Kobe Bryant to be on cover of NBA 2K game for fourth time

NBA Hall of Famer Kobe Bryant will be the cover athlete for NBA 2K24, the video game's publisher announced Thursday.

2K tweeted that two different covers -- the Kobe Bryant Edition and the Black Mamba Edition -- would be released, with preorders beginning Friday ahead of the September release on multiple consoles.

"As we celebrate 25 years of NBA 2K with Kobe Bryant, we commemorate his legacy and the generational impact he has had on the game of basketball," Greg Thomas, president at Visual Concepts, the game's developer, said in a statement. "While we mark the history of the franchise, NBA 2K24 also looks ahead to the future to bring an innovative leap in technology and the introduction of community-requested features like crossplay."

This will be the fourth time Bryant has been on the game's cover. That includes the 2K21 version, when Bryant was on the front of the Mamba Forever edition that came out months after he, his daughter Gianna and seven others were killed in a January 2020 helicopter crash in Calabasas, California.

A five-time NBA champion with the Lakers, Bryant played 20 seasons in Los Angeles before retiring in 2016. He was a two-time Finals MVP, won the 2007-08 MVP award, made 18 All-Star Game appearances and scored 33,643 points, fourth most in NBA history. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in the 2020 class.