NBA Live 2005 Impressions

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Tue Sep 28, 2004 9:22 pm

I bought the Xbox version. I only played a quarter, but it seems much improved. Let me preface my remarks by saying I liked NBA Live (PS2) last year with heavy slider adjustments.

My "Tjung" impressions after 10 minutes of play:

-I really don't see much slowdown at all on the default camera. NOTHING compared to last year. There are some hiccups, but it is pretty minor. The graphics are pretty average.

- The first thing I noticed is that the default human and CPU slider settings are different. Thought that was odd.

- Saw a couple offensive rebounds right away, but nothing overdone.

- The CPU offense is much better than last year. They didn't have the lightning fast unrealistic fast break and constant 3 pointers. They moved the ball around nicely (some may say TOO nicely for the NBA..LOL).

- The default speed isn't half bad.

- Pro hop seems toned down. I drew a charge and saw some turnovers off of it.

- All the good things seem to be back. Plenty of missed shot variety. 10 man mo-capture is awesome. Good speed on passing. I love the foul variety.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Tue Sep 28, 2004 10:05 pm

Thanks for the impressions Leebo...I'm looking forward to trying it and ESPN out.

That Tjung kid is great.

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Tue Sep 28, 2004 11:05 pm

I have seen some slowdown now. It happens whenever the camera has to change very quickly like on a steal. I'd still consider it minor, although it is disappointing EA can't get rid of it.

I had to decrease the forcefield and speed the game up a couple notches (go figure). I was worried about the lack of fast breaks, but I switched my offense to secondary break and hit the white button and it is seems more realistic.

The CPU isn't as crafty and intelligent as ID, but it seems as good as any in the 2K series.

Stats are pretty darn realistic on All-Star. I had a ton of free throws and fouls with the slider only at 65. I just played a quarter on default and both teams shot below 40%. Just like the NBA...LOL.

I'm pretty pleased so far. If you *hated* live last year you probably won't like it. If you liked it except for the pro-hop, slowdown, CPU "cheating" on offense, and lack of offensive rebounds I think you will like it a lot better this year.

Boom · Post by **Boom** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:25 am

I'm pretty pleased so far. If you *hated* live last year you probably won't like it. If you liked it except for the pro-hop, slowdown, CPU "cheating" on offense, and lack of offensive rebounds I think you will like it a lot better this year.

That's exactly what i wanted to hear. Thanks for the impressions.

wco81 · Post by **wco81** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:39 am

There's actually a slider for forcefield?

Lets hear some online impressions. Live has usually had problems online with lag. I think the button mashing aspect of it (compared to other sports games) lends itself to lag.

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:58 am

wco81 wrote:There's actually a slider for forcefield?

Lets hear some online impressions. Live has usually had problems online with lag. I think the button mashing aspect of it (compared to other sports games) lends itself to lag.

Yeah, it's called boundry force field. I'm not sure what it does though.

I haven't played online. There was a roster update available, but I didn't try it.

Boom · Post by **Boom** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 1:01 am

From another board:

Ive played 4 games online with the Pacers, went 3-1. From what Ive played, the game plays flawless online. No lag whatsoever, not even on free throws. Also, there's no defensive adjustments online but I do believe each person can have their own camera view. The gameplay is great and is far more realistic than last year. U actually have to move the ball around, there's actually a mid range game. No more pro hop cheese, trust me on that one. They lose the ball every single time U try to pro hop through a player who's in front of U. There's actually facials this year, U can actually dunk on people this year, and big men will definitely dunk on small guys, fast break is pretty good also. U can actually drive by a slower defender with a fast guy without having to do a freestyle move or something. Default level for ranked games online is all-star, 5 min. U can also play ranked or unranked 1 on 1 games too. Overall, its the best b-ball game Ive played so far. No complaints whatsoever.

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 7:07 am

The Gamespot review refers to something that is very annoying. It has to do with your teammates stopping at the 3 point line on fast breaks.

Also, how am I supposed to know how the offensive plays work? There are a ton of them, but no diagrams that I can tell.

Diablo25 · Post by **Diablo25** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 7:36 am

My copy of Live should be on my doorstep by noon today (Wed.). Inpressions sound pretty good.

grtwhtsk · Post by **grtwhtsk** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 9:12 am

Guys, please post some impressions as soon as you get some playing time in. I am eagerly awaiting impressions from both Live and NBA2K5. I know that impulse might get me today (if you know what I mean). Then again, it's a lot easier to grab a $19.95 game. I just didn't have fun with ESPN's effort last year. With no ID, I want to make the "right" choice. So please chime in guys when you can. Thanks.

Badgun · Post by **Badgun** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 10:07 am

Well I don't have the game and doubt I ever will, but I found this interesting screenshot over at OS. Check out the stats for Shaq. 2 for 3 from 3 pt range? WTF?

http://www.operationsports.com/GameScre ... xbox26.jpg

grtwhtsk · Post by **grtwhtsk** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 10:11 am

Badgun wrote:Well I don't have the game and doubt I ever will, but I found this interesting screenshot over at OS. Check out the stats for Shaq. 2 for 3 from 3 pt range? WTF?

http://www.operationsports.com/GameScre ... xbox26.jpg

What the heck? I thought I saw a 0 rating for his 3 pointers on the IGN post which had all the ratings (maybe I'm wrong). Also disturbing is the fact that he didn't go to the freethrow line at all in 41 minutes played.

tsunami · Post by **tsunami** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 10:27 am

Leebo33 wrote:
wco81 wrote:There's actually a slider for forcefield?

Yeah, it's called boundry force field. I'm not sure what it does though.

I haven't played online. There was a roster update available, but I didn't try it.

I believe that was in last year's version as well and refers to the boundary on the sidelines/endlines. It controls sensitivity of the boundary around the court and prevents you from going out of bounds accidently. It has nothing to do with force fields around the players themselves.

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 11:07 am

tsunami wrote:
Leebo33 wrote:
wco81 wrote:There's actually a slider for forcefield?

Yeah, it's called boundry force field. I'm not sure what it does though.

I haven't played online. There was a roster update available, but I didn't try it.
I believe that was in last year's version as well and refers to the boundary on the sidelines/endlines. It controls sensitivity of the boundary around the court and prevents you from going out of bounds accidently. It has nothing to do with force fields around the players themselves.

Yeah, that makes sense. It didn't do anything to help so I figured it must be for something else.

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 11:23 am

grtwhtsk wrote:
Badgun wrote:Well I don't have the game and doubt I ever will, but I found this interesting screenshot over at OS. Check out the stats for Shaq. 2 for 3 from 3 pt range? WTF?

http://www.operationsports.com/GameScre ... xbox26.jpg
What the heck? I thought I saw a 0 rating for his 3 pointers on the IGN post which had all the ratings (maybe I'm wrong). Also disturbing is the fact that he didn't go to the freethrow line at all in 41 minutes played.

I specifically played Miami last night to test the "Shaq" factor. I was pretty pleased. He went to the foul line 6 times in a quarter of play. Once he totally slammed into my center and knocked him back 5 feet with his fat ass. Just like real life...LOL.

I had fun with the game last night and I'm pretty sure it is a keeper for me, but I'm still pretty disappointed that basketball is so poorly represented in video games. I'd rank it a distant 4th out of the big four sports as far as realistm is concerned. Inside Drive was pretty fun, but statistically it was pretty poor. The rebound distribution was off, there weren't nearly enough fouls even on the highest setting (yeah, for one game it may have been OK but over a larger sample of games FTs were about half of real stats), and there weren't nearly enough turnovers. Live 2005 seems to be awesome from a statistical standpoint now that the offensive rebounds are fixed, but I'm not really having any more fun with it than I had with ESPN 2K1.

jLp vAkEr0 · Post by **jLp vAkEr0** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 12:11 pm

How do the crowds and arenas look?

Sudz · Post by **Sudz** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 1:09 pm

was in Best Buy today and a kid asked if they had it. the feeb working there said oct 7. the kid then said are you sure. the best buy guy then went on to pontificate how he knows videogames and that he makes sure his store has the games before anyone else and that he was a huge basketball game fan and that he would know if they moved it up and that sort of thing never happens in the game industry.

Boom · Post by **Boom** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 3:03 pm

I've played two games of Live. One offline and one online. I gotta tell you that I'm pleasantly surprised by this game. I wasn't expecting much because of some of the things last year that really bothered me.

This year the game runs very smooth on the XBOX. Whatever slowdown or stuttering that others are seeing, I'm not. I use the default camera and the game runs very smooth.

Offensive rebounds are improved this year. Something I just saw that I was very impressed by was Anthony following his own shot and tipping in the miss for two points. Sweet.

Pro hop will get you into a lot of trouble this year (all star level). I like that.

Mid range game is much improved from last year.

Haven't played enough to find what annoys the hell out of me yet, but first impressions are quite favorable.

Boom · Post by **Boom** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 3:06 pm

Oh. The one thing early that does annoy is something that annoyed me last year. When the defense strips the ball from you and it's loose on the court, you still are kind of out of control until the animation finishes. It doesn't happen as much as last year and it's hard to explain, but I think that if you've experienced it then you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Blublub · Post by **Blublub** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 4:24 pm

Can anyone confirm that it doesn't support widescreen? Even at 480p? I could care less about 720p since my set doesn't support it, but I'll be damned if I'm going to spend $40 to play in stretch mode if I can have widescreen in 2k5 for half the price.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 4:38 pm

Wow the courts are small (or the players are big, with bobble heads I might add, LOL). Couple that with the fact that the collision detection is mediocre....you get a lot of running in place. Sound familiar Madden fans?

Leebo33 · Post by **Leebo33** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 4:58 pm

dbdynsty25 wrote:Wow the courts are small (or the players are big, with bobble heads I might add, LOL). Couple that with the fact that the collision detection is mediocre....you get a lot of running in place. Sound familiar Madden fans?

Yeah, I didn't see this and just posted in the other thread. It was late last night and I started goofing with the sliders, which helped a bit.

Why do these companies keep copying the things from the other games that SUCK.

Boom · Post by **Boom** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 5:04 pm

I think the bobble-head comment is a little exagerated, but yes the player-to-court size ratio is off, as it was last year.

I don't experience too much running in place. It happens, but not too much for me. It certainly doesn't happen any more in Live then having my guy go the wrong way due to some animation playing out in ESPN.

One thing about LIVE that I'm diggin' that I had absolutely no pre-release care in the world for is the slam dunk mode. I started playing around with this and it's pretty friggin cool actuallly. There's so much you can do. Yeah, a lot of it is over the top but still fun. It takes a lot of practice to perfect your dunks which I like a lot. It's not something that you can pick up and have a lot of success with. Good stuff. How long will I mess around with this? Who knows, but I've already played w/ it more than I thought I would so bonus.

dbdynsty25 · Post by **dbdynsty25** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 5:06 pm

Boom wrote:I think the bobble-head comment is a little exagerated, but yes the player-to-court size ratio is off, as it was last year.

I don't experience too much running in place. It happens, but not too much for me. It certainly doesn't happen any more in Live then having my guy go the wrong way due to some animation playing out in ESPN.

Play with the Suns and look at Steve Nash, then come talk to me.

As for the animations taking you out of bounds...Live does it too...in fact, it's worse than ESPN when it comes down to being able to cancel animations.

I'll be selling my Live and picking it up on the PC...where the mod community will probably make it playable. It does have a fun 'core' though.

Boom · Post by **Boom** » Wed Sep 29, 2004 6:21 pm

Cool cool. I really like the PC version of Live last year. I felt is played much better and defintely looked a HELL of a lot better than the console versions.

I guess the good thing about Live and ESPN this year is that most people seem to like one or the other, which is a good thing. I hear few people bitching about both.

I'm definitely going to give ESPN more time because I know 2 games is not worthing of truly forming an opinion, but initial impression is that i'm just not impressed.