The Early Days of NBA 2K13 Have Been Particularly Encouraging

2K Sports has a history of trouble, particularly online-related, with the NBA 2K series during each year’s respective release week. Generally online has been the high profile culprit but widespread freezing in various modes or other bugs have arisen early on that required immediate attention. In starting to pull together impressions on the game outside of one issue in MyCareer mode it has become clear that NBA 2K13 has avoided many of the pitfalls of year’s past.

Online play may not necessarily be stellar but it has been much more reliable and has produced a far more enjoyable experience. Most games have been lag free and fun to play. Shot timing – and being able to get up shots before a defender closes space – has been somewhat difficult to get the hang of as responsiveness isn’t ideal. As always there are reports out there of users experiencing lag or disconnects. Regardless any issues are far more limited than what has plagued previous titles during their release weeks.

The biggest complaints about the game have been a disappearing scoreboard (which is really troublesome), MyCareer freezing after the first game is completed (a patch is supposedly already in the works for that), that the server is constantly being contacted to calculate VC which sometimes fails, and that there is no way to turn off auto-saves. MyTeam mode also favors to a ridiculous degree those who are spending cash on buying players and upgrades. Anyone who doesn’t is immediately crushed online by all the super-teams that have been constructed.

Considering history and anticipation levels translating to huge sales for NBA 2K13 it would have been reasonable to expect a bevy of problems in the days surrounding release. That the rumblings of trouble are so limited is a testament to the all-around quality of this year’s product.