NBA LIVE 19 THOUGHTS SO FAR

NBA Live 19 demo dropped Aug, 24^th and like many, I was pretty hyped to play it. The first night alone I spent about 5 hours, excited to finally play a new basketball game. The first thing I noticed is of course the graphics have improved. I also noticed the game felt familiar to NBA LIVE 18, though the game pace seems faster. The movement is more fluid than 18, however I noticed that there’s still quite a bit of stiffness. Player body likeness still needs improvement as well.

My favorite thing about NBA LIVE 19 so far has definitely been the introduction of the icon skill. At first I was disappointed to find out that we would still pretty much have the same playstyles, but once I understood the icon skill and what it could do, my disappointment turned into excitement. With the introduction of the icon skill you’re able to branch off and build your player around different NBA ICONS, for example I went with my favorite build, the 6’8 wing scorer, except this year the build is much more well rounded. I chose the Vince Carter path, not only will I still be dominant in the dunking and dribbling category , I now have a much better 3 pointer at a max of 85. Last year my 3 was in the 60s, which was my biggest complaint, playstyles felt too one sided.

Career mode known as the one has gotten even more love this year, though the story mode is still text style (not a feature I enjoy) outside of joining the league we get to travel all over the world and experience different courts. Not only do we have the pro am world tour they have implemented a new mode called court battles, which seems pretty interesting in the name alone. 

Now this is right up my alley as I enjoy street career mode more than anything. Not only can we build a squad and gain new cpu players we can battle other players teams in the community, think NBA Live Mobile, but on console. And if that’s not enough you can even create a female player and enjoy something new. 

Create your own court from colors to logos (no custom logo features as of yet, or location change. I would love to have an outside custom college court), in the demo the features are limited, as you can’t practice with your “the one player” or invite friends. 

Now that I’ve touched on some of the good, it wouldn’t be me if I didn’t talk about some of the bad. First and foremost the facescan app has been disastrous, definitely a step down in quality from last year’s app. Not only that we still can’t change skin tone, eye color or add eyebrows. We’re still missing facial sculpting tools, we can’t edit default heads, and we can’t choose different hairstyles/beard colors for each style. It was also disappointing to see that the facial hair hadn’t been updated and with better quality. To some this may seem like nothing to others these missing features may be a deal breaker, especially if you enjoy making custom players or just want your player to look more like you.

Movement and Dribbling

As I stated earlier, the movement feels more fluid in NBA Live 19, however it still feels stiff. Not only that, there are times when you get dragged around on offense and defense, that can feel very irritating as we should have complete control over our player at all times. There were times when I wanted to stop at my favorite sweet spot behind the 3 point line and I got dragged in closer or worse dragged into the midrange or paint. There were times when I’d pass to one of my squad members when were playing live events, and they would get thrown into a drag animation that moves them from their initial position.  

On defense there were times where I hadn’t even pressed a button yet my player moved into certain defensive animations. This is something that definitely NEEDS to be fixed. NO auto movements and NO AUTO DEFENSE!

 Dribbling feels very similar to NBA LIVE 18, from the movement to the combos, not many differences, however there has been a speed increase, and some new animations added. Overall the movement is not as fluid as I hoped, but improved nonetheless. Combos still feel too limited and we still can’t create our own dribble packages (at least that’s how it is in the demo, who knows what the future of NBA LIVE 19 updates holds).  

NBA LIVE 19 demo compared to NBA LIVE 18’s demo is definitely more limited, as of now there is no live run to play against other players. We can't earn more than 20,000 RP at a time. We can only level up to 10 (last year we could level up to 20) and our players overall is fairly low compared to the NBA LIVE 18 demo.

Offense and Defense

The first thing I noticed on the defensive end was push backs and being able to make the dribbler pick up the ball a lot more than NBA LIVE 18. Blowbys seems to be less effective, at least against cpu. Even with that I still found myself dominating, pushing my way past at times, breaking ankles and making my way to the cup. But there were definitely times that cpu felt like a brick wall that was almost impossible to get past, even in play now mode.  Players like Kyrie, Curry and Durant at times were stopped firmly in their tracks and forced to pick up their dribble even by centers, other times they were breaking ankles and easily able to blow by defenders. 

Contested green lights and dunking on 3 defenders is still in the game, however once again this is against cpu, and hopefully toned downed when it comes to online PVP (player vs player). 
I also noticed that the bounce back aka snapback meter is still in the game (when the bar hits the top of the meter and bounces back). I saw it happen more in live events than in single player. Hopefully NBA LIVE 20 will have a new meter (similar to NBA LIVE MOBILE) but for now, maybe something can be done for the stiff slow jumper animation that results in a early release and the glitch that makes the meter bounce back, sometimes resulting in a penalty. 

Overall the demo though limited has been enjoyable, and I’m pretty hyped for release. I still haven’t pre ordered, as I stated many times in my videos. This year EA has a lot to show and prove, last year I pre ordered without fully knowing anything about the modes and features. I was disappointed about many things missing (and never updated after launch). The biggest deal breaker to me this year is if franchise mode does not allow editing of the roster. I enjoy making my own custom created team. There are things I always find I want to change during the season, be it hairstyles, accessories, etc. This was something that was missing in Live 18, along with being able to choose player position lock ( if you only want to play as PG, C, etc.) jersey selection in every mode, franchise co-op, 1v1 (with scoreboard) and many other things. EA still has plenty of time to release news about other modes and features, hopefully some of these features have been added to NBA LIVE 19.