NBA Live here for the long haul
When it was announced over a year ago that the NBA Live franchise was going it’s triumphant return in the form of a next-gen launch title in November 2013, fans of basketball were excited about the return of competition to a genre that had been dominated by the NBA 2k juggernaut for the previous four years.
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Unfortunately, NBA Live’s return to the fold was anything but triumphant.
It was met with mediocre to bad reviews from numerous outlets, and just didn’t play the part of a next-gen game very well.. The poor reaction led to many fans wondering if EA Sports would pull the plug on the franchise after just one entry onto the Xbox One and PlayStation.
“I think there is always the risk of a reactive decision any time you put something out that you’re not extremely happy with,” executive producer of the NBA Live franchise Sean O’Brien said. “I think what everyone externally doesn’t tend to know is the plan that we’ve had all along as far as what this journey looks like.”
O’Brien joined EA Sports to lead the production of the resurrected NBA Live series in the fall of 2012, and has knowledge of how the company did business with the previous installments of the game. This allowed O’Brien to completely wipe the field, create a game plan and pitch it to the higher ups at EA.
This gameplan, O’Brien says, is a multi-year process to bring the franchise back to prominence. And it’s an internal plan that the executives at the publishing company are buying into.
But I think that, from a corporate standpoint, we’re all invested in this.
As noted, the initial reaction to the relaunch of NBA Live with NBA Live 14 wasn’t overwhelmingly positive. With so many expectations placed on EA Sports when they decided to bring a series back as a launch title on the Generation 4 line of consoles, it lead to the public having extremely high hopes for year one.
O’Brien credits those high hopes as a reason for the disappointment last year.
“I think I understand why,” he said. “There’s a lot of expectation with the title being away for a couple years. I think the interest level was high, and I think a lot of people wanted to see what we could do in a couple of years.
“Our first installment wasn’t great. It didn’t meet expectations internally, or for ourselves as a team. But I think that, from a corporate standpoint, we’re all invested in this.”
An all-in investment is certainly the case. O’Brien stated that the company has a long-term plan in place that will see year over year improvement on all of the feedback that it’s players are offering. And he wants the building of the game to be as transparent as possible.
“We want to bring them in on the journey,” O’Brien said. “[We want to] continue to show that progress and that we’re building positive momentum behind this franchise and what we’re doing”
Sound off FanSiders! What do you think about NBA Live, and the game’s potential to be a true contender in the basketball video game market? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below. Be sure to look out for part two of this conversation with O’Brien on Tuesday.