Will 
EA’s NBA woes ever end?
After keeping its NBA Live franchise on the bench for the last four years, the publisher managed to release a new iteration in the once-proud franchise in 2013 — but pretty much everyone hated it.
NBA Live 14 currently has a Metacritic score of just 46. User scores are a dismal 2.5 out of 10. And now, EA has a message to its fans: It’s sorry.
The 
Los Angeles Lakers have an 0-2 record and went winless in the pre-season. Kobe Bryant is playing on a bad foot, Dwight Howard’s still getting in game shape and star point guard Steve Nash had to be helped off the court near the end of the first half on Wednesday after suffering a shin injury.
But according to 2K Sports’s NBA 2K13, they’re still going to win it all this season.
In 
a year where there have been plenty of head-scratching moves by video game publishers, EA’s decision to sit out yet another NBA season is perhaps the most baffling.
It is nothing short of a colossal failure on the part of the company that has historically been the leader in sports games. The company’s inability to put together a high quality (or even remotely competitive) product in the ample time budgeted to do so has given Take-Two de facto exclusivity in a lucrative field for the third consecutive year. And barring a miracle or some extraordinarily savvy maneuvering, it may have just ceded the category forever.
Despite 
several promises that its flagship basketball franchise would return after a three-year absence, EA has decided to once again bench NBA Live.
The decision is likely to disappoint fans who were hoping to see some competition in the NBA field once again, but is terrific news for 2K Sports, whose NBA2K 13 will once again have the court to itself.
More 
than six months ago, Electronic Arts announced that after a two-year absence, NBA Live would be returning to store shelves this fall in a reboot that would “[capture] the future of basketball.”
But with a mere two months to go before the tip off of this year’s NBA season, we don’t know much more about the game. It was at E3, but no one was allowed to touch it, and it didn’t look great. Since then? Virtually nothing. What’s going on here?
[In light of an NBA lockout, Gamasutra 
editor-at-large Chris Morris calls Take-Two’s optimistic outlook for NBA 2K12 “baffling,” arguing that the publisher missed a “free pass to lower expectations in a way investors would understand.”]
There was plenty of bad news in Take-Two’s earnings call Monday.
The company missed expectations – and managed to do so on a day where investors were already in panic mode. Duke Nukem Forever, the company said, was profitable, but the overwhelmingly negative reviews put a ceiling on that title’s earnings potential. And because of that stumble from the flat-topped king of the one liner, the company was forced to cut its forecast.
But the bad news was almost overshadowed by Take-Two’s baffling decision to maintain a downright optimistic outlook for this year’s NBA 2Ktitle, despite the dark clouds hovering over the real-world NBA.
The just-started NBA 
lockout is already having far-reaching effects.
Beyond what players, coaches and team owners are going through (and, of course, fans of live games), the television industry is scrambling to find ways to fill the possible holes in their schedule. Meanwhile, video game companies are trying to determine the ramifications for some of their biggest franchises, while NBA.com webmasters have had a busy few days. Let’s break it down by industry.
Blake Griffin has a lot going for him. He has 
endorsement deals with TV manufacturer Vizio, a multimillion dollar contact with the Los Angeles Clippers and sitting on his mantle at home are trophies for the 2011 NBA Slam Dunk Contest and NBA Rookie of the Year.
But what the guy really wants, it seems, is to fight mutants and in id Software’s upcoming shooter, Rage. And he’s making his case in a hilarious new video that includes motion-capture, dribble-drives and, yes, a tiger getting dunked on.
In 2010, Electronic Arts waited until the 
last second to cancel its flagship NBA game. This year, it’s bowing out long before the season begins.
The leader in video game sports has quietly announced plans to bypass this season and release its next installment of NBA Elite (formerly called NBA Live) in the fall of 2012. That will create a three-year gap between releases, a significant fall for what used to be the leading basketball sports simulation.
NBA JAM by EA Sports is, quite simply, a heck of a lot of fun to 
play. Easy to pick up and anything but complicated in its rules, the game focuses solely on the most outlandish parts of the sport — monster slam dunks and huge blocks of opponents’ shots. It’s a bit more aggressive than other basketball games, but the violence is arcade-like and not too concerning. The game further offers impressive visuals and keeps the adrenaline pumping with announcer Tim Kitzrow’s “boomshakalaka”-infused running commentary. The biggest disappointment is the lack of any multiplayer mode, as this is one of those titles that’s more fun with friends.
Chris Morris: Journalist 