NBA Live 10 Player Movement Blog (Videos Included)

[Andrew]

Jeff Antwi has posted a blog on player movement and animations on EASports.com, which you can check out here. It also includes seven videos demonstrating animations in NBA Live 10, though no real "game footage" as yet.

It's kind of hard to tell just how fluid movement and controller responsiveness will be from a video, the latter in particular requiring hands-on experience. However, they don't look too bad and there does seem to be a subtle difference between the different dribbling animations. We'll probably see a bigger difference once the signature dribbling styles make their way into the demonstrations. Interesting to see some work-in-progress videos at any rate.

[bee-boy]

can you repost the link to those seven videos

[Andrew]

Done. Pasted the wrong link the first time around, sorry about that.

[ThaLiveKing]

Honestly this game is already lookin like real basketball, the dribbling alone is crazy. I love the cutting too. I'm excited for this game. Its lookin like the NBA Live I've had in my head all these years

[Andrew]

The producer video I've just posted is even better as it does include some in-game snippets but as I said it's interesting to see these work-in-progress videos in their test environment.

[ThaLiveKing]

I can't see that vid on my phone, I'm gonna have to wait till later. I seriously have no doubts about this game . It looks like real basketball. 2K isn't even that good wit off ball movement like that

[Andrew]

2K's controls have tended to be more responsive, I've definitely got to give them that. I still don't like the Isomotion concept and I'll readily admit that NBA Live is my brand of choice (and thus I want it to succeed) but as much as I did like NBA Live 09 and feel it was a bit underrated, the responsiveness of the controls was a weakness and 2K9's responsiveness was better.

I do like the sound of more contextual dribbling moves however. Of course, the worst case scenario there is that it becomes too easy to beat defenders off the dribble - though hopefully sliders would be able to counteract that if it were the case - but if done properly it should look and feel better, with the Quick Strike moves adding that extra pizazz and being a more effective weapon in eluding defenders...as they should be.

[benji]

They should program it to reflect actual basketball, and let the 95% of users edit the sliders so nobody defends and they can crossover to dunk 100% of the time.

The quicker the devs (from any team) recognize that players don't want to play basketball but replicate highlight films on every possession, the quicker we can go back to the days of one dev who does that, one dev who straddles and one dev who focuses on basketball.

To be non-biased and non-snarky, this looks like the 2K animations. I'm not as anal about them as most people, as I much prefer someone having to finish a move they started instead of suddenly snapping back to do whatever you want. But at the same time, once an animation triggers off the ball you know what someone is going to do, this looks like that. Now in 2K, I notice these 15-20 start animations and know what follows after a number of games, the same will be of Live. The question is, does the AI know?

[Patr1ck]

Having players contextually do crossovers and move like they did in the videos is something that was done in 2K with isomotion. Although, it is something I have wanted in basketball games for years to make things look more natural and aware rather than having a player dribble with the ball between himself and the defender. The potential drawback is the feel of control loss or delay as your player has to go through this animation in order to start moving in the direction you pressed on the left stick.

[Andrew]

So long as we can interrupt animations to make a pass or pull up for a shot (awkward as it might be depending on the player's momentum at the time) it hopefully shouldn't be a problem.

[benji]

I think you have to accept it, but there should be an aspect of control to move the player with the animation in the direction you want. Being able to spin->crossover->spin->crossover->spin->dunk may be what players want, but you'll never get anything resembling an NBA game with that.

But as I already said, I prefer the auto setting the ball away from the defender, having to finish the momentum of a move, etc. It's not like you can direct the player to do it with any control scheme that wouldn't be overly complex.

EDIT to respond to Andrew: Let you shoot, pass, or cancel out of the momentum but you should suffer the result. Not gain advantage from it. Currently, and in the past, you've benefited from it because the AI is stuck in trying to defend your full momentum.

2K manages momentum fairly well, although a lot of "I WANTS TO DUNK" people hate it.

[Patr1ck]

I do accept that there will always be some delay when changing direction due to physics and momentum, I just don't want it to be as much as what was in Live 08 and 09. If the animations fire off quicker in response to my controller action, I will be fine. The change of direction animations is something I have learned to deal with while playing 2K, especially since there is more response from the controller.

[bee-boy]

those moves look authentic and crisp. can't wait to test em out.