With technology advancing at such a fast pace, it eventually had to make its way to the gaming world and specifically into the sports gaming world. For years, gamers have complained about the gameplay when it comes to sports games. There are so many stereotypes and washed down statements in the sports gaming community that developers hate. They say things like “the game is unrealistic” or they say something like “this doesn’t happen in real life”. For the company 2K, their main sports game that they focus on is NBA 2K which is the #1 basketball game. For the company EA, their main sports games that they focus on is Madden NFL and FIFA which are the #1 football and soccer games. For years, we’ve heard many rebuttals to the complaints from the gamers. The opposers say things like “there’s only so much you can do to change a game each year” or “it’s difficult to release a completely different game when they already have their base.” While I understand both sides, I plan to side with the gamers. I believe that they should find a way to make changes within the game that would allow the gamers to adapt to the changes that they’re making. Good news for gamers this year, that is exactly what these companies plan to do.
As a gamer myself, I understand the challenges that come with improving these sports games. However, EA has decided to incorporate a game altering feature that completely changed the way you play FIFA 22 in contrast to the newer game, FIFA 23. This feature is called Hypermotion2 Technology. The feature has advanced the gameplay technology by twice as much, due to the new data capture capabilities. FIFA brought over 6000 authentic animations taken from millions of frames of advanced match capture to the game. If this isn’t what needs to be done to make the game more “realistic”, I’m not sure what more they can do. Another feature that FIFA has added is its own version of machine learning. They wrote new animations in real time to create a natural football motion across a variety of interactions. One of my favorite features has got to be the technical dribbling. The technical dribbling system is also informed by machine learning. It gives the most natural motion with the ball at your feet that a FIFA game has ever seen. It allows you to control the pace of the game while keeping the ball close or even further by turning away the ball from opponents. The fluidity has been better than ever before. They’ve even gone on to make the acceleration a lot better for players. FIFA added an additional layer of personality to how players reach their top speed in the game. It made it a lot more controlled or lengthy changes of pace, and now players reaching their full speed at different rates contributes more to variety in player movement in FIFA. The advancements that FIFA has made will only continue to improve the ratings and will also encourage a new group of gamers to want to play the game.
As for 2K, they have to focus more on the basketball side with their hit game NBA 2K. This game has gone through the most scrutiny that I’ve ever seen from a video game in my life. From my point of view, it seems a little difficult to replicate a sport like basketball into a video game because of so many different ways that you can score. I see the frustration from both sides but the improvements that 2K has had in 2k23 have been game changing. I’ll start with my favorite. It definitely has to be the adrenaline boosts that they’ve added. The adrenaline boosts prevent a player from overdribbling, this making the player slower as time goes on. This is a very realistic feature as this is exactly how it works in the NBA. Another talked about point in 2K that has needed some improvement is its shooting woes. There has been outspoken frustration about the lack of consistency that comes along with shooting in the game. They have fixed this issue for the most part and it comes with some nice upgrades. In NBA 2K22, success from the outside was heavily weighted toward coverage. If you could get an open look, you could balance out poor ratings and inaccurate timing. This year, they wanted a more authentic shooting model that captures the essence of a great NBA shooter’s capabilities. The first major change is the addition of shooting attributes. Since the beginning of signature jump shots in 2K basketball, animations have been more or less aesthetic but functionally the same. This year, each signature jump shot has unique shooting stats that help determine its effectiveness. It starts with shot speed which essentially shows how quickly the shot gets to its ideal release point. Next, you have release height which is how high the jumpshot tends to be released. Then, you have defensive immunity which shows how effective the shot is against defensive contests. Lastly, you have timing impact which adjusts the shot windows to reward good timing at the cost of an increased penalty for bad timing. They have also added a huge number of shot animations to choose from, which is over double the amount of any previous 2K and they are a lot more accurate to players’ real life jumpshot which is pretty cool in my opinion.
While it’s difficult to adjust these games on a year to year basis, I believe that the technologies that these companies are adding are game changing. We take a lot of these features for granted because we just want to turn on the gaming console and play something that we enjoy. However, the amount of research that these developers use on a daily basis to improve the game should not be overlooked. I look to the future to see what other features could be added to make a lot of these sports games more and more realistic.