Tag Archives: NBA Live 365

Welcome to another edition of The Friday Five! Every Friday I cover a topic related to basketball gaming, either as a list of five items, or a Top 5 countdown. The topics for these lists and countdowns include everything from fun facts and recollections to commentary and critique. This week’s Five is a list of five controversial concepts in basketball video games that were ultimately abandoned.

Basketball video games have come a long way, thanks to evolving technology and innovative ideas. Of course, not all ideas pan out, and some definitely aren’t in the best interests of consumers. It’s one thing when a change to a gameplay mechanic or mode doesn’t resonate with gamers, or result in the improvements that were intended. However, when the overall experience is harmed by a controversial approach that’s sorely lacking in goodwill – such as pushy recurrent revenue mechanics – it can easily overshadow a game’s better qualities.

In the best case scenario, such concepts will prove to be so controversial that they’ll be abandoned or at least heavily revamped in the following game, if not sooner via a patch. The annual basketball titles obviously have a built-in audience, and with NBA 2K essentially having a monopoly on the sim genre right now, there’s a lot of freedom to push their luck. Nevertheless, controversial concepts do invite significant backlash, so they will be abandoned if they threaten to damage a company’s reputation; or more accurately, their profits. That said, while they may not be motivated by altruism, it’s always welcome when companies walk back on controversial concepts like these five.

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! From retrospectives of basketball games and their interesting features, to republished articles and looking at NBA history through the lens of the virtual hardwood, Wednesdays at the NLSC are for going back in time. This week, I’m taking a look back at a novel concept that was employed during the NBA Live 09 preview season: the Fresh Daily Grocery.

It’s no secret that for many basketball gamers, the preview season just isn’t what it once was. With only one game to look forward to every year, increasing fatigue and dissatisfaction with the product, and more than a couple of false claims and broken promises, it’s tougher to get excited; at least if you’re familiar with the routine. That sadly won’t change until such time as we have choices and competition in the space again, and I hope that will happen some day. If and when it does, I anticipate the preview season becoming as fun and interesting as it used to be.

Beyond tantalising previews and promising news, something that I enjoyed about the preview seasons in bygone years were the fun extras that got us hyped for the new games. Official websites provided digital promotional materials, from downloadable freebies to browser games and activities. During the preview season for NBA Live 09, EA Sports launched the Fresh Daily Grocery section on the game’s website. It was a creative concept that not only gave us a reason to check in daily, but also emphasised one of NBA Live 09’s big new features. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at some of the unusual Overall Ratings in NBA 2K9.

In the mailbag segment of Episode #354 of the NLSC Podcast, Dee4Three and I talked about bad ratings in basketball video games throughout the years. There are plenty of examples, from odd ratings in NBA Jam Tournament Edition, to the new ratings scale in NBA Live 2004 producing some weird results. Derek brought up the Overall Ratings in NBA 2K9, which is an example I wasn’t too familiar with. NBA 2K9 isn’t a game that I’ve spent too much time with over the years, and when I have fired it up, I haven’t paid too much attention to the Overall Ratings.

Once it was brought up, however, I figured I had to check it out and perhaps discuss it further in Wayback Wednesday. Now that I’ve gone through the rosters, I would agree that there are some weirdly overrated players, considering their performance during the 2009 season, and the way that Overall Ratings above 90 are usually treated (or at least were, several years ago). With so many questionably inflated Overall Ratings in NBA 2K9, it’s worth taking a look back…way back…

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To mark the 25th Anniversary of NBA Live, we’re taking a look back at every game in the series with retrospectives and other fun content! This also includes re-running some features from our 20th Anniversary celebrations, with a few revisions. Whether you’re a long-time basketball gamer who grew up with NBA Live and are keen on taking a trip down memory lane, or you’re new to the series and want to learn about its history, we hope that you enjoy celebrating the 25th Anniversary of NBA Live here at the NLSC! Next up is a retrospective of NBA Live 09.

NBA Live 09 is remembered for several things. It was the first game in the series since NBA Live 2002 to be console-exclusive, which wasn’t a popular decision in our community. It’s also the final NBA Live game to be released on PlayStation 2, with a game that’s undoubtedly clunky, but also interesting. Conversely, it’s also a game that turned out quite well on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, and one that many long-time basketball gamers hold in high regard. Despite that, it’s the first NBA Live game to be outsold by its NBA 2K counterpart, which isn’t necessarily indicative of its quality. Finally, it had an unexpected cover player. There’s a lot to look at, so let’s dive in.

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at some NBA Live 99 and NBA Live 09 trivia, ahead of the release of NBA Live 19.

We’re just a couple of days away from the launch of NBA Live 19. It’s shaping up to be a good year for NBA Live, as the series continues its comeback after many years of rebuilding. Hopefully NBA Live will continue to go from strength to strength from here on out, as it did during its glory years of the mid 90s to around 2005. Back then, EA Sports were doing some very innovative things with the series, and it felt like every year brought something new to the table. As I said in my retrospective, that was certainly the case with NBA Live 99.

NBA Live 09 was also a good bounce back year for the series, and remains one of its best releases during the PlayStation 3/Xbox 360 generation. With the series having been around for over two decades, it’s interesting to look back at the game that came out ten years before the current one, and the one that was released ten years before that. With that in mind, I’ve compiled some NBA Live 99 and NBA Live 09 trivia, similar to what I did last year with NBA Live 98 and NBA Live 08. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at Dynamic DNA in NBA Live 09.

Generally speaking, most of us want five-on-five basketball games to be realistic; “sim”, as we usually put it. One of the key elements of delivering realism in NBA Live and NBA 2K is to ensure that the players resemble their real life counterparts, not just in appearance, but in the way that they play and perform. As the years have gone by, both games have introduced new ratings, tendencies, and other attributes that are intended to make the action on the virtual hardwood more closely resemble what we see during an NBA broadcast. While there’s still room for improvement, basketball video games have also come a long way in that regard.

EA Sports took a big step towards making NBA Live more realistic with the implementation of Dynamic DNA in NBA Live 09. Not only was it an improvement in player AI and differentiation, it was also a step forward in terms of the official roster updates. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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