NBA Live series
| NBA Live | |
|---|---|
| Developers |
EA Canada (1995–2010) EA Tiburon (2010–present) |
| Publishers | EA Sports |
| Platforms |
Game Boy GameCube iPhone iPod Touch Android Nintendo 64 PC PlayStation PlayStation 2 PlayStation 3 PlayStation 4 PlayStation Portable Sega Saturn Wii Xbox 360 Xbox One |
| Platform of origin | Super NES, Sega Genesis, MS-DOS |
| Year of inception | 1994 |
| First release |
NBA Live 95 October 1994 |
| Latest release |
NBA Live 16 September 29, 2015 |
NBA Live is a series of basketball video games published by EA Sports. The series, which has had releases annually from 1994 to 2009 and 2013 to the present, is the successor to EA's previous NBA Playoffs and NBA Showdown series. Live primarily competes with the NBA 2K series and formerly NBA ShootOut.
The predecessor of the NBA Live series was the NBA Playoffs series, which featured Lakers vs. Celtics, released first in 1989 for MS-DOS-compatible PCs and later adapted for consoles in early 1990 for the Sega Mega Drive. This game was played from a horizontal view (while later versions moved to an isometric view before ultimately moving to 3D on newer consoles). The game was one of the first to feature an NBA license, containing both real NBA teams and player likenesses and signature moves. Details such as Horace Grant's goggles are clearly visible, and Michael Jordan's "Air Reverse Layup" is animated with very high accuracy. Player numbers were also visible. The game featured only eight of the sixteen teams that qualified for the NBA playoffs that year, as well as both NBA All-Star teams.
The next game in the series was Bulls vs. Lakers, released in 1991, followed by Bulls vs. Blazers in 1992. Unlike the first game, these two releases were titled after the two teams who were in the NBA Finals the previous season, while the original release apparently chose the Lakers and Celtics due to both teams' historical success, in particular their rivalry in the 1980s. Each revision added more teams and players, as well as more signature moves. The series also included an Olympic basketball spinoff game, Team USA Basketball (1992) which uses the same engine. The final game in the series was NBA Showdown 94 for the Sega Genesis before the transition to the NBA Live series.
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