NBA Live 08 will offer online leagues
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NHL 08 won't be the only upcoming EA Sports title to include online leagues. For the first time it will be introduced into the NBA Live series as well. They will be available on the Xbox 360 and PS3.
It appears for this first attempt at leagues the system will be somewhat limited. There can be 2-32 teams, 1-11 games in a season, quarter length of 2-12 minutes, and owners can have the same teams within a league (which means there will probably be no trading of players). One good aspect is that it is an open structure. There is no strict schedule which is one of the main reasons the majority of leagues end prematurely. It is uncertain whether player stats will be tracked, what the playoff setup will be, or if there will be a web site to view updated league info.
EA Canada seems to be putting a lot of effort into the online area and from my understanding it is a completely different set of circumstances for their games when it comes to online performance as opposed to those produced at Tiburon. Where widespread problems have been seen with the 08 versions of NCAA Football , Nascar, Madden, and now Tiger…those same issues may not arise with NHL 08 and NBA Live 08. They are working towards making sure they don't.
Fortunately they seem to understand that if the online experience is plagued by lag, disconnects, non-functioning features, or simply being light on options then adding in features such as online leagues would ultimately be pointless. So lets hope that they deliver and build on that for the future.
August 30, 2007 at 6:46 pm
I knew it, i guess i’ll have to wait for all human players online for next year
August 30, 2007 at 8:03 pm
Interesting, that is now two EA Canada titles to feature online leagues. I wonder if FIFA will as well?
August 30, 2007 at 8:17 pm
Step in the right direction.
August 30, 2007 at 8:21 pm
Outstanding news! I’m so hyped up for Live this year. Just finished playing the NHL 08 demo and I did like what I saw. Props for EA Canada. Pasta, any info on when the demo will be available on Xbox Live? I heard it would be early september.
August 30, 2007 at 9:00 pm
Well, I will hold back further comments on the game until EA makes a competent basketball title. Is this the year it starts? I have no idea, but once again I will give it a bash just to see what’s up.
August 31, 2007 at 4:01 am
[quote comment="3297"]Interesting, that is now two EA Canada titles to feature online leagues. I wonder if FIFA will as well?[/quote]
Yep. Fifa has online leagues also.
[quote comment="3299"]Pasta, any info on when the demo will be available on Xbox Live? I heard it would be early september.[/quote]
Nothing more than that. I’ve pushed to try and get more details on the demo but no luck so far.
August 31, 2007 at 9:46 am
Just what I feared, EA has royally screwed up if this is true.
taken from an article on gamespot.com
http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/sports/nbalive08/news.html?sid=6177918&autoplay=6177890&tag=topslot%3Blink%3B1&om_act=convert&om_clk=topslot&page=2
Interestingly, if the opposing team passes the ball, Live 08 will automatically switch your player control to the player closest to the ball. Although there’s no option to turn this feature off that we could find, you can go into the menu system and choose to control one position for the entire game if you like.
August 31, 2007 at 12:07 pm
It only automatically switches if you’re holding in the left trigger.
August 31, 2007 at 12:09 pm
If this is the case the feature is nice.
September 1, 2007 at 5:52 pm
very cool news.