EA Sports has announced that their latest basketball game, NBA Live '13, has been cancelled. This is not the first time the company had to cancel a basketball game with NBA Elite '11 being the last one that was cancelled because of bad reception after a demo was released on the Playstation Store and Xbox Live Marketplace. Originally going to be released this October as a downloadable title instead of the standard retail game, EA has been struggling to get the franchise back on track for over three years now, but they mentioned in the official statement linked above that they are not giving up and will try again next year.
Since its announcement at E3 earlier this summer, NBA Live '13's coverage has been both spotty and lackluster. The early previews proved that the game still needed a lot of work especially compared to 2K Sports' NBA '2K13, which comes out next week. 2K's franchise has been on a roll with great iterations every year and we will see if '2K13 continues their streak. The presentation for Live '13 seems to be getting better with ESPN-like menus along with commentary by Mike Breen and Jeff Van Gundy, but the gameplay still isn't there yet as seen in the video below that went up last month. The decision to make this iteration a downloadable title instead of being a standard $60 game will also telling of the game's quality. Compared to their efforts on Madden, Tiger Woods, NHL, and FIFA, EA's handling of the Live franchise has been a joke. Hopefully with another year of work, they can bring it back to the quality we expect from them. Until then, if you're looking to get a basketball game this year, NBA '2K13 is pretty much the only choice at this rate with EA's cancellation of NBA Live '13.
