Every year console sports fans get a new NBA-branded basketball game from mega-publisher 2K. And for the last several years running, Android has been blessed with an official companion app. Sort of. See, MyNBA2K isn't just a companion app that tells you when your buddies are ready to play, et cetera. It's also a free-to-play mobile game that, oddly, depicts computer-controlled battles between digital playing cards. Oh, and there's a big currency system behind it all, driving $100 in-app purchases. Of course.

The core of the mobile game doesn't appear to be much changed since last year. There are a few more cards to collect and a few cosmetic changes, but it's mostly the same experience. The biggest new feature is a face scanning tool, which allows players to take a photo of themselves and send it to the create-a-player mode on the console game. It's more or less exactly like EA's NBA Live series, only it's tucked away into the free-to-play meta game instead of getting its own app.

MyNBA2K17 is free with in-app purchases and advertising. The multiplayer card game is open to anyone (including Facebook and Google+ logins), but obviously you'll need a full-price copy of NBA 2K17 in order to use the connective features.

[EMBED_APP]https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.catdaddy.mynba2k17&hl=en[/EMBED_APP]