NBA Live 14 Is Barely Updating Its Players

[shutdown10]

Quote: Originally Posted by poloelite

I didn't get through all of the comments, but I will say it again about NBA Live. In my opinion Live 07-09 was decent at best and Live 10 was the peak of the franchise. Since then the only game they released was Live 14, which isn't as good as Live 10 of a previous generation. Everyone seems to ignore the elephant in the room that Mike Wang produced Live 10, left and made 2K11-14, all the best the bball games of their respective years. As far as bball basketball games go, he seems to the genius behind them. He left EA because of politics and the fact that it was too hard to get things done to improve the game. We all have fond memories of NBA Live, but we have to be honest about the times. The Live we grew up with didn't have to deliver the level of realism that is required today. Contact in the paint, the level of AI, off ball movements etc are all things that we look for today. Back in 2004 you could simply add a freestyle dribble stick and we were impressed. The detail that goes into sports games today require a great mind to lead, a stellar team and the publisher all working hand in hand. From what I played in Live 14 it would be close to impossible to turn that around to something new in 9-10 months. It took 2K 17 years to get to the gameplay we see now and they have a great organization in place producing their basketball game. I just think it's time that we're all honest about who's making Live today, their track record and what we've actually seen the last couple of years. I remember them saying it had to be on next gen because current gen couldn't handle what they were about to put out, smdh. Just my two cents, spend them how you want.. No offense intended to anyone.

Nobody should be offended by what you said. This Live team needs to prove to everyone in the community that they can make a respectable basketball game. All the excuses have run out for them because you see it in the low sales and the harsh critics and reviews from credible gaming websites.

[rtkiii]

Why is anyone surprised. I'm not.

[poloelite]

Quote: Originally Posted by shutdown10

Nobody should be offended by what you said. This Live team needs to prove to everyone in the community that they can make a respectable basketball game. All the excuses have run out for them because you see it in the low sales and the harsh critics and reviews from credible gaming websites.

Agreed. When applying logic to this situation, I think they thought Live 14 was going to be it, but they couldn't execute it properly. When they saw 2K next gen for the first time they probably either knew they were doomed, or didn't believe it. I remember a statement when the trailers came out about their's was actual gameplay and 2K's wasn't, which meant they couldn't believe how good the graphics were. Judging by the new round of face scans they're doing, updated graphics will be there in Live 15, but there's only so much they can do in a tight window that they couldn't do in the previous 4 years before Live 14. I would love if they just brought back NBA Street.

[shutdown10]

Quote: Originally Posted by poloelite

Agreed. When applying logic to this situation, I think they thought Live 14 was going to be it, but they couldn't execute it properly. When they saw 2K next gen for the first time they probably either knew they were doomed, or didn't believe it. I remember a statement when the trailers came out about their's was actual gameplay and 2K's wasn't, which meant they couldn't believe how good the graphics were. Judging by the new round of face scans they're doing, updated graphics will be there in Live 15, but there's only so much they can do in a tight window that they couldn't do in the previous 4 years before Live 14. I would love if they just brought back NBA Street.

I expect graphics to be improved in Live 15. What I'm concerned about is how will it animate. I think Live 15 will have the same robotic outdated Live engine that has the players moving unrealistic with quirky reactions. Can the over hyped Ignite Engine improve those unrealistic animations? That is the million dollar question that I don't believe they will ever deliver on. Their 3 year plan won't make it because they are pacing this game to death.

[blackngoldfan]

No excuses. EA had 2 years to come up with a solid game. They have a serious case of gamers block If there is such a thing. They come up with ideas, then scrap them whether they're good or bad. There may be some good features in this years title, but they will scrap everything and start from scratch because the game failed as a whole. Yes, NBA Elite was scraped, but wasn't there anything worth keeping? The shooting mechanic seemed pretty cool. I bet if we were to take a peek in the NBA Live meetings, there would be a huge bin full of balled up papers and nothing on the desk.

[blackceasar]

Quote: Originally Posted by shutdown10

I expect graphics to be improved in Live 15. What I'm concerned about is how will it animate. I think Live 15 will have the same robotic outdated Live engine that has the players moving unrealistic with quirky reactions. Can the over hyped Ignite Engine improve those unrealistic animations? That is the million dollar question that I don't believe they will ever deliver on. Their 3 year plan won't make it because they are pacing this game to death.

I have a friend that works in the industry. He works on the dev side around animation, etc. He told me the engine is the most time consuming and costly part of the dev. He also told me once you've built the engine and locked it down, you can make tweaks to it but you can only mess with it so far without pretty much building a whole new engine. With that said, he told me from his own experiences that what probably happened was the Live Team screwed the pooch on the engine part and while 15 will be better it's not going to fix nearly as much as what people are hoping for engine wise. He told me to give people the engine they want, they'd have to build a new one from scratch and they just aren't going to do that. He said that's why even games like Madden, Fifa, etc while have better engines than the Live series only see little bits of improvment each year on that generation of a system. Its like they have to work incrementally from the engine they have established so if the engine is god awful in the first game, its not going to get that much better in 15, 16, 17 and so on unless they rebuild it...which they wont do. He said they will improve other things that have nothing to do with the engine (because cost effctive wise they can) and they will spin and promote the heck out of that in their future ad campains...but that engine minues a tweak here and there is here to stay for PS4 and Xbox1

[shutdown10]

Quote: Originally Posted by blackceasar

I have a friend that works in the industry. He works on the dev side around animation, etc. He told me the engine is the most time consuming and costly part of the dev. He also told me once you've built the engine and locked it down, you can make tweaks to it but you can only mess with it so far without pretty much building a whole new engine. With that said, he told me from his own experiences that what probably happened was the Live Team screwed the pooch on the engine part and while 15 will be better it's not going to fix nearly as much as what people are hoping for engine wise. He told me to give people the engine they want, they'd have to build a new one from scratch and they just aren't going to do that. He said that's why even games like Madden, Fifa, etc while have better engines than the Live series only see little bits of improvment each year on that generation of a system. Its like they have to work incrementally from the engine they have established so if the engine is god awful in the first game, its not going to get that much better in 15, 16, 17 and so on unless they rebuild it...which they wont do. He said they will improve other things that have nothing to do with the engine (because cost effctive wise they can) and they will spin and promote the heck out of that in their future ad campains...but that engine minues a tweak here and there is here to stay for PS4 and Xbox1

If that is the case, then they better start looking at reviving NBA Street Vol, 4. If they can't give us a solid sim Next gen NBA game, then give us a solid street arcade NBA game. I think NBA Street would be a hit on the Next gen consoles if done correctly like Vol.1 and Vol.2 in the PS2 days.

[mrclutch]

Shame to see EA fall short with the vision. maybe next year....if there really is one.