NBA Live Committed to Consoles - Shipping in 2017, But the Focus Will Be on Mobile

[Rockie_Fresh88]

NBA street would be a great direction. I would pay for that

[Ermolli]

In hindsight, after knowing how it all went through, I wish Elite 11 had released. Yes it wasn't nowhere near as good as Live 10, yes it was a bad decision to leave Mike Wang and yes the idea of having a hockey guy direct the game was ridiculous; but still I don't think it could've resulted in a way as bad as the current situation is with the franchise. In my opinion it had stuff I really liked, had features that were more interesting (in my opinion) than the ones that are in Live 16, and had deeper modes in Rising Star and Dynasty. A huge what if I believe.

[Hassan Darkside]

Quote: Originally Posted by Shakedowncapo

Its a wrap. I feel like most people are looking at the 2017 release date and ignoring the, "The best way to do that is through the fastest growing, largest, and most accessible gaming platform…mobile." Game.Set.Match. EA is letting you know right now where this series stands and where they stand with you as console fans. They're finished with you.

Yup, that's what I was going to point out. They're purposefully vague regarding console support but I wouldn't count on anything before October 2017. Sounds like a complete strategy shift toward mobile gaming. I think they're throwing in the towel on at least the fully-featured console title if not bowing out completely.

[dubcity]

Looks like they want to do Ultimate Team, without the hassles and work involved in having to produce console quality game-play (or maybe ANY real gameplay). Basically sounds like EA's dream for all their games.

[Crunky]

I know this is jumping off topic but NBA live lost a ton of momentum not releasing elite 11. Looking back on it was a very, very poor decision not to release the game. If your gonna fail at least allow the consumers to decide, from what I could tell there were many great ideas in elite 11 never to be brought back to recent NBA live games. I'm pretty sure if they kept elite 11 on track they would've been able to polish the game up a bit for the next few installments. The live devs would of ended up well adjusted to the engine they were using that time and the consumer base wouldn't have disappeared as fast as they did, due to the 2year hiatus of NBA live forced consumers like myself at that time to try the competitors game. Like you said in your post it is a what if moment if we stuck with the product despite having a poor glitched bugged game would the consumer base remain intact knowing we had a great product in NBA live 09 and 10. We can all speculate but that's what I believe ultimately did them in.

[strawberryshortcake]

Quote: Originally Posted by Crunky

Spoiler I'm pro competition, live didn't get to this point from a lack of effort but they did get here from a lack of manpower. Live higher ups should of sat down and told themselves hey look the competition has a 2 year developmental cycle on us, so let's poor all our resources on the game similar to our other franchises in madden and fifa, just so we can keep pace with the competition. If they took the time to look at the competition they would of noticed how large their development team is especially since their competitor merged with their College Hoops franchise after it was disbanded. By not pouring enough resources to sustain the product in consumer eyes showed a lack of faith and that's what ultimately did them in. My heart goes out to the live dev team they poured their hearts in to the product, they should be proud of themselves because there's not much you can do when the higher ups have a blueprint that their sticking too and you have little to no say in the product including your understaffed. Spoiler If your gonna go out at least go out with a bang like the competitions football game did leaving a lasting impression on the community. That games game play wasn't all that special out of the box it needed sliders to fix it. But what it did special was customization, animation quality and presentation they killed it. That's the blueprint you need togo out with, don't leave a poor taste in consumer minds because if you do have a change of heart and want to come back it won't end well.

This is directed to anyone who has any input whatsoever, from anyone please.

When people claim developers' hands are tied by suits, what exactly does that truly mean? Aren't the suits only concerned about the bottom line? Does motion capturing running, shooting, rebounding, passing, shot blocking, movement etc styles, during session one on day one at the developer's office change depending on what the suits want? Do suits say you can't motion capture "x" realistically and say you must motion capture it arcadey?

Then when it comes to gameplay and player movement and play books and interactions on the floor, how do suits influence these aspects? Do suits say can we make Kobe jump from the three point line and dunk the ball? Where's my half court shots? Facial scans look too realistic, can we make them look more arcadey, please?

Are the suits really influencing what happens with gameplay elements? If the suits want highlight dunks, wouldn't the programmers simply program more dunks in the game, but when it comes to motion capturing these dunks, they should still be realistic considering the developers are basically motion capturing a guy dunking the basketball.

Some people might consider the "other" basketball game arcade and others consider it simulation. Those considering it arcade may say there's too many dunks. But the way the dunks look still looks realistic. Too many shots going in, even contested, but they still aesthetically looks realistic.

Wouldn't the suits take a look at their competitor's numbers and sales figures and say "why can't you guys try to mimic what their doing?"

The question is: Is it really the suits influencing what happens in the game or is it the developers just having a difficult time programming what the developers actually want to accomplish in the game? Maybe developers actually want to do something but they simply can't program the game to do what they want. Software programming is suppose to be difficult, right?

[Crunky]

Quote: Originally Posted by strawberryshortcake

This is directed to anyone who has any input whatsoever, from anyone please. When people claim developers' hands are tied by suits, what exactly does that truly mean? Aren't the suits only concerned about the bottom line? Does motion capturing running, shooting, rebounding, passing, shot blocking, movement etc styles, during session one on day one at the developer's office change depending on what the suits want? Do suits say you can't motion capture "x" realistically and say you must motion capture it arcadey? Then when it comes to gameplay and player movement and play books and interactions on the floor, how do suits influence these aspects? Do suits say can we make Kobe jump from the three point line and dunk the ball? Where's my half court shots? Facial scans look too realistic, can we make them look more arcadey, please? Are the suits really influencing what happens with gameplay elements? If the suits want highlight dunks, wouldn't the programmers simply program more dunks in the game, but when it comes to motion capturing these dunks, they should still be realistic considering the developers are basically motion capturing a guy dunking the basketball. Some people might consider the "other" basketball game arcade and others consider it simulation. Those considering it arcade may say there's too many dunks. But the way the dunks look still looks realistic. Too many shots going in, even contested, but they still aesthetically looks realistic. Wouldn't the suits take a look at their competitor's numbers and sales figures and say "why can't you guys try to mimic what their doing?" The question is: Is it really the suits influencing what happens in the game or is it the developers just having a difficult time programming what the developers actually want to accomplish in the game? Maybe developers actually want to do something but they simply can't program the game to do what they want. Software programming is suppose to be difficult, right?

You do make a fair point live devs hands aren't tied when it comes to game play, animation quality and motion capture work all this was poorly done. But their hands were tied when it comes to the vision the higher ups wanted directed at consumers. Which is an arcade easy to pick up and play catering to the casual gamer. With the higher ups vision they went away from 2man animations in the paint that resulted in players having having easy access in the paint without restraint from defenders. The players in the game also shot contested jumpers at an alarming rate which screamed unsim, all came from the higher ups vision for the game.


Now let's look at the modes where the live devs have little to no say in the feature set. Live devs were pressured to implement NBA live Ultimate Team due to the success from their other franchises this mode was meant to be the cash cow with microtransations and all to bring money to the company. Then the higher ups came up with the vision let's rival that, and out do the competition at there own game by adding modes like Rising Star that rivaled Mycareer, Proam that rivaled Mypark its not live devs fault the higher ups got cocky and steered them off a cliff. The higher ups should of sat down with live devs back when they released NBA live 14 and told them you know what for this year we gonna be as barebones as we possibly can be and focus only on game play and animation quality from motion capture work, then the following year we can reintroduce all the features back in the game like NHL franchise did. As you can see it was the vision that failed them if they had started out the focus on what really matters most gameplay and animation quality instead of features they wouldn't have ended up in this situation.

[strawberryshortcake]

Quote: Originally Posted by Crunky

You do make a fair point live devs hands aren't tied when it comes to game play, animation quality and motion capture work all this was poorly done. But their hands were tied when it comes to the vision the higher ups wanted directed at consumers. Which is an arcade easy to pick up and play catering to the casual gamer. With the higher ups vision they went away from 2man animations in the paint that resulted in players having having easy access in the paint without restraint from defenders. The players in the game also shot contested jumpers at an alarming rate which screamed unsim, all came from the higher ups vision for the game.

Then the obvious question is, how do you know all of this? How do you know that they in fact wanted an "arcade easy to pick up and play catering to the casual gamer." How do you know about the "2man animation" part? Is this just speculation on your part because that's what the game turned out to be as opposed to the developers couldn't program the game to be in line with their vision to create a respected simulation product?

An easy to pick up and play game doesn't mean how the gameplay is executed needs to be arcadey. At the same time, arcadey doesn't mean something has to look fake. People are graphics whore. Something can look extra real and extremely realistic with the most simplest control scheme catered to casuals or extra hard with the most difficult control scheme ever developed catered to your hardcore gamer.

How do you know the suits wanted the interior defense to be lackadaisical? Honestly as a gamer of the competitor's product, the only major issue I had with NBA Live's 16 demo was the lackadaisical interior paint defense. A couple great things, very realistic things about NBA Live16 was the way steals actually look realistic and the way rebounding actually looks realistic.

Quote: Originally Posted by Crunky

Now let's look at the modes where the live devs have little to no say in the feature set. Live devs were pressured to implement NBA live Ultimate Team due to the success from their other franchises this mode was meant to be the cash cow with microtransations and all to bring money to the company. Then the higher ups came up with the vision let's rival that, and out do the competition at there own game by adding modes like Rising Star that rivaled Mycareer, Proam that rivaled Mypark its not live devs fault the higher ups got cocky and steered them off a cliff. The higher ups should of sat down with live devs back when they released NBA live 14 and told them you know what for this year we gonna be as barebones as we possibly can be and focus only on game play and animation quality from motion capture work, then the following year we can reintroduce all the features back in the game like NHL franchise did. As you can see it was the vision that failed them if they had started out the focus on what really matters most gameplay and animation quality instead of features they wouldn't have ended up in this situation.

Suits-desired features still doesn't dictate what happens with the gameplay component as far as what a pass, a shot, a block, a dunk, the way the player dribbles, the way the players run, player movement, player awareness, etc should be. What difference does it make to how gameplay mechanics are implemented in the game if all the suits wanted were money making features?

Session one of day one at the office for motion captures is not dictated by what features make it into the game. EA's NHL series and Fifa series' gameplay mechanic looks "real" enough. Some might consider certain elements to play arcadey, but overall, both series look real. Each game's respective programmers are able to "program" their game to do what they want. This is why I don't believe the suits caused the potential downfall to NBA Live. I believe it's because the NBA Live team simply can't program the game how they want it to be -- and that's simulation gameplay with casual easy to pick up and play controls. Gran Turismo, Forzas, Skate 1/2/3 are supposedly classified as simulation products more or less and sells pretty well.