NBA Live 06 E3 2005 Preshow Impressions

Among other sports games, EA Sports' Xbox 360 demo movie showed the next entry in the publisher's long-running hoops series, NBA Live 06. Like most of the footage shown in the quick-moving demo, it's tough to get a feel for what exactly is new in the game beyond some truly extraordinary-looking graphics.

The demo opens up with an expansive shot of the interior of Key Arena, home to the Seattle Supersonics. The scene switches to a Sonics-Pistons matchup, which is followed by a couple of close angles that show the Sonics playing some possession ball on the Detroit end of the floor. This culminates in a nice Ray Allen dunk, as shown from above the net. Just as in the other EA demos, all the players in NBA Live 06 moved with a fluidity that really looked nice (much better, say, than the smoke effects in the brief glimpse of The Godfather game in the same clip).

Perhaps even more impressive than the game in motion, however, was a close-up shot of Allen shown later in the demo movie. Comparing photos of the bald-headed shooting guard to his in-game doppleganger, you'd be hard pressed to tell much of a diffference between the two...except maybe in the depiction of the eyes, a notoriously difficult part of the anatomy to capture in game graphics. A close-up of Allen's chest in the demo showed intricate highlighting effects on his skin. So even the ripple of muscle on his shoulders was quite clearly visible.

We don't expect to see NBA Live 06 in playable form at E3, as it wasn't on the list of EA Sports games to be shown this week. Don't fret, however, as we'll have plenty of coverage on the game in the coming months.