The star mode of NBA 2K, MyCareer, once again puts you in the shoes of an up-and-coming player trying to make his mark on the Association. Instead of playing your way into being a lottery pick, this year you have a giant chip on your shoulder as an undrafted free agent. To crack an NBA roster, you need to perform well in a scrimmage for a team of your choosing and earn a 10-day contract. From there, your fate is in your hands. Off the court, you experience the highs and lows of an NBA player. Visual Concepts added more endorsement deals to the mix, included some interactions with celebrities, and amped up the locker room drama around your ability to enter free agency after your first year.

 

You can create the image of a villain or a hero along the way based on how you respond during press conferences and post-game interviews. You can even call out or try to recruit players via social media. And what did I find there? Pretty much the same game as NBA 2K14. The gameplay is basically identical. There are a couple U.I. improvements, a couple changes to how shooting works to help you make your shots more accurately, and movement feels a bit tighter all around, but that’s it. You can jump in with no tutorial, no manual, and no instruction whatsoever and you are fine. Actually, this probably would have been a good place to put a tutorial, but I digress.

 

Folks who enjoy more legacy-based gameplay can create their own fantasy dream team of players from every era in MyTEAM mode, which plays out like a collectible card game from a roster building standpoint. You'll start out with bronze-rated players at first who make Will Perdue look like Shaquille O'Neal under the rim but can work your way up to stronger ones by earning MyTEAM points and getting rewards and packs. Lovers of role playing and more involved team building can try out MyGM mode, which throws in a new conversation system as well as changes to scouting, injuries and offseason activity. Sim fans can also simulate seasons up to 80 years in MyLEAGUE mode while controlling rosters and draft classes.

 

This brings me to one complaint that I have with NBA 2K15: excruciatingly slow load times. I'm talking about load times so oppressive that once or twice I was convinced the game had crashed. It's a shame to have an otherwise pleasurable gaming experience marred by load times so bad I almost forgot what game I was playing. MyTeam mode is a card-based team-management game. You begin with a starter pack of cards and then build it from there. You earn more cards as you play and those cards can be used to obtain additional players. I've never been one for any card-based team-management game and MyTeam was no exception. This is the kind of detail that I find boring, but others may love. I'd rather be out on the court ballin'.

 

NBA 2K is a almost always a blast to play with a friend on the couch. With the full NBA and a decent selection of Historic teams, there are plenty of great matchups to be played. BlackTop is a fun way to try out a variety of players, I just wish there was an option for standard scoring not just the 1’s and 2’s. The servers for 2K are straight up garbage. For all the money they make from game sales and VC sales the consistency of the servers is pathetic. Often times players will have to keep restarting the game just to try and get a connection and since almost all modes function with VC those modes are unavailable to be played without an internet connection further restricting players ability to play the game they paid for because 2K cant connect. Lagging out is a regular occurrence in any online mode and input lag is almost to be expected. They need a serious upgrade in the server department considering they funnel every mode through the servers. I certainly have fun playing 2K but its a game of highs and lows. If the Fun Factor is 6.5 then the Frustration Level is an 8.

 

The expansive MyLeague mode rounds out another incredible offering, which only serves in making the shoddiness of the game's online servers even more frustrating. NBA 2K15 flirts dangerously close with achieving perfection, yet it's severely let down by its hideous online performance. While patches have improved things somewhat, it doesn't work nearly as smoothly as it should. Clearly patches need to be a focal point for NBA 2K16, when it rolls around next year.