Monday Tip-Off: Grinding Is Antithetical to Fun…And Stick Skills

We’re at midcourt, and the ball is about to go up…it’s Monday Tip-Off! Join me as I begin the week here at the NLSC with my opinions and commentary on basketball gaming topics, as well as tales of the fun I’ve been having on the virtual hardwood. This week, I’m tipping things off with some frank thoughts on how grinding is not only antithetical to fun, but also the concept of stick skills.

It’s interesting – and honestly, a bit alarming – to see what we’ve come to accept in video games. Far too many gamers defend microtransactions, excusing them as being “optional” or “just cosmetic”, or indeed, that it’s “just business“. Excessive grinding will also be defended as a necessary part of the experience, usually suggesting that anyone that takes issue with it wants to be OP and done with a game in a week. And, since heavy grinding and microtransactions are intertwined in NBA 2K, the apologist rhetoric for both problems is likewise combined in a shameful display of shilling.

I’ll say it again. Everyone who criticises recurrent revenue mechanics understands all too well that video game development is a business, and that profits are something that a billion dollar corporation is going to strive for. We just don’t enjoy the negative effect that has on gameplay! Likewise, gamers that are fed up with releases that are a total grindfest understand the need to have a challenge and a journey. We just want it to be fair and fun, and grinding for grinding’s sake is antithetical to that. However, it’s also antithetical to the concept of testing stick skills, and the almighty mythical skill gap. We only need to cast our eyes back to some classic games to see the proof.

Now, I know that saying that is bound to draw some dismissive eye-rolls. “Here we go again, pretending that everything was better in the past!” Of course that isn’t a universal truth, anymore than the notion that everything always gets better. If you want an example of an old basketball video game that demonstrates how we had some absolute busts back in the day, look no further than NBA Live 07. They don’t make nostalgia goggles with enough rose-coloured tinting to make that game look good! Conversely, however, NBA 2K7 does hold up well, and was rightfully better-received at the time. It also provides some fascinating proof that grinding is antithetical to fun.

In most single player career and campaign modes, we expect to begin with low ratings and few if any special abilities and animations. Levelling up and equipping our player with boosts and other perks is all part of the journey. That’s what makes NBA 2K7’s version of 24/7 so interesting. As I noted when I covered NBA 2K7 and the history of 24/7 mode in the NBA 2K series, it doesn’t have any player upgrades. You just play through the story, raise your Rep to unlock new teammates and the next location, gain new moves from beating boss battles, and then finally triumph in the Legends Charity Tournament at Rucker Park. It also unlocks your player for use in other game modes.

Obviously, this is a simplified and streamlined approach compared to MyCAREER, and even the previous iterations of 24/7. I have to say though, it was a blast playing through that mode in NBA 2K7! Instead of being horrendously underpowered and barely able to make simple moves, I was immediately able to hold my own against the NBA players that the campaign put me up against. I didn’t have to worry about raising my athletic attributes, earning and equipping Signature Skills or Badges, or trying to find animations that worked. My avatar – an alternate universe Terry Hanson – had all the skill he needed for me to succeed, as long as I was sharp enough on the sticks.

Granted, I don’t think that MyCAREER could feasibly do away with the concept of player upgrades at this point. Furthermore, I don’t believe it should! With that being said, my playthrough of 24/7: Next in NBA 2K7 proves that it isn’t actually vital for a career or campaign mode to be enjoyable. If nothing else, it shows that we don’t need to madly grind from a starting point of a barely capable player in order to have fun. Not only that, but with no control over my ratings, animations, or anything else apart from my avatar’s height and position, there was no meta-gaming for success. It all came down to my inputs, reflexes, strategies, and overall stick skills with NBA 2K7.

There’s something delightfully old school about that. Sure, there are many classic titles that involve levelling up and gaining new abilities as you progress. This includes some of my all-time favourite games, such as Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas. It’s an essential mechanic in some genres, though to that point, the best games approach levelling up and grinding in a fairer and more enjoyable way than most iterations of MyCAREER in NBA 2K. At the same time, I like the concept of being handed all of the moves you’ll ever need at the beginning of a game, with its challenge coming from level design and increasing difficulty, requiring mastery of the controls and strategies.

It’s one of the reasons that I greatly prefer the Donkey Kong Country games on Super Nintendo to Donkey Kong 64 on the Nintendo 64. In the SNES games, the Kongs had all of their abilities from the very first level. Progressing through all of the levels and defeating the bosses came down to timing, pattern recognition, navigating danger, and effective use of their moves. In DK64, new moves, weapons, instruments, and even characters had to be unlocked. Reaching new levels and ultimately beating the game meant collecting bananas and other items in one of the most infamously over-the-top collect-a-thons in video game history; a process not unlike grinding in MyCAREER.

Of course, beginning DK64 with only Donkey Kong and his basic abilities wasn’t nearly as artificially challenging as being a 60 Overall MyPLAYER in NBA 2K. The abilities that you could unlock were essentially gateways to accessing new areas and solving their puzzles. Their absence didn’t make the early game barely enjoyable out of the gate like an underpowered MyPLAYER does. Similarly, in a Zelda game like Ocarina of Time, weapons and other items won’t be necessary until you reach a point where they’re required to beat a dungeon. Whether it’s levelling up abilities or gaining new items, there are good ways and bad ways to begin a game with basically nothing.

Even in RPGs such as Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, levelling up is part of the fun because it isn’t necessarily about grinding. The early areas and quests are usually balanced for low level characters, and even if they’re tougher, that’s often part of the appeal of the early game. Not only that, but veteran players can also find ways to beat tough areas before levelling up as part of a challenge run. Most importantly, though, you don’t have to perform mundane and repetitive tasks to grind for progress, just to have a viable avatar. I mean, you can, but a good game won’t force you to do that. It also won’t push you towards paying real money to skip the frustrating grind, either.

That’s the point that apologists forget – or, let’s face it, wilfully ignore – when they bleat about people wanting to be 99 Overall after a week. Grinding is different to simply progressing and levelling up, and it doesn’t necessarily mean a fun journey. They’ll also point out ways that you can ease the grind or avoid buying VC, such as quests, trying your luck with daily prizes, mini-games in a companion app, and so on. Here’s the thing, though: when it gets to the point where you’re strategising how to maximise VC earnings through quests and other extracurricular activities that have nothing to do with playing basketball, it’s not about fun, and certainly not stick skills!

Completing side quests where you become a rapper or fashion icon doesn’t test your abilities on the virtual hardwood or blacktop. Taking advantage of pre-order bonuses to get the game on two generations of consoles so that you can double dip with daily prizes and a shared VC wallet may demonstrate savvy thinking, but not a skill gap. In short, all the ways to grind for VC have nothing to do with an enjoyable basketball gaming experience, or sharpening your skills as a virtual baller. With some of the forced and repetitive actions while grinding for Badge progress, it’s antithetical to fun and stick skills, too. And of course, paying to skip the grind isn’t skilful in any way.

Honestly, I consider it to be far more skilful to take control of real NBA players, or the standardised builds we used to have, and dominate that way. It’s a level playing field, with no artificial augmentations based on meta-gaming. Frankly, it’s also more fun in my opinion. While NBA 2K14 and NBA 2K17 didn’t grant me as much control over my point guard builds as in later games, they’ve been my favourite MyPLAYERs to play with to date. The fair progression rate also helped, as I didn’t feel nearly as underpowered for anywhere near as long as I do in newer iterations of MyCAREER. Without mindless grinding, the focus is on stick skills, but more importantly, fun.

Once again, never was this more apparent than when I finally dove into 24/7: Next in NBA 2K7. I’ll admit that there is something missing when there’s absolutely no need to level up your player. There isn’t quite enough meat to the mode with that approach, and even if microtransactions and online play weren’t factors, I wouldn’t advocate for scrapping upgrades and builds/plays styles from MyCAREER. Nevertheless, it was so refreshing to not have to worry about that, or grind my way up from a starting point where my avatar doesn’t even feel like he’s a basketball player! It was just me and my stick skills versus the game. If I lost, I just needed to play better…indeed, to get good!

Apologists won’t admit it, but grinding – dull, repetitive grinding that turns gaming into a chore – is not essential to enjoyment. Indeed, it’s antithetical to it! That isn’t news, but it bears repeating in order to push back on all the “it’s optional” rhetoric. Moreover, we also need to point out how it’s antithetical to stick skills, from reducing success to gaining boosts, to having nothing to do with actually mastering gameplay mechanics. An artificially long journey just to make your avatar viable is not about the on-court experience or developing skills, but rather reaching into your wallet. For my money, I’d prefer games to test my reflexes and savvy, rather than my patience.

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