May 10, 2000

GAME THEORY

Making Hoop Dreams Come (Almost) True

By MARC SPIEGLER

	TELEREALISM NBA 2K presents professional basketball as television entertainment. A player can choose one of eight camera angles to view the flashy offense or the more pedestrian defense.

The National Basketball Association was one of the marketing marvels of the 90's. So it is no surprise that N.B.A. simulations have been a major focus for video game makers, especially in an era when motion-capture technology and high-speed rendering allow the developers to offer nearly realistic games. Or rather, "telerealistic" games, since television is the driving medium behind the recent success of both the league and the league-inspired games.

Many of today's basketball video games are licensed N.B.A. products that feature full player rosters, with images of the real athletes' faces skillfully mapped onto their virtual bodies. At the top of this genre is NBA 2K, by Sega Sports for the Sega Dreamcast console.

Short of building in celebrity spectators and hordes of photographers, every effort has been made to mimic a televised event. The games start with laser-show introductions, include a stream of cliché-ridden patter by the television announcers for the Golden State Warriors, take place in digitized versions of actual stadiums and even include on-court woofing between players. When Kobe Bryant pulls off a two-handed helicopter jam, for example, he is prone to crowing, "I'm bustin' out the whuppin' stick."

To add to the telerealism, you can choose from eight camera angles, including isolation cameras that track a single character. Gamers can also call for a replay at any moment. Using the console's controllers, you can then watch the highlight frame by frame or freeze the motion and swoop around the scene, recalling similar effects in "The Matrix."

In actual game play, characters are impressively rendered, their movements neither jerky nor truncated, and they move around the court in an entirely plausible fashion. The telerealism falls apart only in the close-up replays triggered by players or by the game itself. That's when the motions seem stiff and the players wear a single expression: the patented sullen look of the professional athlete. Only as their programmed shooting moves kick in do they start displaying a wider range of facial expressions and stop looking like doll heads on human bodies.

In fairness, that is a minor quibble, one that will bother only players with unreasonably high standards for the suspension of disbelief (and nit-picking critics). Certainly, the game has a lot of what gamers call granularity, those little details that make the action seem real. Would-be coaches can call plays, change defenses and make substitutions; fantasy-league devotees can trade players and even conduct a full draft.

Game players with Dr. Frankenstein leanings can build players from scratch, customizing things like height, bulk and skills as well as facial hair, eyewear and sneaker style. This character-making feature had one funny effect: I built a player almost at random, then suddenly realized that I had created a clone of Kurt Rambis, the gawky backup center to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar during the Los Angeles Lakers' "Showtime" era.

But once you get past all the razzmatazz, there is a fundamental flaw in the game, one that has tripped up the makers of every basketball game I have ever tried: you just can't play good defense.

Basketball with all the dazzle: no-look passes and too-good-to-be-true dunks.

Of course, that problem may be intractable. As anyone who plays a team sport learns, the person playing offense always has the distinct advantage of knowing where he's going; the defender can only guess. That predicament is compounded in video game play, where you can't watch your opponent's hips or eyes, and where hitting a single button will propel an offensive player toward the basket, but adequately covering him requires a far more complex set of moves. Because you can control only one character at a time, you have to switch characters constantly as the ball moves around the court, then move that man to the ball quickly -- a tricky feat in the traffic of five-on-five half-court offense.

That imbalance tends to make for riotously disjointed games. On offense, you're pulling off plays you would never attempt on a playground -- no-look passes, behind-the-back dribbling, 360-degree dunks. And it takes only about three attempts to learn the trick of successfully lobbing alley-oops that lead to rim-crushing jams, an apparently unstoppable tactic. Likewise, pushing the Turbo button while dribbling upcourt tends to give you that extra quick step required to shimmy behind your opponent for a layup.

Yet on defense, your character seems to be playing his first game ever. If you want to win, you're usually better off posting the man you actually control near the basket to block layups and dunks, while letting the game's artificial-intelligence programs handle the dirty work of actually guarding your opponents. After a week of rigorous play, perhaps your defense might become middling. But why bother, when you can be competitive against the computer without even learning to play solid man-on-man?

Without good defense, NBA 2K quickly becomes an exercise in shame, as Rusty LaRue, the Bulls journeyman, grandstands his way up the court after dunking over Glen Rice, the Los Angeles Lakers All-Star (or, at least, over your sorry attempt to play as Rice). The game has a practice mode for passing and shooting, but not for defense. That is especially disheartening because of NBA 2K's arsenal of programmed offensive stunts.

One could argue that this is only fitting, given how much of today's N.B.A. play revolves around making the evening sports newscast with acrobatic slams and fancy dribbling moves. And it is precisely the realism of those components that makes NBA 2K such an exciting game to play; there's no telling what wonder you'll pull off next. Still, it's defense that wins real basketball games. As long as virtual hoops draws more on the legacy of the flamboyant dunkmeister Darryl Dawkins than the fundamentals fanaticism of the great U.C.L.A. coach John Wooden, there is some critical realism sorely missing. Then again, it's just a video game -- cue the highlight reel.

NBA 2K by Sega Sports for Sega Dreamcast; $39.99; for all ages.