By Dmitri Salcedo on October 20th, 2005

The 2K basketball series has recently suffered through a couple years worth of disappointing times. Last year’s NBA 2K5 offering looked initially promising but was quickly sunk by obvious bugs that made for some lackluster play, leaving many to wonder if there actually was a QA department at Visual Concepts at all. EA also made a power play in the interim to lock up the ESPN brand for their games. Things were certainly looking down for the former undisputed king of video game basketball. Yet this year, it’s like night and day. I have never seen a sports franchise make as big of a turnaround as VC has pulled off for this installment of NBA 2K6. Apparently mixing in some of the NFL 2K5 team and former Inside Drive staff has done wonders for the game’s quality.

What strikes you from the outset immediately on your first play is how much more realistic the game feels. The pace feels like the NBA, and the players and their interactions with each other have a tuned solid physical presence to them. There’s none of that "ice skating" syndrome that many other basketball games seem to struggle with. Players are very active off the ball now as they try to get open. The teams play a lot like they do in real life, especially at the higher difficulty levels. The Suns love to run the fast break, and the Spurs grind it out while eating up the shot clock.

The players individually act more realistic now as well. This year, each player is assigned different tendency scores, which dictate the kinds of things they do when they get the ball. Shaq will park in the paint, back people down, and chip it in. Last year he was often seen hanging around the three point line and even taking middle range shots, which any basketball fan knows to be uproariously laughable. Kobe now plays true to his ball hog nature. Ginobili slashes to the hoop and causes general havoc. Just as importantly, offensively un-gifted players who don’t take many shots won’t bother trying to shoot it unless they’re totally open next to the basket. It’s a real treat to see the players act true to life, but again, to get the full effect of their tendencies it seems you need the difficulty level set higher than the default.

Some very significant changes to the controls were made this year, and in turn 2K6 plays like a totally different game. There is no more turbo button, as it has been replaced with the two triggers acting as a "shift modifier," and an "aggressive modifier," each doing different things depending on the context. To perform flashy Isomotion moves, you now tap the aggressive trigger and then do some sort of movement on the left stick. Quick presses left or right do crossovers, while half circle moves do more fancy behind the back dribbling.

The innovative new shot-stick feature is a welcome addition. Long criticized for not having the ability to differ one’s shots as in NBA Live, VC responded by assigning detailed shot selection to the right analog stick. The shot stick mechanic works similarly to the old button-based shooting: you hold the stick in a direction to start the shot and then release the stick to release the ball at the right moment. The clincher is the extra dimension of control this new scheme offers. Want to dunk?

On defense, you also can now use the right analog stick to steal and block, down to the detail of which hand you use to swipe at the ball. Overuse this feature though, and you will rack up fouls pretty quickly. There is still no "defensive stance" button like in yesteryears’ games, but staying in front of your man, using the "take charge" button at opportune moments, and asking for double teams when mismatched works well instead and can be quite rewarding.

Sound complicated? It is, and very much so! Even expert players will have trouble adjusting to the new control scheme, while basketball game newbies will most likely be at a loss. This is made all the more frustrating by the fact that neither the instruction manual nor the in-game help fully detail what all the stick-based moves actually are. I suppose fighting games don’t necessarily do that either, but it’s still annoying to have unexplained controls in a sports game. Luckily, shooting, stealing and blocking are all still assigned to good old regular buttons, so using the new stick-based moves is mostly optional if it seems too complicated for you.

Graphically, the game’s player models are unmatched amongst basketball simulations. Most superstars look like their real life counterparts and are instantly recognizable. The animations are generally improved from last year, while seasoned with the occasional rough transition, but it’s nothing like last year’s problems where the animations seemed to dictate the game play instead of the other way around. The silly yet entertaining cut scenes featuring the crowd are still in there and give the game a sizeable dose of personality. On the sound side, the commentary crew of Kevin Harlan and Kenny Smith works well and for the most part gives seamless and realistic dialogue, while there are a few annoying repeated snippets. Perhaps they should’ve lowered the frequency of Kenny’s praise for Gervin’s finger roll prowess just a little bit.

As for the other game features, each seems to have been improved incrementally, save for the removal of last year’s Full Authority mode. Maybe next year VC will bring it back, as it looked like it would’ve been fun with more polish. 24/7 mode this year is more dialed in. The play sessions are shorter and never feel like a chore. In this year’s franchise mode, also known as The Association, some small additions like assistant coach hiring and more detailed scouting were put in. The best new addition is the ability to build up your players’ abilities by risking drill points on them. Spending drill points allows you to enter a drill mini game with them. If you fulfill the minimum requirements within the allotted time, the player’s stats go up. In a way it brings some of the 24/7 RPG aspects into Franchise mode and it’s a fun extra outside of the standard games.

The online mode this year seems to run smoothly, and I haven’t had a network-dropped game yet. I have run into occasional connection issues when trying to access the game on Xbox Live, but once I’m connected the game stays connected. I believe I noticed lag for a brief three seconds during one game, but none otherwise. Leagues are easy to create, and each league has a nice web page front-end that you can access to track your schedule and get the latest results.

While the bug count has been reduced dramatically, the game is not perfect, and there are still a few small yet noticeable problems. Strange mismatches sometimes occur where the Center ends up guarding the Point Guard, a bug that VC has confirmed. Superstars that are on a hot streak are frustratingly hard to shut down even when double-teamed. Double-teams still result in too many jump balls on the lower difficulty settings. Reverse dunks almost never go in. There are probably too many fast breaks at the higher difficulty levels. Still, this year, the good points far outweigh the bugs.

In all, NBA 2K6 is a simulation dream come true for the hardcore basketball fan. I still would wager that the casual basketball fan might not see it in the same light. If the casual basketball fan wants a game of basketball that plays like the game he follows, he’ll love 2K6 and its TV-style presentation despite its mostly optional complexity.