NBA Live 13 Not Cancelled, Delayed

EA Sports announced the release of NBA Live 13 has been delayed in a post on their website Thursday.

The NBA mandates that officially licensed basketball video games must release the first week of October. NBA 2K13 is set to debut on Oct. 2 and the start of the NBA season falls on Oct. 30. NBA Live 13 will apparently release at some point but that date has yet to be announced.

Previously, it was rumored that NBA Live 13 had been cancelled. EA Sports did nothing to dispel these rumors, making basketball fans more and more doubtful of its return.

Although no information has been confirmed by EA, it appears NBA Live 13 is heading for a digital-only release. Either because of the heavy competition from the NBA 2K series or from lack of confidence in the project, indications from the company suggest the title would be coming to Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 as a $20 downloadable title.

It is completely different reasoning than what was behind the famous ESPN NFL 2K versus Madden 2005 debate. Cutting the cost of ESPN NFL 2K to $20 was necessary for the game to compete with Madden 2005 on the marketplace. NBA Live 13 is seeing a small price essentially as an omission of its inferiority.

Leaked gameplay footage of NBA Live 13 showed basketball gamers the company is not ready to compete with NBA 2K13. Player models were subpar and menus were too simple. EA later stated the gameplay was from a very early build of the game and people who watched the video should reserve  judgement.

The NBA Live franchise was originally killed in 2010. It was to be replaced in the EA Sports lineup by a new basketball franchise called NBA Elite. That never came to fruition as the game suffered severe criticism for a demo released for a short time. EA then decided to scrap the new series and start NBA Live from scratch.

No official reason for the delay was announced. NBA Live 13 could see a release later in October as fans become excited for the new NBA season and hype for NBA 2K13 dies down. EA insists the game will still release but it could still be scrapped altogether.

In the post, EA released a new trailer for NBA Live 13. It is the first official time showing off in-game footage.