NBA 2K26 Review - Refining the Process
Death, taxes and a new NBA 2K game. The three things that are sure in this life. Every year, this franchise sells a squillion, has a massive community and, without fail, attracts some criticism because of its monetisation policies. But in saying that, every year the basketball itself gets better and better. So with the release of NBA 2K26, do these certainties play true, or does this year’s edition break the mould?
I want to start with the elephant in the room. Over the years, 2K has rightfully been blasted for its nickel-and-dime tactics to suck money out of players. Thankfully, though, over the last few years that approach has softened. Now, with NBA 2K26, I feel like the balance has finally been found. Sure, there is the option to buy in-game VC with real money, but frankly, there is no real need anymore. The game lets players earn VC for just about every activity. From MyCareer goals to quick play matches. Everything earns VC, and it comes in at a steady rate. Just playing the game let me earn a nice amount and keep my player upgrading at a satisfying pace. I never felt that the game was pushing me towards using my wallet to get ahead, and I always saw a way to keep upgrading and improving my stats. It was wonderful to see, and it finally feels like 2K has listened to the noise from their community.
The other major improvement for me is the City and its performance. Last year, The City was a sprawling, massive area that ran at a terrible framerate and had a ton of glitches, even on my beast of a gaming PC. This year, the City has been shrunk, designed intelligently and efficiently and avoids tech and framerate issues. It is honestly a much nicer place to explore now, and getting from one side to the other doesn’t feel like a chore. They have even managed to make the skateboarding feel enjoyable and not like something developed by someone who has only read about skating in a book. Overall, it is a huge improvement, and it makes the MyCareer experience a significantly better one.
Speaking of the tech, this year’s edition feels like it has been really refined on the PC. I played it on four different PCs, from my high-end rig to my ROG Ally X and the game adjusted perfectly to each system. The experience was great on all of these systems, and apart from the stupidly long shader compile when you start the game for the first time, there were no issues at all. I love to see that developers are really making an effort for their games to be playable on a huge range of systems. We probably have the rise of handhelds to thank for that, but it is impossible not to see it as a net positive for all PC gamers. What was even more impressive was that the difference between the high and low settings was surprisingly minimal. Sure, you dip out on ray-tracing and the like on the low settings, but it still looked great.
As to the actual basketball. Well, it is no real surprise that it feels great. This year, it seems like it’s a bit more free-flowing, with players able to get around screens a little easier and move through the lane with a bit more freedom. This really opens up a more attacking style of ball, the style that both the Thunder and Pacers took to last season’s finals. It also allows for a bit more ad-lib style of play as opposed to the more structured feel of last year’s title. How you feel about that will be a personal thing, but I felt it was a nice adjustment. This year, the devs have also really taken steps to welcome new players with some seriously good tutorials and guides. This is something that the series has struggled with in the past, so it is wonderful to see.
The story this year was a fun one, but I had issues with it. It was great to see the story follow a player through the Euro Leagues, especially in this day and age. It is an increasingly common path for players to take to the NBA, so it was nice to see it represented in the game. The main problem with the tale, though, was the writing. It felt a little uneven, and the main character switched between being a likeable sod to a whiny punk, to an arrogant tool, seemingly at random during the story. It was jarring and led me to quite dislike this year’s MP for large chunks of the tale, not a great thing when I have to spend untold hours with him.
The other problem I had with the game is that, despite the international story, it still feels like NBA 2K doesn’t recognise that the rest of the world plays basketball. It would have been fantastic to see the developers make a real effort to include more international teams, allow for a “World Cup” style scenario and let folks from around the world really get involved with their own nation. The gap between the USA and the rest of the world in regards to talent is shrinking every single day, so I feel like that really should be represented in the world’s biggest virtual interpretation of the sport.
All that said, there is no denying that NBA 2K26 is one of the best iterations of the franchise we have seen. It makes a host of smart and considered refinements to previous titles that take it to the next level. The use of VC is the fairest it has ever been, it works wonderfully on a wide range of systems (including handhelds), and the actual gameplay is fluid and enjoyable. Rarely do I feel like players need to get every year’s edition of this franchise, but this year I will make the exception. NBA 2K26 is a fantastic upgrade and well worth it, even if you already have the 2025 version.
NBA 2K26 was reviewed on PC with code kindly supplied by the publisher.
