Chris' Blog: Playing the blame game with NBA Elite 11

[marcmywords]

Will start off saying I'm not a fanboy of 2K. I was a Live head from Lakers vs Celtics, but been playing 2k for the last few years. It started for me when I heard their "hockey guy" or "a hockey guy," was heading the project...what? why? Obviously Dr Jack or Phil Jackson isnt gonna join any video game team, but at least have people tht know the game to an extent. Theres nothing that comforted me to believe tht "a hockey guy" would be able to capture the nuances of high level basketball. But I dont blame him....I blame the chuckleheads tht said "hockey is like basketball, tht guy will turn it around." pfft.

[phawj2010]

Quote: Originally Posted by bdiggs25

I like the new elite more than the 2k cause 2k's getting boring and elites something new. The controls are easy to get used 2

you so weird to like that lame game is Elite better than 2k .. 2k have players play like real life .. go ahead waste your $60 on lame Elite then you hate it too fast like one week then sold it that mean you're ashamed of yourself for lost $60 on Elite 11

[Court_vision]

Quote: Originally Posted by MMChrisS

I'm pretty sure this game might be Live 07's equal. I remember that game, these seem pretty similar to me actually....although I'd have to find Live 07 in the archives just to make sure. I get the same feeling at least playing them

I am going to make a big call here........it's definitely not as bad as LIVE 07.

That thing was Hall of Fame bad.

I think ELITE is definitely better than that game now that I've spent more time with it. It's nowhere near as bad as SONY's basketball games...I think you went way too far comparing it to that SONY NBA thing. That game was the worst game of all time by so far that even a box with no disk inside would have been better than SONY's game.

Sadly, ELITE is pretty bad though. The CPU AI has regressed dramatically. I can only assume whoever did the AI knows nothing about basketball / and / or EA simply isn't concerened about USER v CPU this season......

It's unplayable v the CPU.

There's no way I can justify buying it this season.

First LIVE / ELITE I'll not be buying.

[kennyacid]

i knew there was gonna be problems when all they talked about was controls and physics and didnt spend enough time talking about gameplay and animation. So no surprise...I blame the whole creative team.

[phawj2010]

people are just dumb to buy Elite 11 for NBA Jam is big crazy .. just let them waste their $60 on this garbage game then they regret it to get 2k11 in few months

[Carrington618]

I blame us the user for letting a company (ea) slap us around an we still give them money. WE ask for a better game, they try to buy the 2K so we willn t notice that there game is wack. There is not passion in there game you can see that by the way they talk about it. Every time a next gen system comes out it takes EA 3 years to get a good game with all the features from the last gen yet people still buy the crap so i blame US

To make matters even worst they are doing this on-line pass shyt. ok fine for used games. but if i take the copy i got new to a friends i cant play on line if want to use my other account name i cant w/o paying again
this is y i dont buy EA games and i really want need for speed and madden but i just cant give EA any more money with them giving me the finger

[noshun]

Quote: Originally Posted by Court_vision

I am going to make a big call here........it's definitely not as bad as LIVE 07. That thing was Hall of Fame bad. I think ELITE is definitely better than that game now that I've spent more time with it. It's nowhere near as bad as SONY's basketball games...I think you went way too far comparing it to that SONY NBA thing. That game was the worst game of all time by so far that even a box with no disk inside would have been better than SONY's game. Sadly, ELITE is pretty bad though. The CPU AI has regressed dramatically. I can only assume whoever did the AI knows nothing about basketball / and / or EA simply isn't concerened about USER v CPU this season...... It's unplayable v the CPU. There's no way I can justify buying it this season. First LIVE / ELITE I'll not be buying.

CV this game is just like 07. Remember when I sent you all the emails I sent to EAC CEO David Gardner and dev members Matt, Nate, and Brent Nielsen, well Im getting a little something together becuase this time Im going to email Peter Moore, as well as 3 devs from Elite.

Its no coincidence that the Jason Kid calls a cab freeze glitch from Live 07 is eerily similar to Elite 11's Passion of Bynum pose, or the new double Jesus vid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6z2bA...layer_embedded

Im just getting everything together, and pulling out all the business cards I gathered. Everything is getting prepped. One of these days Im going to post that email from 06 on these forums because people need to read what I wrote back then, and see why some the Live 07 cycle has come full circle this year.

Even Marcus said that my email back then was famous, I didnt belive him, but we talked about it on meebo, and sure enough I got through back then. Only a few people outside of yourself, Czar, 23, Pared and Luvmist have read that email.

I said it earlier and agree with Czar's "Hockey is not Basketball. My years at DigiPen for game design in production animation, I thought was way too much, but man when I first heard about Live to Elite, something woke me up and I realized that everything that all my teachers who are in the gaming industry taught me.. about game design, 1000's of hours of human anatomy, film class, Maya, XSI, Max, Flash, man it woke me up and I saw exactly what I needed to.

I had a bad feeling about Elite. Let alone I tested Live 07/08. I couldnt even say in the email back then due to NDA but screw that man. We've (gming community) have got to be heard. Everything just woke me up man.. I explained this weird feeling to 23 I had... its the Live 07 cycle just in a slightly different form. While I didnt get why Littman was on this project, and yes he turned NHL around, I understand that EA's basketball games needed a view from outside of NBA, so that they can see whats wrong from someone elses perspective. But the bad thign about it is that Littman said hes not a basketball guy, so its a double edge sword. You def need someone outside of your comfort zone, but he shouldve had a co-producer in basketball at his level him to help him oversee.

If you want to get the point across you gotta contact the people at the top(CEO, suits) and let your voice trickle down through the ranks like I did back then. You also gotta show them with your wallet and stand by it.

Not saying that people cant be happy with what they do with their money, but man buying mediocrity when you should be getting much more in terms of quality for your money, at some point you gotta do things you dont like doing.

Edit: I dont recall anything on the wishlist sighting change of control. That was Live 10's strongest point in terms of gameplay. Teh Surveys after Live 07,08 just went by the wasteside man. People have been asking for shortened season since Live 06.
What was the point of asking us the consumer about surveys if the things we want arent even being implemented and still to this day end up on wishlist like "shortened season options"?
Live 96 on Genesis had this option of 29/56/82. Hell Visual Concepts made that game too, if people didnt know.

Its like what we ask for doesnt even matter, becuase the suits and sales are going to dictact what EA games are going to be like, and they only give us what we what when sales show a big dip. EA's NBA is just getting ESPN after 5 games on next gen, and I not talking about score ticker or radio show options. People are slowly waking up or getting disappointed man, and now this year this game is on its last Life Line.

Animations are choppy, just like Live 07. The cycle of mediocrity is upon us once again. Too much control is making the game do thing that are beyond the realm of what the human body can do in real life. Im so thankful for anatomy class man.. look at half the stuff going on in the demo man is a travshamockery. This game needs some canned animations so this game doesnt over exaggerate the movement of what the body can do in real life, and its goign to kill this game. Too much control allows us to make teh game look spastic as I said about a month ago.

Sorry for the rant, and trust me its not that Im a fanboy, its just learning about game design and then seeing all these oddities, is such a disappointment, for the artist in me when I see this stuff and know, this shouldnt be happening, period. Guess I got what I needed to say off my chest.

If the mods say its okay, I will post that email, as well as the few responses I got back from EA back then. But its the mods call.

[gameova24]

everyone needs to stop look at it like a sequel to live 10.....its a new game in its 1 year out of 3 year cycle....its going to be good but its not as bad as everyone is saying it is.....i bet everyone that says its bad is a fan of 2k....cuz i like both....but at the same time elite is giving you guys something else to try other then 2k so if you dont like it go back to the game you like...there not playing it safe they try something and you guys jump all over them...its crazy.....and you guys say redo the franchise and they do and this happens....everyone wants them to be like 2k....but there not