NBA Elite 11 Demo Impressions

[atlwarrior]

omg i thought nba live 07 pc got the short end of the stick. Apparently it was nba live 07 for xbox 360. That game is the reason why Gamestop give you hell for buying an EAsports basketballl title.

I'd go with NBA Live 08 PC

Atleast Kris made that game playable. Well atleast for me. And it had go to moves and sig shots for every player after aiact editing. Therefore Live 07 360 wins the title for the worst basketball game in history. The most annoying issue with 07/08 pc was the stamina. If you keep the stamina the way it was right out the box you get decent gameplay but no subs and unrealistic stats. But if you decrease the stamina you get subs but even worst gameplay and the players would take bad shots with and play with no urgency. So either way you will encounter problems.

[benji]

You guys need to look outside the Live series if you really want to find the worst basketball games. For one thing none of the games listed are made by 989 Sports or Konami, and none of them feature Bill Laimbeer or Flavor Flav.

[wabenne]

Hey Andrew thanks for responding to my questions, all of my responses weren't towards your comments but I thank you for your responses all the same even if we have a difference of opinion I think its cool that someone I respect on these boards and that commits to bringing us updates and info takes the time to respond. So want you to know that I appreciate that.

I do find disgust with those who can't handle the opinions of others and start name calling or saying that people are 2k lovers or live lovers and that is why your saying what your saying. I will admit I am a live lover I got in heated arguments defending live over 2k, I have never bought a 2k game. But in all honestly I gave both a chance this year I thought what 2k was offering with there game was very appealing but was still pulling for Live. I just think that for me the demo is the last thing i was going to go by and I honestly believe that 2k will be more fun for me and think Elite would be more frustrating then fun. AT the same time I believe that those who defend Elite really believe what they are saying and aren't just saying it because they love live and hate 2k. I think its alright as gamers to have a particular affection for one or the other could that make you biasis maybe but biasis doesn't mean you can't be objective.

I'll admit that the frustrations I have with Elite probably caused me not to even notice the good of the game. I think that happened with most and is why the critism is so much, I think most people were so frustrated that they overlook the good of the game. But truthfully for me i'm very disappointed in what Elite offered this year, and I'm very pleased with what I see and have played from 2k

[JaoSming]

Live 08 on PC wasn't too bad and Live 09 on the PS2 is pretty much the same as 08/07

Live 07 next gen was so bad they didnt do a demo or release it on the PS3 as a launch title like they were supposed to......that's pretty bad.

[bronco_4_ever]

2k fans are the biggest haters, why dont they talk about their game before talking about elite. Elite will put nba 2k11 to shame. the moment i broke fishers ankles with rondo i fell in love with it. and pierce shot a 3 in artests face i realised that elite was better. when you learn the controls its crazy, and im gonna be like a 2k fan now, nba 2k11 is crap because you tricks and run with the same button.

[Andrew]

Atleast Kris made that game playable. Well atleast for me. And it had go to moves and sig shots for every player after aiact editing. Therefore Live 07 360 wins the title for the worst basketball game in history. The most annoying issue with 07/08 pc was the stamina. If you keep the stamina the way it was right out the box you get decent gameplay but no subs and unrealistic stats. But if you decrease the stamina you get subs but even worst gameplay and the players would take bad shots with and play with no urgency. So either way you will encounter problems.

For me, NBA Live 08 PC's main issues are the sim engine and the bug where you can't move your players after the final free throw attempt. That and the Fatigue issue, also present in NBA Live 07 PC, is one of the reasons why 06 remains one of my fallback options. A few of us have got an NBA Jam mod in the works for NBA Live 08 though (still five on five gameplay) and I have to stay, it's great for that because of the way it handles the FSS moves.

[benji]

Live 08's sim engine was the entire reason I never bought that game, the first PC Live I have never owned. (Even if I needed an Aussie billionaire to buy me 06 and 07 since I wasn't going to otherwise. What a waste of his money.) If I couldn't at least sim franchises what was the point.

That said, it's not the worst sim engine ever and none of the Lives can really be called the worst basketball games. There's one of the late ShootOut's in the Playstation era which has a sim engine based entirely on random numbers. That's the only way to explain the results it spits out.

Live 07 is terrible, on all platforms, but it's not the worst basketball game. I have played at least 90% of basketball games that have been released in the last three decades and there is tons of absolute shit out there that makes the Live franchise (even when it's imploding in an obvious misdirection off the cliff every few years) sparkle in comparison. (And makes 2K look like it was programmed by god himself. Even though I'd never score a game in the series higher than 8/10.)

[Andrew]

Where would you rank Kobe Bryant in NBA Courtside?

[soho]

2k fans are the biggest haters, why dont they talk about their game before talking about elite. Elite will put nba 2k11 to shame. the moment i broke fishers ankles with rondo i fell in love with it. and pierce shot a 3 in artests face i realised that elite was better. when you learn the controls its crazy, and im gonna be like a 2k fan now, nba 2k11 is crap because you tricks and run with the same button.

Theres not only 2k fans... what about ppl who like basketball?

I watch a lot real basketball .. play it myself more than 10 years

but if u play elite and u watch it, how things goin in tv .. I just wanna turn it off rather than play game...

but 2k looks great it doesn't make u feel like turning off ur tv..
I took 2k11 cuz i like real basketball and want that my game looks like real and gameplay is as close as real game...

but elite 11 is just a game not REAL game...

[benji]

Where would you rank Kobe Bryant in NBA Courtside?

Highly!

It was ahead of its time really. It has player specific animations, a properly built (for the time) post-game (remember, we didn't really have post-games in all our NBA games until around 1999) and does differentiate between types of players. The sequel is a serious step back. On the other hand, Courtside 2002 on the GameCube is not a great sim (does have some nice animations, and hilariously mis-scaled arenas), but its arcade mode is the best non-Street 2 one out there post-Jam TE.

I mean of course, if we're ignoring BigKaboom running straight into the basket supports when we tried to play it over Kaillera.

[Andrew]

I might have to go back and give it another look. I just remember being underwhelmed back in the day.

[benji]

To be fair it does somehow clone NBA Fastbreak/Action 98 in many respects, but that's part of why it's good.

Remember what it has to be compared to: NBA Live 98, NBA Action 98, NBA ShootOut 98, NBA In The Zone 98, etc. It's not any kind of serious competition as Live 98 and ShootOut 98 are lousy or worse, In The Zone is solid but nothing close to a real sim, and Action/Fastbreak is first-generation. It's not a murderer's row that Courtside was taking on.

[bronco_4_ever]

2k fans are the biggest haters, why dont they talk about their game before talking about elite. Elite will put nba 2k11 to shame. the moment i broke fishers ankles with rondo i fell in love with it. and pierce shot a 3 in artests face i realised that elite was better. when you learn the controls its crazy, and im gonna be like a 2k fan now, nba 2k11 is crap because you tricks and run with the same button.

Theres not only 2k fans... what about ppl who like basketball?

I watch a lot real basketball .. play it myself more than 10 years

but if u play elite and u watch it, how things goin in tv .. I just wanna turn it off rather than play game...

but 2k looks great it doesn't make u feel like turning off ur tv..
I took 2k11 cuz i like real basketball and want that my game looks like real and gameplay is as close as real game...

but elite 11 is just a game not REAL game...

Have u learnt the controls properly

[nicosantos76]

Bronco, in any game, if you play stupid basketball you'll get a stupid basketball match. However, no matter how well you master the new controls in NBA Elite 11, there's no way you can fix your teammates playing stupid basketball or your opponent playing stupid basketball.

Forget about Bynum playing Jesus, forget about some glitch, forget about graphics not being good or lightning not being good. Let's forgive the poor animation, but in the end, the idiotic 5 on 5 remains the hell of an issue. Gameplay, that's the main thing for me.

Now you can call me a hater because I'm bashing Elite, but i have to tell you I bashed FIFA for years, bought Winning Eleven (or Pro Evolution Soccer, as you wanna call it) for years, and then I found FIFA was a better game and started playing it again instead of Winning Eleven (I can not buy both). Nor EA nor 2K is paying me for playing their games, it's me who pays them, so I pay to the one I think deserves my money. I don't understand people who raise the flag of NBA Live, Elite or 2K no matter what. If Elite 2012 is a better game than NBA 2K12 I'll be the first to say and celebrate it cause it will force competition and that's always a good thing. NBA 2K11 is an improvement over 2K10 mainly because NBA Live 10 brough the competition back.

So you can call me a hater, I'm sure there are some, but I'm sure many ar just users like me who don't raise a flag and just had expectations from Elite. Elite is a dissapointment for me and for many users.

I'm sad to say there's no competition this year, NBA 2K11 is a better game in almost every aspect, but MAINLY in gameplay which is the most important part for me. I hope NBA Elite 12 will change that, for the sake of NBA games evolution we need competition. ELite wasn't ready to compete, I think they shouldn't have released the demo, neither the game.

[saharor1]

O.K I have download that game so i have question...
may i play this game whit another keys cuz its sucks(i mean like 2k)

[JaoSming]

[quote="benji" but its arcade mode is the best non-Street 2 one out there post-Jam TE.
[/quote]

quoted for the truth, that game is the reason I have a gamecube controller for the wii

[ThaLiveKing]

If they put a turbo button back in, It might make this game more playable, especially in Be A Pro. Because you cannot recover on D or control the pace of the game to your liking!!! It sucks when you have limits to what you can really do in a game where your supposed to have total control. In my honest opinion, I can see this game being improved, it's all the little things that make basketball, basketball that need to be worked on.

The should put back the speed of the game sliders, I don't know why they took it out!! It's not good that they limited the sliders this year
Make a player strength slider too, unless you can edit the weight or strength in the CAP. I just spend an hour playing a few of the demo, and I think, Turbo might be the missing key in this game

There are also AI Issues and they can't hit shot to save their lives sometimes

[Daniel24]

Hey, I gave elite a chance after enjoying playing NBA Live 10 the last couple weeks.

So i downloaded the demo.

Played 1 quarter with the Lakers.

Deleted the demo off my ps3.

'nough said.

[Andrew]

If they put a turbo button back in, It might make this game more playable, especially in Be A Pro. Because you cannot recover on D or control the pace of the game to your liking!!! It sucks when you have limits to what you can really do in a game where your supposed to have total control. In my honest opinion, I can see this game being improved, it's all the little things that make basketball, basketball that need to be worked on.

The should put back the speed of the game sliders, I don't know why they took it out!! It's not good that they limited the sliders this year
Make a player strength slider too, unless you can edit the weight or strength in the CAP. I just spend an hour playing a few of the demo, and I think, Turbo might be the missing key in this game

Really? I didn't actually miss it as much as I thought I would. Besides, it wouldn't address the issues with the animations which is one of the main criticisms that's turning people off the game.

[Houndy]

Honestly, I don't get why people are bashing Andrew about his opinion. I mean, it's his game he's buying, and I hope Elite is better than we all thought, but I am sticking with 2k for what I can do besides Association and Quick Game.

[Andrew]

To be fair I don't feel like I've been bashed outside maybe a couple of replies here and in the comments on the main site, for the most part people have respectfully disagreed and that's absolutely fine.

[Jackal]

Does EA read these things? Like does it make an impact on them?

[Andrew]

It might do, last year they released an update based on feedback from the demo.

[benji]

Does EA read these things? Like does it make an impact on them?

Well, they read OS because they post in the threads over there. Things like:

I think there is a spectrum, and I'm not sure what to label each end of that spectrum.

On one side you've got what you guys call sim players, who border on wanting to play a basketball manager game. Nothing wrong with that so don't take it that way.

The desire is to have a game that has the players recreated as close to real life as possible, so you have a collection of virtual players that you can throw into a simulation and see what happens.

On the other end of the spectrum you have people who want to play basketball as a video game to pretend like they are playing in the NBA. The want complete control of their player, and the ability to get creative and explore the simulation as if it was more of a sandbox. This side of the spectrum often gets labeled arcade, but I don't think that is accurate.

You still want the sandbox to be as accurate to real life as possible, but the freedom and creativity aspect is important.

I think with Elite we are targeting more this second end of the spectrum. We're not all the way on that side as we still try and incorporate aspects from the other side, but we are giving more focus to that side and when two things are in conflict we sided with the control end of the spectrum.

We wanted the game to feel like you were playing basketball and give you the abilities you expect in real life basketball.

So the answer might be yes...but the intention is not to alienate the first group (even though the responses here may indicate that it is a possible outcome).

Time will tell if that market is bigger or not I suppose. We're still trying to cater to both ends of the spectrum, but we put more focus on the second as it had been neglected for a while in basketball games.

The success of NHL and FIFA suggest that people will respond well to that direction, but time will tell.

This forum has a very vocal population who fall into the "sim" side of the spectrum, but I have received may PM's from people who like the direction and may be a little more moderate.

As for Jam, that really wasn't an influencing factor. There are a lot of people who have stopped playing basketball games all together (both Live and 2K) and that group was getting bigger every year.

Adding Jam was meant to give them reason to try basketball one more time, and the nostalgic appeal of Jam was meant to accomplish that.

We wouldn't have done it if we weren't confident that people would stick around after playing the game for a while.

EA's interests here are long term, not short term.

[rizzlekayandretti]

once u master the controls and the button layout its actually better then live 10 in so many ways just by the amount of ways your can score and the way you can defend really makes clamping a good scorer down an i'm ready to see the advanced control videos i just hope you guys patch in a rt turbo and a rs crossover modifyer