FirstCuts: NBA Live Thinks For Itself

Mottram can have the All-Star Game. If I could be out of the office this week at one event, I’d be at E3 in Los Angeles.↵↵There’s the potential for a lot of exciting stuff to go down this week in terms of announcements, but one interesting nugget from the Electronic Arts camp has already slipped out, via the San Jose Mercury News.↵

↵↵⇥↵⇥EA plans to announce today that the latest version of its “NBA Live” game will include a constantly updated artificial intelligence.↵⇥

↵⇥↵⇥Whenever users log on to the game, the title will connect to the Internet to download data from the latest NBA games, including such details as whether a player like Kobe Bryant is taking more shots from the left or the right side of the floor and his relative success from each spot. The game will use such information to affect how the virtual Kobe Bryant plays in NBA Live and how he is guarded.↵⇥

↵↵↵EA bashing is a popular thing because they hold such a vast majority of the sports market, but between what I’ve seen in NCAA Football 09 and and what I’ve heard about both Madden 09 and NBA Live 09, you’ve got to tip your cap to Peter Moore, John Riccitiello and everyone having to do anything with EA Sports. They’re on a hot streak.↵

↵↵Sports games so often just feel like roster updates, but this is the kind of thing we should all expect from next-gen game development.↵

↵↵(H/T to a stern warning)↵

↵UPDATE: The name of the feature is Dynamic DNA. Hit the EA developer blog for more details.↵