Character Devlopment

During every NBA off-season, each player on the 2K game gets re-evaluated before they are officially given a new rating for the upcoming year. These ratings are  generally based on a number of questions: Has the player improved from the previous year? If so, how much?  How will age affect the player this upcoming year? With this in mind, developers separate into three major categories: Offense, defense, and rebounding.
 In this example, we will use current power forward  for the New Orleans Pelicans, Ryan Anderson.

  From the 10-11 to the 11-12 season, Ryan's point per game average skyrocketed from 10.6 to 16.1. Ryan's improvement was able to earn him the NBA most improved player award for the 2011-2012 season.
 Improvements such as these are just one of the many aspects that game developers must look at each year for every player. What type of improvements did the player have? Is the player getting worse due to old age? Does the player still have the abilities to perform the same way that they do within this past season. Only going from 67 and 69, Anderson was only improved in rebounding and in athleticism. The highly underrated Anderson is a sure fire to at least reach the mid-70's in 2K 14 and NBA Live.

Don't know who Ryan is? Check out this small series of Ryan Anderson highlights.

Lob Nation

      There's many great things about NBA 2K13, but there is nothing like throwing the ball up, and watching another player grab it and slam the ball with authority a seemingly helpless opponent. An alley-opp deflates  whoever you're playing against, and stops any momentum that they may already have had. The flow of the game can change all  because of a single alley-opp. Alleys can be detrimental to whoever you play against. I know that I've gone on runs that have started due to alleys, and have lost leads because of them.
      
     One thing that I love about 2K, is the different types of finishes that players may have off of alleys. If you play with  a team such as the Jazz, with the exception of Jeremy Evans, you are more than likely to have the player on the receiving end finish with a basic two hand slam. On the other hand, if you play with a team like the Miami Heat, or the Los Angeles  Clippers, you are bound to witness spectacular dunks. In my opinion, the Clippers are the best alley-oop team on the game. Miami has the options of the perfected and mistake-free made LeBron James, and the slashing Dwyane Wade. However, the Clippers have a number of weapons. When throwing the ball up for players such as Blake Griffin, Eric Bledsoe, and DeAndre Jordan, you almost never know what they will do once they get the ball. You may see anything from a  windmill, to a powerful lunging two-hand, or a cocking back one hand throwdown. In the near future, as a fan  I would like to be able to control what type of dunk that the player may do once they have the ball in the air. Also, with that new feature, only certain player should be able to perform dunks that they can normally do.
     
     For  those of you who don't know how to perform an alley-oop on 2K, simply hit the "x" and "a" button simultaneously. If you would  to play with a little more style, throw the ball off the glass  by pressing "x" and "a" ,but make sure there is a trailing teammate. (For XBOX 360 console only.) Go ahead, try it for yourself.