Cover-Credits:
Ronnie Singh, better known as Ronnie2K is the Digital Marketing Director for 2K Games and is known as the face of NBA 2K. He has been involved with the franchise ever since its inception. He started off playing the early NBA games on the Dreamcast and caught 2K’s attention after achieving the top 10 on the leaderboards. He joined 2K Games as a community manager and social media specialist, before becoming the face of the game.
Who is Ronnie2K? The Face of NBA 2K
Ronnie2K has become a prominent figure in the gaming and sports community, primarily due to his active engagement on social media and his involvement in the promotion and marketing of the NBA 2K series.
He is a well-known personality in the NBA 2K community and acts as the bridge between the game and its community. He has successfully blended social media, celebrity culture, and video games into one for the NBA 2K community and has played an influential role in the game.
Ronnie2K’s Entry Into 2K Games
Very few video game publishers in the world have had an impact on the video games industry as much as 2K Games. The publisher has a list of storied video game franchises under its belt including BioShock, Borderlands, Mafia, X-COM, WWE and NBA. It has published MLB and NHL in the past.
Ronnie 2K told AFK Gaming that his entry into 2K Games was not planned and it is something that just happened naturally. He saw an opportunity to be a part of the franchise not just as a player.
Over the years basketball legends achieved celebrity status and they were seen as cultural icons instead of just athletes. Basketball has blended into American culture and 2K Games’ NBA titles have capitalized greatly on it. Ronnie 2K’s first major project was NBA 2K11’s launch party and he has never looked back.
Talking about how he engages with the community, he said, “Social media channels and livestreams help me have one-on-one sessions with fans and I engage directly with the community. I have tried to become a part of any community conversation and try to address the wants and desires of the community.”
He continues to engage with the community on a day-to-day basis and he believes that one of the reasons behind the success of NBA 2K is the engagement he has with the community to improve the NBA 2K games like no other every year.
His Most Memorable Experiences at 2K Games
Ronnie shared a memorable incident with us. He recollected, “A few years ago we had to engage with a fan through Make-A-Wish. He was suffering from an illness and his wish was to meet us and offer ideas to work on. He wanted to have an NBA 2K game with a living open world and we were already working on ‘The City’”
The feature was added to the game and 2K Games is working on improvements to the open world to make it even more engaging in future games of the franchise. He added, “We want to continue working with whatever the newest tech is. While I can’t comment on what we are working on next. Compared to when I started, the difference between the games back then and now is ‘night and day. As long as the technology improves, our imaginations can go wild.”
“There is Appetite for Both Esports and Real Sports”
One of the challenges that sports games have when trying to enter the esports domain is that they not only have to compete with other esports titles but also the real sport that they represent. We asked Ronnie about his thoughts about NBA 2K and he said, “There is an appetite for both esports and real sports when it comes to games like NBA 2K. We have invested into the esports space for only the last five or six years and I expect there to be an audience for both our game as well as the real sport.”
He pointed out that countries like India have a massive gaming population with hundreds of millions of fans and the market is big enough to accommodate both traditional sports and esports for sports video games.
He wants to keep NBA 2K’s content fresh and the game is transitioning to a lifestyle product that allows celebrities, fashion brands, esports and other vertices to merge and connect with the community. He believes that there are a lot of opportunities that NBA 2K has not tapped into yet. Fans can expect new things from the franchise each passing year and he wants the playerbase to look forward to what’s coming.
