NBA 2K21 Free On Epic

Monday, lies were said as Google believes Stadia is “Alive and Well,” and Alexx spoke of Grindstone releasing on Epic as of yesterday. Tuesday, I spoke about F1 2021 and my hatred of fans. Wednesday, I covered the almost nothing releasing on Game Pass this week and next, while Alexx spoke about Biomutant which releases next week. Thursday, I want to climb in an oven to avoid Geoff Keighley and Summer Game Fest this year, while Taylor spoke of GTA V and GTA Online coming to a third-generation of consoles.

Right, onto moaning about the Epic Games Store and NBA 2K21. Yes, that’s this week’s game, which I wouldn’t mind if it wasn’t the one that 2K “explained” they needed to make more expensive, but only for next-gen consoles. This PC port is the last-generation version, even though PC is where you have more power than any console currently available, and yet the price hike didn’t come to PC. Instead, the PC version was about £15 cheaper (at the time) and it was the sequel to the universally panned 2K20. Its first trailer for “My Team” featured more loot boxes and gambling than the warehouse EA store their upcoming Vegas casino in, which won’t have gambling, just “surprise mechanics.”

Look, I could joke about the balls, the men, and my own lack of interest in sports, but I don’t think I have to. It was at the back end of last year and the front end of this one I was left worrying which one of the avaricious publishers would be purchasing Codemasters. It turns out it would be EA, which I’m surprised that at this point, I’m relieved about. Yes, down the line I’m sure they’ll try to screw it up, but have you seen the trailer for “MyTeam” NBA 2K20? It was a literal casino!

If you know anything about these types of yearly releases, it shouldn’t surprise you to know very few overall changes from year to year. Do I expect there to be fewer microtransactions, loot boxes, and general 2K-levels of greed? No, no I do not. I’ll explain exactly why by simply bringing up WWE 2K Battlegrounds, a game that was so dreadful I made it my worst game of 2020. Why? Well it was the replacement for the canceled WWE 2K21, which would have also been developed by Visual Concepts. However, after the mess of the previous year’s release they didn’t bother.

Logically, doing tweaks to NBA 2K20 to make 21 would be easy enough. Remaking WWE 2K20 from the ground up to find out where it all went wrong, well that would probably a bit harder to do. I’m not saying it is 100% the same game, I’m saying that there will be enough to keep it fresh, but 2K kept the bits that make them money. To quote the game’s Wikipedia (the most reliable source!) on the “MyTeam” mode “Virtual Currency (VC) is used extensively within the mode.” While we’re on this horrible pile of bat smegma, this is also the one with the horrid unskippable in-game ads.

“Hopefully the mystery of it means it’ll be something good,” I honestly wish I had the optimism of Americans. This is what I was told last week when we found out that this week’s free game on Epic wouldn’t be unveiled until it was available to claim. Why was it a mystery game, as it is again this week too? Because Epic is doing a Mega-sale thing, which means for the next couple of weeks we’ll continue this game of “mystery game” meaning I can’t plan anything ahead of time and live a life. Thanks Epic, how is that horrible court case going for you?

Look, all this week 2K’s NBA 2K21 is available for free on Epic, if you want to pick it up, you’ll have until Thursday the 27th to do so. If you want to be extra spiteful to 2K, you could just claim it to drive the price Epic paid to them of each copy down, keeping Celeste the best-for-value deal any developer possibly made. It honestly makes no difference to them, they got whatever million dollar deal Epic gave them. Anyway, next week’s game will be revealed in “Mystery game unlocking in 6:??:??:???“