Fansided: Interview with Live EP Sean O'Brien
Fansided's Michael Straw will be posting a new part of his interview with Live EP Sean O'Brien each day this week.
We will add excerpts of the interview here each day. Follow each respective link for the full article.
Day One: NBA Live here for the long haul
O’Brien joined EA Sports to lead the production of the resurrected NBA Live series in the fall of 2012, and has knowledge of how the company did business with the previous installments of the game. This allowed O’Brien to completely wipe the field, create a game plan and pitch it to the higher ups at EA.
This gameplan, O’Brien says, is a multi-year process to bring the franchise back to prominence. And it’s an internal plan that the executives at the publishing company are buying into.
An all-in investment is certainly the case. O’Brien stated that the company has a long-term plan in place that will see year over year improvement on all of the feedback that it’s players are offering. And he wants the building of the game to be as transparent as possible.
“We want to bring them in on the journey,” O’Brien said. “[We want to] continue to show that progress and that we’re building positive momentum behind this franchise and what we’re doing”
Day Two: What is the focus of NBA Live 15?
But just what is the focus of NBA Live 15 after laying out the basic foundation with NBA Live 14? O’Brien says that this year is heavily focused on making sure the game looks, feels and plays like a true next-gen basketball experience.
“Our priorities [this year] center really around visuals, gameplay and onboarding,” O’Brien said. “We’re going to blow people away with where it was visually and what it looks like visually for 15. So, I’m extremely excited about doing that. And also our progress within gameplay.”
Of course, people also want to know how the main modes of the game will change from last year. And while O’Brien wouldn’t give too much away in terms of what changes are coming to the mode, he did state that the improvements won’t be as drastic as some might expect.
“The reality is that your rising star, your dynasty, your online or your ultimate team experience is heavily influenced by how the game plays and what it looks like,” he said. “So, for us, our focus is around creating a great playing five-on-five game, and having it look amazing.”
The team really wanted to focus on how the game looked, felt and how easy it was to learn. This, O’Brien says, was a direct result of feedback from the players.
Day Three: Behind the NBA Live 15 release date decision
“We’ve got a lot of plans around trial, and how we can get a lot of people a hands on trial of the game,” he said.
Without officially confirming it, O’Brien did hint that a demo for the game will be coming sooner than average demos are released. In most cases, a demo for a game is released two weeks prior to a game’s official launch. With NBA Live 15, it appears as if the company is pushing to get a demo out a bit sooner than that.
That being said, O’Brien isn’t counting his chickens too soon in regards to the response of the game. He knows that there is work to be done, and doesn’t expect people to just come out of the woodwork this year singing the praises on NBA Live based on what’s being said. O’Brien wants to show people how much better the game is.
Day Four: Why so many updates with NBA Live 14?
From visual updates to improved gameplay experiences, NBA Live 14 saw drastic improvement during its lifecycle. One particular improvement was the addition of the practice gym to teach players the controls.
With the series being dormant for so long, fans had no idea how to play the game when they first picked it up for Xbox One or PlayStation 4. In fact, it was so bad that the lack of a practice mode turned fans away from the series completely.
Seeing this, O’Brien’s team worked to add a practice arena in one of the first major updates to prove to fans that they have their best interests in mind. It’s all about being open and transparent for O’Brien and the developers at EA Sports, which is something he feels the fans want to see.
“The intent was to be honest about where we are,” O’Brien said in terms of how the team went about updating the game. “We weren’t trying to really sell what we’re doing. Instead, we’re trying to educate everyone on what our vision was, and what our story is.”
But why so many content updates throughout the year? O’Brien believes that because of what the next-gen PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles allow developers to do in terms of updates, it only makes sense to constantly improve your game based on feedback and maintain relevancy throughout its life cycle.
“Our games are more like experiences, and they’re evolving throughout the course of the year,” he said. “Meaning they’re getting better, they’re adapting to the season and they’re adapting to trends. So, gone are the days where we ship a package good once a year, and maybe update a few things or update rosters.”
Day Five: EA Sports excited about the future of NBA Live
“What impressed me the most is that the people I have working on this game want it to be perfect,” Sean O’Brien said. “They don’t want to be known as those behind a failed franchise. They want to bring it back to what it once was.”
At one point, the NBA Live franchise was the top basketball game on the market. It trumped the sales of the NBA 2k series in the early 2000′s, and really seemed like it would be at the top forever. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen.
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“It proved we weren’t just in it for the money,” O’Brien said. “We could’ve made more revenue had we released on the last-gen systems as well. But we wanted the opportunity to make a great gen-four basketball game that fans will enjoy.”
All in all, O’Brien knows there is still a ways to go to get the NBA Live franchise back to a respectable level for basketball fans. However, he will be the first one to admit that the plans in place for the series has him believing that it’s not a matter of if, but when NBA Live is back at the top of the mountain.
“I’m excited,” O’Brien expressed. “With the people we have and the plan we have, I can’t wait to show fans what we have in store going forward. And not just for ’15, but for NBA Live 16 and beyond.”
