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NBA Live 2002

Score: 5.5/10

The EA team responsible for the Live series is likened to the sagging draws slang spittin' white boy found on your suburban high school ball court, trying intensely hard but never quite attaining street cred.  This naïve child one day will take his game which has proven peerless in his school of three hundred, to a nice integrated division 2A school where he will meet true competition, and have his pride dismantled.  The NBA Live franchise has always reveled in its ability to appear “down” and “with it”, yet when Visual Concepts introduced it’s corn fed mule of a B-Ball title back in 99’ the masquerade nearly died.  In EA’s latest offering, NBA Live 2002 (NL2K2), the coffin and nails are supplied; it need just lie down.

All efforts to remain alive and kicking are found in NL2K2’s presentation, where it is clear that all of EA’s Cal Tech recruits have had every last bit of creative juice squeezed out of their vitamin B depleted acne scarred bodies.  Really as far as intro films, interface layout and designs and logo’s go NL2K2 deserves high praise.  Everything is as sleek as can be and easily navigable with a perfectly selected color palate to boot (fresh lily violet and crushed bone ivory (interior design courses do come in handy!)).  There really is no question in this authors mind that the men and women responsible for such a such a brilliant display could have far more money and success designing Volkswagen commercials, but hey.

 

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While navigating through the lovely menus you find that NL2K2 has many nice features, with the common season mode, franchise, one on one and exhibition modes.  Perusing the options in the season mode discovers that wisely, when conducting trades you are now able to offer up more than one player for another, allowing you to dump your bench to acquire up and comer Tracy McGrady, or who ever else you might want.  Also nice but expected is the ability 

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to play as some of the greatest players of all time, either in one on one or exhibition modes, from a group of five teams, 50’s, 60’s, 70’s and so on.  Gone however is the incentive ability to unlock certain players, ala Jordan and Bird, as was the method in the 2000 installment (the last one I experienced) as they are all playable from the get go..

It is at this point where I must release my dissatisfaction for the title.  It assuredly must be frustrating for the EA team after trying so hard for so long to produce a quality B-Ball game to have Visual Concepts come along and in their first year of efforts offer a product far superior.  For even with the updated rosters the monstrously improved graphical presentation and the inclusion of the Wizard Jordan I would play NBA2K first.  The big problem lies in the gameplay  (who’d uh thunk it!).  Like always the Live players feel floaty, maneuvering all over the court as if within a vacuum.  You would think that those momentum obsessed Madden programmers would throw these guys a bone or something.  Shaq turns on a peso for God’s sake!  Without surprise the “special moves” such as the spastic spin step or the epileptic crossover offer nothing but frustration as they are less effective than an airport x-ray security guard.  The commentators begin to repeat themselves within the first quarter, and though the players look smooth and real in some instances the ball leaves their hands like in Arch Rivals and so its all null and void. 

In all reality or Live-ality if you will, there is nothing fun about NL2K2, though it try’s harder than Bush it has been weighed and been found wanting, wait for NBA2K2.

- Tolkiemingway

(November 29, 2001)

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