roheblius's Full Review: NBA 2K8 for PlayStation 3
My first foray into the latest generation of basketball simulation video games wasn't NBA Live for once. When I first bought the original Playstation, the first basketball game I bought was the first PSOne version of NBA Live. When I bought a PS2, it was the same deal. So when I bought a PS3, I pretty much figured that I would just continue the same pattern. However, the reviews for NBA Live 08 were terrible and my buddy told me that NBA 2K8 was really good, so I went out and bought NBA 2K8. I can't say that he wasn't right.
NBA 2K8 is a really slick looking basketball game. 2K Sports did a really nice job emulating what doesn't seem to be a hard game to emulate on a video game system. But it is. You'd think that because there are only 10 players on the court at once (versus 22 plus referees in football), it should be easier. But time and time again, basketball games come out that don't come close to duplicating what it's like to either be on the court yourself, or watch a game on television. 2K Sports does a really nice job here. The animation is fluid and the players on the court move like athletes. But that's only part of the game.
Where basketball games can go wrong is in the basketball artificial intelligence. NBA basketball specifically isn't necessarily rocket science. It's a superstar driven sport. The best players usually play on the better teams. There are times when that's not the case, but Michael Jordan won 6 championships not simply because he had the best teammates, but more so that he was the best player and had a good supporting cast. There are simply times where the best player on the court takes over games. NBA 2K8 does a decent job with this. I play with the Warriors and Baron Davis is the best player on the team (until he signed with the Clippers) and I felt that if need be, I could get a decent shot with him with very few exceptions. He was usually one of the quicker players on the court, was strong down low like in real life, and could finish his shot if there was no one around. Where this game got complicated was when he was trying to score on defenders who were in good defensive position. In real life, Davis would probably either draw contact with the defender and get a foul, or just use his athletic ability to rise or create space. In NBA 2K8, this doesn't happen enough. The players get stuck in lay-up motion and can get their shots blocked from time to time. Blocked shots don't happen that much in the real NBA.
That might sound a bit nit picky, but it's still relevant criticism. Not many NBA games get it right though. On the other hand, this game does get many on court things right including how to run offensive plays. When you're playing against the computer, you have the ability to see the plays drawn out for you and get this, if you run them correctly they can work. In many NBA games, plays are just there because they are supposed to be, and they don't work very well. Here, they are well defined and the players run them accordingly. Now, in the real NBA, if you run play after play after play, the defense will catch on and here it doesn't, but I still enjoyed being able to run players off screens and get them open for shots.
On defense, you can get lost playing perimeter defense. The computer AI tends to use its point guard to dribble until it can get to the basket. If you play good defense on the point guard, he will back out and try again. It's a silly way for the computer to play, but because of having to play good man on man defense with the analog stick, many times the computer will succeed with this type of offense. On a finer note, the computer AI offensively will go with their best player and he'll usually be their top scorer. Sometimes, they go overboard, but for the most part, I'd rather see the computer use their best player than their worst. Also, late in the games, the computer will play smartly and play for the win, which makes games much harder to finish.
(I will note that I never used "lock on D", which was a new feature for the game because I heard that it actually ruined defense.)
The controls are responsive and I didn't feel at all like there was any lag. When I wanted to shoot, my player was ready to chuck it up. That's a big deal for basketball games because the game is so fast.
If you're into controlling an entire franchise, NBA 2K8 does a pretty good job at letting you. You'll have to manage egos, personalities, set a coaching style, see if you want to practice your guys hard before a game (please don't as it will affect their stamina), and also scout for future draft picks, manage the salary cap, and look for trades. It is interesting to see certain players react to less playing time, though I didn't see it affect their game enough. Also, I nearly ran Monte Ellis to death and though he showed that he was a little worse for wear because of being tired, I didn't notice a difference.
One of the great features is their online feature. If your PS3 is online, you can go download the latest and greatest rosters, which keeps your game fresh. I purchased this game sometime in February and the NBA rosters were much different at this point than when the season had started. I waited for the roster to be uploaded and then I went online, downloaded the roster and was able to play with Chris Webber on the Warriors. Not like he was someone I just had to have, but when you play sports games, to most die hards, having the rosters correct is a big deal. 2K Sports eventually included 2K Share with the college basketball game, but it wasn't included yet here.
If you enjoy playing games online, I would say 2K Sports did a decent job at making opponents easy to find, and getting started quickly. The onscreen action had a noticeable delay for both me and my friend and I'm not sure exactly if it was the fault of the game, our connections, or something else. It seemed that his connection was worse and his play was slow. I noticed it somewhat, but it wasn't terrible.
Overall, NBA 2K8 for the PS3 is a really good basketball game. There are things that need to be fixed (like any game really), but it is a really good option for basketball gamers.
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