[Dantecamp21]

For everybody who is waiting for the PS3 demo, my thougts:

Presentation:

From the front-end menus to the transition animation splashes, everything is really sharp and well executed. The in game stats layout is very elegant as well, never getting in the way of the on-court action. Overall, that's an area where I thought EA always did a better job than 2K. If you played NBA Live 2005, you will see that the Live 10 menus are very reminiscent from that game (wich by the way, was the last NBA Live prior to this one that Ryan Santos was involved).

Graphics:

I've read some people complaining about it being too "cartoonish". Well, that's a point of view and it must be respected. In my opinion, people tend to think that way because the color palette used in the game is really vibrant. While 2K goes with a more real and sober flat look in terms of colors, Live assumes a more stylized look. I like it a lot, but it's definitively a personal matter. On the other side of the coin, I disagree with some reports about the player models. They are spot-on in terms of proportions and face-wise. Overall, I think this is a beautiful game to look at.

Sound:

The atmosphere in the stadium is terrific. The organ at the Staples really add to the experience. Overall sound fx are the regular fare. I don't have a problem with the rim effects. Marv and Steve could dig a bit more into the Game Storyline wich is revealed at the start of each game, but the demo has a disclaimer saying that in the final build they'll have a lot more to say so, we'll have to wait on that.

ps: the overall technical quality of the sound wasn't excellent. I don't know what it might be but I had that same feeling when playing Madden 10 as well.

Gameplay:

Before playing this game you have to forget everything you knew about previous Lives. The controls are very different and, as the CZar already stated, the game does have a learning curve. Once you get comfortable with the new mechanics everything starts to shine. The animations are great. Shooting (for me) is the highlight of the package. Never before I felt so much control while shooting the rock in a basketball game. Shooting just feels great. I only missed the ability to change your shot in mid-air (dunk to layup). I felt rebounding (a sore thumb in every Live) was very rewarding if you really focused on it (grabbed 8 rebounds in game with D-12 playing on All-Star leveI). I won't dig any further into gameplay (offense, defense, etc) because others already did it, but the feel of the game is amazing. My biggest complaint was playing the passing lanes. Never felt like I could snatch those careless passes out of the air.

Overall:

Regardless of weather Live is the new king (wich would be foolish to state since no one played 2K10 up to this point), it's definitively back. The game is so much fun. I could spend tons of hours solely working on my game at The Hangar. I believe it has the ability to become something trully special next year (just like what happened with the NHL series from 07 to 08).


Thanks Marcus, Mike, Garreth and the rest of the dev. team.
See you guys online on October 6th.