impression, but some aspects have shown a regression.
To find a compromise, our action team has developed an upgraded action engine over the past few years. Thanks to their unremitting efforts, the gameplay of the work has made great progress this year. After picking up "NBA2K20", you will immediately feel that the footsteps, momentum modeling and action style changes have been greatly improved. When starting to cut or break through with the standing movement, the player's own sense of weight and the contact between his feet and the ground performs better. Because of the added action style, players will quickly feel the difference between a bulky big player and a quick and agile defender player. The action team spent a lot of time studying and analyzing the sprint speed and acceleration time of real NBA players. This helps us adjust the speed of players and more accurately show how fast we can in NBA games (especially on open courts). This work also guides us to redesign the working principle of the sprint. We really want to build sprints into a valuable resource, not an insignificant element. In this year's new work, after the energy drops below a certain threshold, a flashing yellow effect will appear around the physical strength bar. After entering this state, the player's running speed will drop sharply and quickly develop fatigue. Therefore, you need to pay attention to the timing of the explosion in the new work, and do not press the sprint button at will throughout the game.
ball holding and ball holding
In the new work, the ball holding player will gain unprecedented perception of specific situations. For example, the ball holder can sense peripheral situations such as pick-and-split separation/combination, cutting, front and back court movement, etc. Another big point in the action system upgrade is the signature dribble style to accurately show the large number of action styles in the league. We have added various new concepts, such as various stop actions - emergency stop/sharp turn, hesitation steps, turn, etc. Cut and first steps also have a variety of styles to distinguish the speed players (De'AaronFox, John Wall) and DeMar DeRozan, who are swinging. Legends like Lebron James, Kawhi Leonard, Kobe Bryant and Tim Hardaway all have signature dribbling moves. Magic Johnson and John Stockton will use their own exclusive moves to transport the ball to the frontcourt to organize the offense, while space players such as Russell Westbrook and Giannis Antetokounmpo have different sprint acceleration animations when transitioning offense and defense. There are 27 different styles in the league, and you can also choose the ball-handling style of your own players in the "Glorious Career" mode.
style list is as follows: basic, large, strength, basic, fast, chopping, agile, James Harden, LeBron James, Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, Jerry West, Dennis Johnson, John Stockton, AllenIverson, Tim Hardaway, Steve Nash, Jason Kidd, Isiah Thomas, Chris Paul, Damian Lillard, Russell Westbrook, Kyrie Irving, Kemba Walker, Stephen Curry, Paul George, and KawhiLeonard
, change in rhythm and speed is very important for ball-handling experts. The new system provides many tools that players can achieve perfect ball control by simply using the left stick. But if you want to make the defender feel embarrassed, you still need to "add some materials".
This year's new work has added a new fancy dribbling mechanism, connecting the standing dribbling movements in a more realistic way. Each action is made one by one by the expert rocker, and there will be no past action routines. Players can use slower cross dribbling to make the defender dribble, or they can quickly slap the ball with a fast-paced machine gun cross dribble. James Harden has his signature dribble between legs, Kyrie Irving has a set of street ball movements, Allen Iverson has hesitant steps that are hard to defend, and each major star has his own movements. This new mechanic gives players free space to create their own unique rhythm. Once you master the operation, the strongest defender with the ball will find it difficult to defend you. If you dribble for a long time, or make a wrong move at the wrong time, you may make a dribble mistake or be easily intercepted by the defender.
players will also have new advanced moves such as the back cross-dribble break, Luka Doncic's fake step back, the quick stop and the new Shammgod move, and the fake hesitation steps that Will Bynum showed in the Big Three. In addition, the three threat attack has also been expanded, adding a large number of new actions: directional spike steps, mid-span steps, back-body shaking, and a brand new starting action. I'm looking forward to seeing what tricks the players in the community can play with these new ball control mechanisms. Defender, be careful of your ankles.
Reading and Reaction
But don't worry, we did not ignore the defensive end. We also provide more tools for ball-holders to lock in the defense. The development team calls it "reading and responsive defense." When defending the ball holder, the defender will see a small arrow appearing under the ball holder, indicating the direction of its tilt or the direction of attempting to break through. Depending on the defender's ability, the arrows will be displayed at different opportunities, and the reaction time of weaker and stronger defenders will also vary. Accurately predicting the movements of the ball holder and blocking his offense will produce predictable good results, such as blocking the dribble, forcing the dribble to collect the ball, or causing his dribble to make mistakes. The newly upgraded action engine, improved defensive footwork and a significantly improved physical confrontation system make 1-on-1 offense and defense more traceable, and the differences when facing crappy defenders and advanced defenders are also shown more vividly.
When the ball holder moves or makes moves in the field, the ring below it will be broken into lines. The greater the degree of decomposition of the ring, the higher the possibility that the ball holder will drop the ball. To emphasize this, we adjusted the ball-holding steal to make it more predictive. Therefore, reading the intentions of the ball holder in NBA2K20 is very important to determine when to take a steal. Running around and pressing the steal button has no effect.
offensive plan and penalty area defense
penalty area offense and defense are another focus of the game team. A few years ago I talked to you about the concept of offensive plan. The basic concept in reality is: when an excellent breakup attacks the penalty area, he will use a clever plan to defeat the defense. In NBA2K20, we restructured layups and slam dunks to make them a mechanism with complete branches. Last year we added some abilities to turn layups into slam dunks. But after all, in most cases, the player will jump into the air after pressing the layup key. Players can now use the new ball collection mechanism to stop the ball and complete advanced ball collection actions on the ground, read defense, and push the expert rocker to choose the way to shoot after the ball collection during the jump. For example, if you see the defender approaching when starting the European step, you can push down the expert rocker to make a throw to avoid physical contact. This also allows us to introduce a plan to earn the ball. Forced ball collection in a pile of people or directly contact the defender will be in trouble, and correctly collecting the ball in the air can bypass the crowd. In addition to the European steps, swings, jumps and turns that have been previously available, you can now use semi-turns and cross-turns to bypass the defender.
Like dribbling, the defense on the basket has also been strengthened. Hundreds of new aerial collisions, tough fouls, cap grabs and blocks are added to the new work, further enhancing the presence of the frame guard elite.It will be difficult for the penalty area defenders who are good at grasping the opportunity and making decisive decisions. Be careful when meeting them in the interior! ZionWilliamson, welcome to join the 2K team!
The scorer in the penalty area can use new fake moves, back hits, and movements to roam in the penalty area; and the defender in the penalty area will use the upgraded penalty area body system to prevent the attacker's turn, cut, sink the bottom step and jump.
Balloon status
Several months ago, I mentioned in the "Developer Q&A" session of 2KTV that the ballaloon status will be improved. Players don't hold the ball 90% of the time when they are on the court, so we want to show this part in the game.
On the offensive end, the fans' favorite off-ball feint move has returned to "NBA 2K20". We hope these moves will perfectly simulate the state of the ball holder, so these moves not only return, but are also improved. With a simple expert rocker operation, players can make continuous false starts, turnes and small steps, or immediately pull open the space to cut, cut into the basket, or shoot at the top of the space. The action is also divided into three levels, distinguishing the pros and cons of players without the ball. The new combination and ball-free movements make the ball-free state more technical. In this way, the classic battle between KlayThompson and Steph Curry against the Raptors in the playoffs can be reproduced in the game.
On the defensive end, we have used the technological innovation of the body confrontation system over the past few years to re-made the unstoppable collision. If you determine the offensive direction of your opponent without the ball, you can cut off your contact with your teammates and trap him, making the opponent difficult.
ball-holding and off-ball screens have also been rebuilt, and the interaction between the screener and the screen defender has become better. The new content will provide full control to help defenders roam around the cover more efficiently and enter better positions without being blocked by other players. We have also added the concept of quick cover and press the button to set the cover. This is similar to the risk-reward mechanism and cannot be used for a long time, but it can effectively squeeze the opponent defender who cuts into his teammates and slows down his movement speed so that his teammates can make room. There are a lot of new content added, including upgraded demolition/removal conversion, bypassing cover, fake cover, cover amplification and advanced brick wall cover. Players can also perform manual switching controls. Press and hold the substitution button or press the right rocker twice to manually overwrite the coach's screen defense strategy. You will notice that AI teammates will dynamically dismantle/retreat to space, and before they will be fixed to a static location.
AI
Advanced AI
AI in our game is the best in sports games, and we are very proud of it. NBA 2K20 is still exploring the limits of AI.
offensive end is determined by a brand new dynamic free operation engine. Smart ball-free sports can be performed without calling tactical teammates. It allows excellent players to automatically perform intelligent offensive choices (determined by adaptive coaching engines and on-site coaching), which includes off-ball screening and cutting, creating scores for themselves two episodes. This new system and the ever-evolving ACE system allow mass players to make layered attacks more easily.
Tactical players with extraordinary insight can also make full use of the latest tactical operation buttons. Call these easy-to-access operations to create your own offensive methods: crossing, receiving cover, singles, etc. If you want to go further, you can create a "favorite tactics" list in the tactical operation buttons and specify 8 favorite tactics. Last year's work included a series of operations, which caused a huge response in the community. Community users strongly demand that user-defined series of operations be added to this year's "NBA2K20", and we are also happy to meet everyone's requirements. In the new work, players can convert their favorite tactics into personal exclusive series operations, and even control the way the series operations are performed (if they succeed, they are reused, used throughout, called in sequence, dynamics, etc.).
AI defense has also improved. We rewrite the defense swap module and add some new options, including "Protect the Peripheral" and "Build the Wall" (for defensive position conversions for elite speed players.) There are also new team-specific and player-specific adjustments in ACE, including:
- Utah's ball-holding adjustment for Harden in the playoffs
- Toronto's arc-top blocking blocking solution for Curry
- Player-exclusive sense of dominance
- Legendary team and player adjustments
- Let's say one thing about AI. In past 2K works, AI will use the hit rate of real players to decide on the hit. This often results in mechanical, completely predictable results. This year we have added the same shooting timing mechanism for AI players as players. In this way, AI's moves look more similar to real-life players and more fair. When the game is simple and difficult, they will also make a blacksmith due to the timing of shooting, but when the opponent is in high difficulty, they need to keep a close watch on the opponent to prevent them from taking calmly when the shooting bar is green. In the new work, players can also customize the shooting bars and set different green effects. After all, everyone likes customization.
badge and dominate
badge have become one of the main ways for players to distinguish each other. We know the meaning of badges to the game and the community, so one of the first things we did during this development cycle was to have multiple meetings to reimagine the badges of the game, and what they mean. Finally, we carefully selected about 80 badges to allow players to show different abilities in various parts of the game. We have done a lot of development to ensure that each badge has special and practical functions and presents a variety of styles. We even added block-specific badges to enhance the street court's ability to compete and gorgeous play style.
We listened to feedback from the community and internal testing team for a year, giving the master of NBA2K20 more new content and new features. We make the dominant ability more balanced between positions and style of play.
We still have a lot of topics to talk about about badges, attributes, dominance and player type improvements, please stay tuned later. We believe everyone will like the new adjustments we make.
Last summary
Thank you for reading the blog post to learn what new content will be included in the game released next month. Today we have talked about most of the major gameplay elements, but we will share more good news with you as it is about to be released. I would like to thank all the engineers and producers in the gameplay section for their hard work to bring you the strongest basketball game on the surface "NBA2K20". Trust me, what I posted today is just the beginning. The entire development team of Visual Concepts can exceed the development achievements of several years of Visual Concepts's years of development. I cannot describe them in detail here. Please keep an eye on it in the next few weeks, and we will continue to introduce information on all the modes and functions in this year's latest work! We can't wait for everyone to get started with the game, so I'll hear your feedback on this! Without 2K fans around the world, we cannot achieve today's achievements, so on behalf of the entire development team, I would like to thank everyone for their support! -
——Mike Wang, Director of Games at NBA 2K
