This week we head to the States to take part in the NBA series with the top teams in NBA Live 2003 from those guys at EA Sports.

Overview:

Well for any sports gamers out there, here’s your third EA Sports game in three weeks. This week it’s NBA Live 2003. To be honest I only played one of the NBA games prior to this so as far as comparing it to the previous ones. Maybe that's because I’m not that much of a basketball fan, but the game is, actually a quite enjoyable one even for a non-basketball fan.

It’s the new NBA game so it has all the updates from the last NBA season, i.e. teams, players, commentary etc. Pick your favourite team from the NBA series, get them out on court to play and head for the ultimate goal – the NBA title.

The Game:

The game is really easy to navigate with no over complicated but very nice looking set-up screens. It’s as easy as one - two - three (I love cliché’s). But seriously they are self-explanatory. The hardest part for me was trying to decide on a team to play with.

Once you get through it go straight to the court for your game. The courts have been improved very well in relation to the spectators, flags, banners and lighting. It’s all very professional and definitely a brownie point for the game because it’s adds so much atmosphere to the game. The camera work is also very good and resembles the usual TV footage with it following the players out onto the court. It’s like a televised match, only you’re taking part.

Anyway enough of the cosmetics and down to gameplay. It took me a while to get used to but that’s because I haven’t played the others ones so I didn’t know the configurations that well. Once into the swing of it, it’s very good. Whatever team is attacking always plays towards the top of the screen. So when the ball changes hands that sweet little camera gets to work and pans around the arena. Except for the fact that I couldn’t get the hang of changing direction in the middle of the game, to start defending it works really well and it’s gives a better perspective of what’s happening at the basket that’s in focus.