By Marcus Stephenson, Producer
What’s up everyone! For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Marcus Stephenson, and I’m an Assistant Producer for NBA LIVE 10. I know a lot of you have been waiting (patiently) for even the slightest bit of detail on our new game. Well, you don’t have to wait any longer. First things first, let’s get to our new cover guy for NBA LIVE 10….
Alright, now with that out of the way, two things:
1.) Yes, that’s Mos Def doing the voiceover (his new album “The Ecstatic” dropped on Tuesday)
2.) Superman has “arrived!”
We’re extremely excited to have Dwight Howard on the cover of NBA LIVE 10. A lot of us here in the studio have been playing the game with the updated Dynamic DNA against the Lakers, and he’s a force in LIVE (not like using Yao with the pick and roll control in NBA LIVE 09 ). Naturally, the first thoughts that a lot of us have whenever a player is revealed as a cover guy for a sports game, is try to tie the cover guy to features/emphasis in that game. Well, we can put that to rest. Our team believes in authentic basketball in every area, and we try, to the best of our ability, to even out every aspect of the game. Does that make you feel better? Don’t worry, we don’t have an all new “freestyle block” feature utilizing the right stick in a circle/half-circle motion.
From this point forward, you’re going to see a new blog every single week that will explain everything we’re doing in detail from the drastically improved net and rim physics, all of the other gameplay fixes that will blow you guys away, to the evolution of Dynamic DNA. Every Friday, one of our producers will talk about something they’re working on, and then on the following Monday, they’ll be on the EA SPORTS LIVE Radio Show to discuss, and answer any questions you guys might have.
I encourage all of you to please leave your feedback. If you truly hate something that we’re doing, please let us know. You could also let us know if you really like something too ;). If you want a topic covered that we haven’t talked about yet, let us know. We’ll see if we can adjust the blog schedule around if enough people want to see a certain thing earlier.
I get this question a lot: “Who do you make the game for?” I hear different dev teams say a bunch of different things, but the most popular is “We make the game that all of us would want to play”. While that’s true, I’d be lying if I didn’t tell you that we’re making this game for you guys. The basketball community in particular demands and expects authenticity to the umpteenth degree. Because of that, this industry labels all of you as “the hardcore,” but I think that tag should die. You aren’t the “hardcore,” you’re the “informed.” I get it though, you just want what’s real. With that said, we read every post, every blog, and every review and preview you guys give for the NBA LIVE franchise. To say we know where we’re at would be an understatement. Trust me when I say that we know where we’re at, and where we need to be.
Next week, Sean O’Brien, our fearless leader, will reveal NBA LIVE 10 to all of you. He’ll “lay the foundation,” and introduce all of the producers that will be speaking to you guys on the Inside Blog. We really think there will be a positive “ground swell” of sentiments for NBA LIVE 10 this year. I hope you enjoy this, but remember, speak out no matter what your opinions are!
A few more things:
Some of us are on Twitter (follow us):
NBA LIVE 10 - http://www.twitter.com/nbalive10
Me – http://www.twitter.com/stephensonmc
Garreth Reeder – http://www.twitter.com/iminurbase
Ryan Santos – http://www.twitter.com/ryansantos
Kathryn Peck - http://www.twitter.com/kp_easports
You can also find us on various forums, but specifically we talk a lot at the EA SPORTS NBA LIVE Forums, Operationsports NBA LIVE Forums, and our biggest NBA LIVE fansite, the NBA LIVE Series Center.