Xbox Gaming in South Africa

EA has announced that the ageing NBA LIVE franchise will be on the receiving end of a serious make-over this year, with an all-new physics system, control system, and even a new name, NBA Elite 11, when it arrives on the Xbox 360 in October.

EA Sports president Peter Moore claims that this overhaul will give fans what they have been begging for in a basketball game for years, saying that NBA Elite 11 will "profoundly evolve the interactive basketball experience in a way that the category has not seen for a decade."

A major change in the gameplay is the new "Hands-On Control" system, which apparently takes a leaf out of the playbooks of other top rates EA Sports franchises, bringing more fluid player handling instead of the canned animations which have plagued the NBA LIVE franchise.

"This is the first basketball simulation videogame where you are controlling every movement, dribble move, shot, dunk, lay-up, steal and block in real time with one-to-one control. You're no longer going to push a button and watch the computer generate a long animation sequence," said NBA Elite 11 creative director David Littman. "It is like being on a basketball court with an amazing set of skills. This is going to change what people have come to expect from a basketball simulation videogame."

Sounds like they may be on to a good thing with this one, and if it works out as intended NBA Elite 11 might prove to be the evolution gamers have been hoping for.