REVIEW: NBA2K22 PS4 edition – Back to the Courts

NBA2K22 is the most excited I’ve been for a 2K release. I was exhilarated since the cover athlete announcement. I’ve been playing since the first NBA2K and this is the first time that featured my favorite athletes Luka Doncic and Dirk Nowitzki (Legends Edition).

NBA2K21 garnered mixed reactions as last year’s iteration more or less is like a patched NBA2K20 with minimal difference. Honestly, this is what I’ve fear for the PS4 Edition of NBA2K22. Even if I’m celebrating because of the cover artists, I still have my doubts.

STORY

NBA2K’s story mode is in MyCareer. Every year you play as an upcoming college athlete and the journey to achieve his dream of making it to the NBA. This year, we follow the story of MP, a superstar athlete who also happens to be a social media superstar, a Youtuber. His social media fame comes as a blessing and a curse. Fans love him and critics such as Kendrick Perkins has a lot of things to say about you. This is a refreshing approach to MyCareer integrating social media with a basketball storyline.

As is with any release, you can modify your players appearance via face scan through NBA2K’s accompanying app, MyNBA2K (available in the Google Playstore and App Store). With each release, the developers have improve the face scan feature and this year’s edition is the easiest time I had. I guess new mobile phone camera’s makes the scanning more easier.

Along with the story mode in MyCareer is The Neighborhood, an open world-like that lets you play other players through different courts and modify your character through different shops that lets you purchase clothes, shoes, accessories that you can wear anywhere in MyCareer both for an NBA game and the Neighborhood. Also, a change to this year’s Neighborhood is that it’s not an actual neighborhood but a cruise ship called the Cancha Del Mar. Instead of different neighborhood blocks it was changed to different decks that allows you access courts, shops, and others. It made me wonder how hard it is to play basketball on a moving ship if it were on real life. I can only image the difficulty if you have motion sickness but for others, ball is life.

Speaking of purchase, MyCareer still relies heavily on microtransactions. Items can be purchase using VC (Virtual Currency). You use VC to pay for items and also purchase upgrades to your player. It is a pay-to-win template that the more you spend, the more chances of winning. The game does not require you to purchase VC to enjoy it but you need to grind for it.

You earn VC by playing basketball games, completing MyCareer quests in the Neighborhood, or follow NBA2K social media pages and enter locker codes. A new addition that I love to this year’s MyCareer is the addition of season rewards. As you level up and earn experience, you obtain different items for your character to use without spending VCs that makes the grind worthwhile.

 GAMEPLAY

The strength of any NBA2K game is the gameplay and how real it is to the actual sport. This year there has been an improvement to the game’s offense and defense. NBA2K21’s shot stick /pro stick wasn’t a real hit with fans that in a later update, NBA2K added a feature to turn it off. In NBA2K22, a new shot meter is introduced. Each time you shoot with either the square button or the right analog stick, you need to land on the green area on the shot meter to make the shot. It’s easier but there’s a bit of a learning curve. However, once you get used to is, open 3s (depending on the player) makes it easy to make.

This year it is also more satisfying to play defense. The defense mechanics have been reworked and it is easier to perform chase down blocks and swat weak shot attempts outside. This encourages you to play actual defense! Also, the AI have improved noticeably regardless of difficulty and repeated pick and rolls from 2K’s past is no longer as effective as it used to be.  Similar to an actual basketball game, you somehow need to have basketball IQ to make plays and quality shots to win a game.

To help you win, the game added new dribble moves and combos to help you breakdown the defense. With a simple flick of the right analog stick in different directions allows you to deliver ankle-breaking combos. The game has included 50 new signature styles to give a fresh variety to dribbling.

Another gameplay feature of NBA2K22 is MyTEAM. It is the game’s card collecting game that allow to you to use different player cards from NBA’s past and current players. This is NBA2K’s version of a gatcha game. You obtain random players from different packs. To purchase packs you either need to use real money – VCs or MyTeam coins.

However, similar to MyCareer there are different season rewards that lets you obtain player cards without purchase. This year the MyTeam: Draft has been added to introduce a new feature for card grading that is something that players have clamored for years.

You can now also modify shoe abilities instead of previously pre-listed attributes to shoes in previous versions of MyTeam. To create new shoe boosts, you can craft shoe cards in the MT Shoe Lab section.

VISUALS AND PERFORMANCE

I hate to admit that NBA2K22 still looks as the game’s previous iterations beginning with NBA2K22. However, it is not entirely a bad thing and it is actually understandable. Honestly, we are in a weird time as we transition from current to next-gen consoles. As you’ve probably seen in trailers, the game looks entirely different on the Playstation 5 and Xbox series we are left with as what we could described as patched edition of the game.

Honestly, I believed that the Playstation 4 had outlived it’s life cycle. Developers can only do as much with the PS4 computing power as compared to next-gen hardware. It is not the developer’s fault that we still don’t have enough supply of next-gen console no thanks to the pandemic. Having said that, I’m totally fine with what we are given for the current gen. I’m actually thankful that there is still a release for the current gen version of this game. I’ll take what I can get don’t get me wrong, NBA2K still a beautiful and as life like as it can be (sweats included haha).

You can differentiate an NBA2K game with the previous releases based on the sneakers that players are wearing. Luka this year is now wearing his signature Jordan 36 with his logo on it. However, there are other players that have yet to be updated and are still wearing the default 2K shoes like Donovan Mitchell.

Another new addition that I liked about NBA2K22 is the introduction of a new courtside reporter, Allie LaForce. No love lost for David Aldridge but her addition makes the game fresh. Of course, there are still the same commentators but another great addition is the different PA announcers from the leagues’ 30 different arenas so each game sounds different from the other.

As of this writing, I’m downloading the game’s version 1.03 update. The reason I mentioned this is because of some minor bugs I encountered in the game aside from the outdated sneakers. Some players like our very own Jordan Clarkson is missing a headband and other minor details.  The most glaring bug that I encountered is the missing Halftime Show of Ernie, Shaq, and Kenny. The graphic shows then the game freezes and when it comes back, the Halftime Show is over. I hope that this patch addresses these bugs.

 VERDICT

My review of NBA2K21 garnered mixed reactions with most not agreeing to the high rating that I gave. I’m not here to defend that but I would like to just like to say that I’ve read the comments and I appreciate your thoughts. The reason why I brought it up is because NBA2K22 looks almost the same as 2K21.

For the reasons, I’ve discussed earlier, NBA2K22 has already exceeded its predecessor. The similarities ends with the visuals and with minor improvements to the gameplay makes it fresh and plays like an entirely different game. I actually commend the developers for adding new content while working with the limitations of the current-gen console.

During the opening week, I frequently see in my social media feed if the game is worth getting at release or wait until it goes on sale? My answer to that is a definite YES! First, NBA2K22 is the only basketball simulation we have and I haven’t heard that the competition is doing a release this year. Also, it’s worth getting because of the timed season rewards for both the MyCareer and MyTeam modes. You wouldn’t want to miss out on this especially if you’re a fan of these modes.

This game is definitely for the fans specially now that we are still in lockdown and could not play actual basketball. NBA2K22 is still the closest that we can get to the game. Like everyone, I’m hoping that by this time next year, there are enough Playstation 5 stocks for all of us to enjoy next-gen editions of the games we love.

[This review is based on a retail copy of  the game provided by the publisher]