NBA 2K27 PS5 Review. The NBA 2K franchise has been in production since 1999 on the Dreamcast. Yes, it’s kind of hard to believe that NBA 2K has been around longer than the Call of Duty franchise. Unlike Call of Duty however, NBA 2K hasn’t had much competition over the years. Thankfully, 2K27 does a good job of maintaining its fundamentals in check while expanding on the look and feel of the game in a healthy way.
NBA 2K27 Review (PS5) – Positive Changes to Gameplay With An Abundance of Presentation
I’ve always been a stick shooter girlie, opting to use the Right Joystick to make my shots instead of pressing Square. I just prefer the feel of it. The same goes for pitching in MLB The Show. With this Rhythm Shooting, you push up on the joystick to start the shooting animation and then let go of the joystick to time your accuracy.
Another thing I like about Rhythm Shooting is that you can adjust the meter in settings to make it a little more generous. By default, my timing always ended up just a hair off no matter what I did. After I made the setting change, I started nailing my shots much more regularly. It’s no gimme by any stretch, but I felt much more capable of executing the timing after making that setting adjustment.
It’s been a couple years since I last played an NBA 2K game, so bear with me on this if the following is a standard feature now. What I’m used to while playing is getting visual cues from teammates via gestures and movement to communicate their movements and calls. Here, the game gives you little chat bubbles over players showing if there’s a defensive mismatch or when someone calls for a pass.
Further Adding Realism
The overall feel of the game is much more organic than what I remember. I got so used to animations that would leave your player out of position or doing goofy-looking block attempts. Player interactions are much more contextual now, yielding more varied animations based on the situation you face. In older versions of NBA 2K, I distinctly remember seeing the same jump block animation all the time, which left me looking like an idiot while my opponent ran right by me.
Now, the way your player jumps to block comes in direct response to how the offensive player moves. If the offense executes a fade away, then you block by trying to reach over them and NOT just put your arms straight up in the air. One of my favorite additions (though I hate looking dumb doing it) is that desperation block when a defender tries to close the gap on a wide open shooter. It often looks like your player takes a flying leap toward the ball, but that’s what it looks like when someone lays out to block when caught out of position.
Then, if you’re out of position, prompts appear on the court showing you where you’re supposed to be. You can still ignore them, if the situation calls for being more opportunistic, but it’s nice. To boot, it also shows you directional paths on the court to promote more strategic spacing and movement. I get so caught up in what I want to do on the court that I often neglect the team dynamic. Seeing these prompts helps me stay focused on the team sport aspect of basketball, and I truly appreciate this feature for that reason.
We All Ball Out
MyPlayer still fully embeds itself in an online, community-based City environment. This is great in the present, since now is the point and time in the game’s life where the most people will be playing. With that said, there is an offline aspect to the game built into the mode. As you level, you can face off against bot challengers in order to progress your player. Does it need to be strictly online in order to play this way? The preservationist in me says no, but the community aspect of basketball almost calls for it. I would like to see more flexibility here, since the offline elements are already present in the game. I just like being in my own ecosystems.
At the same time, though, walking into a park and seeing all of the other players playing each other in real time is just so cool. For several hours, I went courtside for some street ball and just watched people play, many of them in goofy costumes. I also love how The City is much more consolidated now. You no longer need to run around a large map with nothing to do but run between destinations. Everything is consolidated in specific areas and much more sensibly placed now. It’s just nice to be able to go from buying new gear to playing a 3v3 in just a few seconds instead of needing to run across an entire city.
To boot, now everyone can play together in The City, both men and women. Anyone who plays actual street ball knows that this happens all the time. Finally seeing it in NBA 2K feels great. It’s about time.
Missed Shots
Speaking of women’s basketball, I wish that the MyPlayer experience were more fleshed out for female players. You still get the basic experience of playing and making your way into the WNBA, but there’s very little story like there is in the men’s MyPlayer experience. Plus, adding in the actual WNBA commentators would be nice too. Yes, these things cost money to create.
Considering how much money gets made on microtransactions, I think these additions are more than affordable and well worth the effort. The in-game interviews mention the new pay bumps and incentives that WNBA players have now, which is great to hear about in a game of this caliber. Equally so, it would be nice to see a similar level of focus put on the game experience itself rather than just plugging in talking points (albeit very positive talking points).
On the topic of presentation, there is a lot of menus and scenes that cause excessive down time. In many cases, you can just skip a broadcast scene, but you can’t skip all of them. Then there is down time on the court. I might be in the minority, but I like just being able to play the game and not watch it. There have been leaps and strides made to present NBA 2K like an actual basketball broadcast, but this is also a game. When you go into MyTeam, the scenes play out even longer, showing courtside interactions in abundance. I want to be very clear: These scenes are super cool additions, but being forced to watch them every time when you want to just stay focused on the court you’re playing on is a struggle.
Finally, I want to be frank. I do not play MyTeam or any form of card-based modes in sports games. I do not enjoy them simply because I do not like playing in modes where pay-to-win is an option. I just like playing the sport. I’m not very competitive anyway, so it’s not really a mode meant for me. With that said, there is plenty of coverage out there for MyTeam from people who are far more qualified to talk about it than I am.
Solid Adjustments Without Losing Fundamentals
NBA 2K27 does a great job of expanding the court-level experience, adding more realistic player interactions rather than standardised, simplified animations. A more consolidated City experience gives you the social aspect of street hoop without all the excessive running around. Finally letting men and women play together in The City is a long-awaited addition. Broadcasting and off-court presentation take up a lot of unskippable time, and the MyTeam experience lacks the same amount of immersion and story for female players as male players get. All in all, NBA 2K27 is a good entry in the long-running franchise, especially if you haven’t played in a while.
Review code kindly provided by publisher.