The NBA 2K series has long been up there as one of the best sporting video games, each year putting forward a great recreation of basketball that always makes the most of each era of console hardware. But for over a decade there’s always been the looming shadow of VC, the microtransactions that have spread to almost every fact of the experience. Does NBA 2K25 strike a better balance in that regard than previous games? Yes and no.
The first thing you will see on the home screen is a pop up to go to the current season and buy Virtual Currency (VC), which you might easily open up by mistake when hurriedly tapping through to reach MyCareer. This kind of splash screen is increasingly common in mass market video games, but the difference, as always, is that 2K is pushing people to spend more in an already full priced game to get a leg up for your character.
Once you actually reach the main menu, you have a choice between MyCareer, MyTeam, NBA Eras which includes MyGM, and WNBA. Most players, myself included, will head to MyCareer as that is where a lot of the action is. In NBA 2K25, there are new options to create your player, including Pro Builds. With Pro Builds you select some aspects for your player, like position and playstyle, and NBA 2K25 will pull a few players that your build is similar to and base your stats on them. Do not expect a powerhouse player, as you will start as rookie with a rating of 60.
For the purposes of this review, we were provided with 100,000 VC, which I did spend on improving my player’s attributes. This amount moved the needle from a 60 rating to a 76 rating, which is mid-range for the vast majority of NBA players, but well off the top. I would suspect another 100,000 would get my player to the mid-80s. For context, 200,000 VC is priced at $49.99.
In MyCareer you select the team you want to play for and are already part of the squad, though your first goal is to become a starter. MyCareer brings back the city hub with quests to complete, side content like kart racing, a gym, practice areas, and boss matches against the CPU. There are also lots of shops to spend your VC in for clothing for your player. The cheapest options I found cost 1,500 VC, and there are dozens of apparel options. Spending VC on this means not spending it to improve your player’s attributes, which was my main focus. Some of the quests to provide VC as a reward and they are worth checking out, especially the 3v3 boss battles across the three different arenas in the City. They’re tough but a fun distraction. The go-karting, though, feels very floaty.
If you have played MyCareer before you will know what to expect. In the NBA games you only control your player, and not the rest of the team, which can be both fine and frustrating. Team chemistry has to be built over the long term with the on the court and off the court actions impacting it. The higher the chemistry the more likely your teammates will take notice of you, and not ignore your calls for passes or make silly plays. For example, my player passing to our open 3 point shooter, who instead of shooting decides to drive to the post for a 2 pointer and miss, or my player getting into an open lane with no defence covering me, only for the call for the pass to be ignored and the ball get turned over instead.
This impacts your own teammate ranking, which in turn can impact the outcome of a game, and how much VC you earn. The most I have earned so far is around 800 VC, after getting a B+ team ranking and winning the game. The grind is very much alive in MyCareer.
MyGM is the much better option, in my view, to play. For a start VC isn’t really a factor here, except as a reward post-match depending on the outcome, and you can instead focus on just running an NBA franchise as well as playing the games on court. You can control everything from the staff in your franchise, organising and negotiating player trades, and dealing with the day to day running of an NBA franchise.
You interact with staff members around the office, as they pitch ideas and give advice, with you making the call to pursue or reject suggestions. Maybe it is worth trying to get a past prospect back into the game, despite the injuries and personal issues they have had, and maybe the cost of a fan day would outweigh its benefits. As the GM it is your call, and I would definitely encourage more players to engage with that side of NBA 2K25, because that is where the real shine of the game is.
The on the court action is very well presented, and the level of polish is something we have come to expect from the NBA 2K franchise. The player likenesses and on the court animations, of which there are thousands more, really mimic the real life counterparts. The gameplay is generally very smooth, though some camera angles are definitely better than others. For MyCareer, the standard camera is fine, whereas in full team games the broadcast and full court view is much better.
The shooting does still feel off at times with a slight millisecond difference could determine a shot being excellent, which will always drop, or slightly early and slightly late which have less chances of dropping. Sometimes, it is not even clear what shots will go in the basket with early rated shots going in, whereas something you’d expect to doesn’t. This is down to the shot meters, of which there are three to choose from, not feeling entirely accurate.