To pay their respects after the tragic death of NBA superstar Kobe Bryant, NBA 2K20 and its online community have come together in a series of touching in-game tributes. On January 26, the 41-year-old basketball legend, his teenage daughter, Gianna, and seven others lost their lives in a fateful helicopter crash in Calabasas, California.
From the moment the world learned of his sudden and shocking passing, the internet has been awash with a collective outpour of grief and condolences to Kobe Bryant’s legacy and family. Close friends, peers, and notable figures all shared their goodbyes to the basketball icon, whose budding life chapter in sportscasting and on-air analysis was closed shut far too soon. That goes doubly for Bryant’s thirteen-year-old daughter, Gianna Maria-Onore Bryant, who was en route with her father to a basketball game, in which she was scheduled to play and her father was slated to coach. Investigative and recovery efforts are still ongoing, but it’s known that pilot Ara Zobayan, John, Keri, and Alyssa Altobelli, Sarah and Payton Chester, and Christina Mauser all also perished in the catastrophic crash.
Developers of premier basketball simulator NBA 2K20 have altered the game to open on a black-and-white memorial dedicated to Kobe Bryant’s life, making his image the first thing that players see when they log in. Players, too, are giving their own touching send-offs to the late sporting legend. One redditor shared a heartfelt and wholly unscripted moment shared with online strangers, in which they each took intentional 24-second shot clock violations in honor of the last number Bryant wore on the court before retiring from the Los Angeles Lakers. In another Reddit post, a powerful screenshot pictured dozens of players grouped together in the game’s Neighborhood hub area, with every player having clad their character model in Lakers gold and purple in a final show of gratitude for the Black Mamba’s contributions to the sport.
Although NBA 2K20 doesn’t currently have any official Kobe Bryant jerseys with which players can outfit their custom characters, some in the game’s community are instead opting to wear jerseys bearing #2 in honor of Bryant’s daughter, whose youth basketball career was just beginning. When trying to mentally tabulate the immense pain inflicted on the sporting world by this heartbreaking loss of life and youth, it becomes clear that the fatal crash that took Kobe Bryant’s and eight other’s lives will go down as one of the greatest tragedies in athletic history. It’s only to be expected that gamers, developers, league players, and more are all coming out to pay homage to one of the NBA’s greatest point guards of all time in whatever ways they can.
Above all else, the world can only hope that these NBA 2K20 shows of love amid a near-infinite sea of farewells and condolences will reassure Bryant’s surviving wife, Vanessa, and daughters, Natalia, Bianka, and Capri, with the knowledge that the world is mourning with them. Players on real and digital courts may not gather together for tearful shows of respect for Bryant’s phenomenal life and career forever, but his legacy as an idol, game-changer, and loving husband and father will never fade.
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Source: Rowmel_/Reddit, filthyrichX/Reddit
