Only a few years ago, NBA 2K and NBA Live were locked in a pretty intense battle for video game basketball dominance. As 2K took over (in both ratings and sales), Live was left trying to catch up, but has 2K’s solid lead left the franchise a little lazy at tweaking what matters most? Well, probably not, but 2K10 still feels a little off in some of the most important areas.

Gameplay:

It seems like 2K has added a slew of new features every year, and 2K10 will do nothing to change the trend. While there’s a handful of solid new content, two of the newest additions that impressed me were the My Player feature and the NBA Today feature. With NBA Today, you can play (and view recent stats) for the day’s scheduled NBA games. This is a very fun way to keep track of the season, and see if you can predict the outcome of what might take place later that night (or maybe even change the outcome to one more to your liking).

With My Player, you can create your own basketball player and take him through the professional ranks, all the way from the bottom of the summer league to the D-League to the NBA itself. While it’s very slow going (it takes a PAINFULLY long time to grind your player to a good rating befitting the superstar you’d like him to be), the reward is pretty great considering the amount of time you invest in the payoff. Even if you don’t use My Player and simply enjoy the standard NBA roster, 2K’s Living Roster is constantly updated to keep your game completely up-to-date. The best part about this is that 2K does this for free; it won’t cost you 1200 Microsoft points like EA’s greedy, bogus “Dynamic DNA” rip-off for NBA Live 10. “Dynamic DNA” might sound special, but it isn’t. It’s exactly like 2K’s Living Roster, EA just gouges you for it.

The NBA 2K series has always been built on solid gameplay, with small tweaks being made here and there throughout the years to keep the series’ newest title fresh and different. The shot stick, for example, brought one of the most intuitive shooting controls into the series and has remained a staple since. This year, though, it feels a little…off. If you spent as much time playing NBA 2K8 and 2K9 as I did, then you’ll probably notice that the timing of a “Perfect Shot” is significantly different than it used to be. It feels much quicker and if you want to have a chance at actually hitting an open jumper, you’ll have to release much earlier than the peak of your jump. For nearly every player I tried out, it just didn’t feel natural.

Unfortunately, the movement also seems to have taken a slight turn for the worse. Playing a Cavs game with the super nimble LeBron James, for example, I found myself trying to quickly run toward a loose ball that bounced behind me. Instead of simply turning to pick the ball up when I used the Left Stick to direct James to do so, he slowly turned and ran in a wide semi circle toward the ball…which an opposing player had long since picked up.

The lack of some features also drove me absolutely insane. Regardless of how many times I tried to adjust them, I couldn’t get my Coaching Settings to stay saved to my profile or my Settings file. I tried in vain to adjust my rotation changes and substitution methods over and over again only to have it reset and find myself adjusting the settings every single time I played a game. 2K10 also inexplicably removed the ability to use the Right Stick for defense, which really hurt the gameplay a lot for me. I felt like the Right Stick Defense was a fluid extension of the Right Stick’s use for the shot stick in the previous games in the series, and being limited to only raising my hands on defense (instead of stealing, cutting off a driving player to the right and left, and raising my hands) feels like a step backwards.

It also makes no sense that the 2K games change the dribbling controls every year. One year a Behind-the-Back move uses one trigger, then it uses both, then it uses the other trigger. This greatly interrupts consistency for series fans, and it makes no sense considering the fact that the dribbling moves themselves have remained the same for three games now. While we’re addressing bizarre missteps, why is there still not an option to have an “Absolute” (a control setting based on the same directional use of the Right Stick always performing the same motion/action) setting for shooting on offense rather than the inconsistent and unpredictable “Relative” setting?

Graphics:

Even these quibbles can’t keep 2K10 from really shining in the area it’s always excelled in, however. Visually, 2K10 is not just the best looking basketball game ever made, it’s one of the best looking Xbox 360 games you’ll ever see. The attention to detail has increased year after year, and this year it is downright mind boggling. 2K has gotten everything down perfectly, from player attire to idiosyncrasies, and when I say idiosyncrasies, I mean every single twitch, sniff, and jersey tug. Steve Nash licks his fingers, Dirk Nowitzki pulls his jersey to the side, and every free-throw animation, jump shot gesture, and facial expression is so real you’ll think you’re either watching a real game, or that the 2K devs actually stalked and recorded every moment of these players in-gym lives.

Everything is incredibly slick and polished to a mirror sheen. The menu, while still uniquely awkward in its function, is smoother than ever and glides quickly between sub-menus with ease. Pre-game stats and rosters are displayed with professionalism that would give ESPN a run for its money, and the in game camera angles are so amazing and well done that it would be very, very easy to confuse this for an actual game. Now more than ever it’s clear that nobody can even come close to matching 2K’s presentation – nobody.

Sound:

The audio is an integral part of the top notch presentation, as well. Kevin Harlan and Clark Kellogg are by a wide margin the two best commentators in video game sports. This year they sound even more comfortable and fluid together than they did in 2K9. They laugh naturally at little jokes, discuss recent games and stat changes, and talk about special events and unique occasions. On my Halloween day game, Kevin chuckled as he welcomed me to the “spookiest broadcast this year,” which came complete with an accompanying wolf howl and ghost “boo” to follow-up his introduction The arenas sound amazingly realistic (and you can trust me as a guy who has been in plenty and heard plenty more on TV) and the music fits very well and echoes in the loud stadium accurately. Cheryl Miller’s performance doesn’t quite sound as natural as Kevin and Clark’s, but she’s still a damned good side line reporter, even in a video game.

Longevity:

As usual with the 2K series, 2K10 is packing a lot of replay value for those interested. Along with the aforementioned game modes, there is now online support for up to 10 players to cooperate and compete in the same game on Xbox Live. It’s great to see 2K really jumping onboard with the multiplayer support and to execute it so well. Having five players work together on the same team is what basketball is all about, after all.

Overall:

While it may not be perfect and it may have taken a few steps backwards, the strides forward still make NBA 2K10 the best damn basketball game you’ll find on the Xbox 360 – or on any other console, for that matter.