Basketball gets full season with NBA Live 99
by Alan Zisman
(c) 1999. First
published in Toronto Computes,
February
1999
Electronic Arts Sports
NBA Live 99
About $60
www.easports.com
for Windows PC, Playstation, N64
For a while, it was looking like this would be the
year without basketball.
As it is, sports fans get a shortened series, and life without Michael
Jordan.
But all is not lost. There?s always computer games.
And once again,
the best has gotten better. Electronic Arts Sports lets fans play a
full-length
1998-99 series with this year?s version of their best-seller: NBA Live
99, for Windows PCs, and Playstation, and N-64 game systems.
In many ways, the game looks and works like last
years??it will be instantly
familiar to players of previous versions.
As always, the teams, uniforms, and rosters have been
updated. This
year?s version offers improved animation and game play?new moves, and
facial
expressions. Fans will find many of their favorite players are
recognizable,
and that they look happy or sad depending on how that big play comes
out.
The game offers a range of modes. New this year (and
also featured in
the company?s NHL 99 game) is a practice mode?a good way to hone
skills.
No crowd, no competition, just you and the player of your choice
building
skills. Alternatively, there?s an arcade mode offering wild non-stop
action,
with fast setup, and a sense of anything goes, though the game still
lacks
NBA Jam?s flaming basketballs.
Of course, you can follow your team through a season,
but for the patient
amongst you, you can also build a team over a decade of seasons. Watch
young players mature and mature players age. Trade with other teams to
build a winning combination. You can even start completely from
scratch?creating
a new team from the expansion draft and taking ten years to try to
season
it into championship material. (Toronto and Vancouver fans have the
chance
to improve on the local efforts this way). You can short-circuit time
by
playing less-than 82-game seasons, and adjust game time from two to
twelve
minutes per quarter in order to speed up dynasty-building.
While the game offers great gameplay combined with
cutting edge looks,
PC-users should be warned: the game was released with a bug requiring
users
to be connected to the Internet in order to start the game. The fix is
to go to the game?s NBA99 folder, and find the file nba99.ini.
Double-clicking
it opens the file in Windows Notepad?look for a line with the word:
?tickerspeed?
and set it to 0.
As well, the NBA lockout made it impossible for EA to
include rookies
in this year?s rosters?the company has promised downloadable team
updates.
And even if Michael Jordan hadn?t retired, he has kept his player out
of
the virtual game. (Hacks on the Internet let users add him anyway).
All in all, this year?s version remains another of EA
Sports? champions?lots
of fun to play alone, against another player, or across a network or
the
Internet. And it?s a way to play all those games lost due to the
lockout.