Doing the Right Thing: Canceling NBA Elite 11 (IGN Feature)

[Andrew]

Editorial on NBA Elite 11's cancellation over at IGN: Doing the Right Thing: Canceling NBA Elite 11

Calling it courageous might be putting too positive a spin on it, though pulling the plug on the game a week before it was set to ship was ballsy in its own way. The article is kind of looking at the silver lining of the cancellation and in that respect I'd have to agree, as much of a disaster as it is now the potential is there to put the time and effort into NBA Elite 12 to make it a quality product.

It's still going to be an uphill battle to win back a disgruntled fanbase (many of whom have moved onto NBA 2K) and take back a share of the market but I'm hoping that they can succeed for two reasons. First of all, I'm a longtime fan of the series and I'd like to see it recover from its fall from grace. Second, as we've discussed before having two quality products out there and legitimate competition is better for us as consumers. Only the fanboys truly win if a lone brand prevails. As far as the NBA going exclusive with its license, I'm guessing that's not happening just yet but that's another interesting point.

[benji]

I wouldn't call it any of those things, they already printed a million copies of the game. Should have just thrown it out there no matter what to recoup some of the costs.

And games are cancelled all the time, is it really courageous?

[Houndy]

I would buy the game.... For 20 bucks

[Andrew]

I'd definitely pick up the game at a discounted price to complete the collection and better tailor detailed feedback for future releases in the series. That's something they could have tried if they'd gone ahead and released the game, though presumably they'd put the price back up for NBA Elite 12 and that likely wouldn't go down well even if Elite 12 is a huge leap forward.

[Houndy]

Agreed, I recently stopped by Gamestop looking for NCAA Football 11, and when I couldn't find it, I thought to myself "If only NBA Elite was here." I then got College 2k8

[Axel The Great]

If EA was just looking for money, then releasing it no matter what is the way they would've gone. I think they were going with trying not to ruin their reputation in cancelling Elite 11 (either way, they were screwed). They were going the right direction with the hands-on control, but the many complaints of people of not having turbo, and the fluidity of the controls and what not was what wrecked it I guess. Saying that cancelling it was "courageous" is overrating it, but smart, imo, yes.

Hopefully now EA (Tiburon) can come up with a quality product in Elite 12 (and hopefully taking some advice from our wishlist ). Elite 12 won't be anywhere near as good as 2K12 (assuming they maintain the quality of their game), but Elite 12's success could be a huge turning point for the Elite/Live franchise.

I would've probably bought Elite 11 for a reduced price had it been released, I loved the new hands-on control in the demo. Here's to hoping that some day, Elite/Live will be able to put out a quality product that competes with 2K, and win back some fans as well.

[Andrew]

Their reputation was going to take a hit whichever way they want. Had they gone ahead and released NBA Elite 11, more customers would've been burned and less likely to return for NBA Elite 12 and beyond, with the claim being they never should have released the game. They still lose some face by not releasing the game and the argument can be made they should have released it anyway. They obviously had high hopes for NBA Elite 11 but as we've said before, were too ambitious in what they wanted to do within one production cycle and it just didn't pan out.

[Patr1ck]

It was almost like any decision EA made this year with their basketball title was going to fail in one way or another.

I had a thought about how each developer borrows ideas from one another. What will happen with NBA 2K12 since they don't have any new features or elements to borrow? Will it be Elite 12 that borrows heavily from 2K11 next year?

[Axel The Great]

That's a very good question. I don't think they'll add more features, they'll probably just add more to the features (fingers crossed that they fix some of the bugs in MP, Assoc. etc). What I'd like to know is if they'll keep the classic teams or maybe add new ones if they can obtain the likeness rights.

As for Elite borrowing heavily from 2K11, probably so. Since 2K has made up a bunch of game modes, anything Elite comes up with is probably already taken by 2K. Who knows, only time will tell.

[shadowgrin]

Be A Referee Mode.

LeBron looks at you crazy? T him up!

[Axel The Great]

Haha, that'd be so awesome! That would really express how much the officiating sucks.

[Andrew]

While NBA Elite is playing catch-up, I'd expect NBA 2K to continue to tinker and refine current features, fixing things under the hood and adding bits and pieces to Association Mode and My Player. In terms of brand new stuff, I think a the full All-Star Weekend is the next big thing they could add. Depending what they can manage with likeness rights for MJ and other legends, they could expand upon the Jordan Challenge to include historical games for other NBA greats and other content with strong nostalgic value.

[shadowgrin]

Doing the Right Thing: Canceling NBA Elite 11

The right thing would have to be doing a massive QA testing before even printing a game.
Even 2K is guilty of not doing that.