With a little more than two weeks to go, countless fans of the NBA 2K series are beyond excited to play the latest edition in the series, NBA 2K18.

The problem with NBA 2K and sports video games, in general, are that most of the time they're the same game as the year before, just with a semi-fresh coat of paint. Thankfully, NBA 2K18 looks to be a different game with 2K Games and the developers sharing numerous blogs throughout the production of the game sharing and showcasing new elements that will be seen in the latest version. One of the revamped features was the MyGM mode, which allows the player to take on the role as a general manager for their favorite NBA franchise and control the ins and outs of day-to-day life with the team, by making it much more interactive and a tad more story driven for the player. They're even going to update the cover to show Kyrie Irving playing for his new team, the Boston Celtics.

Besides all the promises and additions to the game, many fans of the series are clamoring for a few major changes to the series that would make NBA 2K18 the best in the entire series.

1) The ability to better customize your MyPlayer

For the entire existence of the NBA 2K franchise one of the most popular options is MyPlayer, where the player creates his or her own NBA rookie, participates in the pre-draft process, mostly by playing in college in recent versions of the game, is selected by a lottery team and then plays out their NBA career. But, before all of that even begins the player must first customize their player from position to number all the way to their physical appearance.

When it comes to customizing the physical appearance of a MyPlayer, that is where NBA 2K has fallen flat in the past. What games want is a fully fleshed out customization option comparable to the Dark Souls series (0:00-1:00):

If players were able to customize their MyPlayer to the finer details and create anything they wanted while customizing, the entire experience would be greatly improved.

2) Playing beyond the polish

The development team at 2K Games puts a lot of love into the NBA 2K franchise. They constantly are looking to improve the experience for the player with improved graphics, better mechanics, and much more. But after all the polish and fine tuning the game lacks some minor continuity errors and mechanics that prevent the player from being fully immersed in their experience.

In MyPlayer, the fact that you are required to constantly attend practice just to unlock the ability to further improve your player can be fun at first, but after playing the same few drills time and again it just gets tiresome. If 2K were to remove that requirement it would make the MyPlayer experience a lot more fun on your path to becoming the next GOAT. The other improvement that could happen in MyPlayer is to continue to tweak the ways you can improve your player. Much like the FIFA series, 2K Games could take a page out of EA Sport's book.

The other popular option, besides MyGM and MyPlayer, MyTeam, where players assemble teams of players throughout NBA history, could take another page out of EA Sport's book with their Madden series. One of the biggest requests gamers have been making is something similar to Madden's Ultimate Team's draft mode. The ability to take a selection of cards and draft a team with friends, either online or offline, would be a huge improvement for the MyTeam mode and allow it to keep pace with rival sports franchises.

3) Sharing is caring

Finally, the third biggest item on most gamer's wish lists for NBA 2K18 is the ability to better share content created throughout the game. There is a ton of cool stuff being created by the shoddy servers and lack of ability to share custom creations is what is forcing gamers to go to third-party sites. If players were able to better share content with other players it would bring NBA 2K18 to the highest level in terms of sports gameplay.

On September 18, or September 15 if you pre-ordered, gamers and basketball fans alike will be treated to the latest installment of the NBA 2K series with NBA 2K18. While some gamers fear that it will be much of the same from NBA 2K17, there are plenty of options that have not been shown for the latest version that will allow it to become one of the best games in the entire series.