Michael Jordan is, by most accounts, the greatest basketball player of all time, but his legacy in a brand is perhaps even more enduring. Appropriately, for the inclusion of Jordan in NBA 2K11, there will be more Air Jordan shoes than ever before.
“There are two legacies of Michael Jordan, his playing and his brand,” explains NBA 2K11producer Erick Boenisch. “And for this game, the Jordan brand guys at Nike were finally asking for us to incorporate all of their shoes into our game. This is something we wanted for years, so we were really excited that this year with Michael, they really got on board with us.”
“We have so many shoe heads into our game that when we put out our first trailer for NBA 2K11, people were doing freeze frames and capturing screen grabs of the Space Jam shoes he has on in the video, Boenisch added. They cut out Michael entirely and put a little box around the shoes to show off that the Space Jams are in the game. All I have to say is people like this are going to be so happy this year.”
There are over 40 pairs of shoes in the game, and the more time people put in, the more shoes they get. “The way they unlock is every couple of hours you get a new pair. The shoes also have attributes on them, so this becomes really beneficial both in My Player and MJ Creating a Legend mode. And shoes can be unlocked anywhere in the game, whether you’re playing online or franchise or practice mode. Your timer is always running and shoes are always unlocking, explains Boenisch. “And the order you get them in is random. It’s strategically random where the rarest shoes in real life are the hardest to get and are unlocked toward the end while the common ones are unlocked upfront. But if you and I are playing next to each other at the same time, we’re going to unlock shoes in a different order. So you can show your friend that you got the Jordan 12s, but maybe he got the 1s and 23s.”
The game will also provide bits of history for the different pairs of Air Jordans. “Back when the Jordan 1s were introduced, everyone in the league only wore white shoes, and these were red with the black swoosh. Michael saw them and said something like, ‘I can’t wear that shoe. Those are devil colors.’ But he wore them and the NBA fined him every single game he wore them that season and the Bulls paid the fine. History was made right there. Shoes became culture in the NBA and it was all started with Michael. That’s why we’re so proud to have him in the game this year, not only as a character, but as a brand.”
Source: ESPN
