Electronic Arts will not release NBA Elite 11, the company revealed during an earnings call Tuesday.
This comes just a month after EA Sports announced an indefinite delay on the basketball game, which would have been the first in the rebranded Elite franchise. Elite, which was to succeed the company's NBA Live basketball brand, will now be developed by the Florida-based Tiburon studio. Tiburon has found success in previous sports franchises, having worked on the popular Madden NFL since 1994.
"We set ambitious quality goals for NBA Elite, but the game is not ready," EA Sports vice president of communication David Tinson said in an e-mail to Wired.com. "Moving products to new studios is a normal part of reinventing a franchise and we’re confident that shifting development of the product to Tiburon puts us in a better position for the future."
This is all dismal news for NBA Elite 11 developer EA Canada, which suffered massive layoffs last week.
According to Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter, although NBA Elite 11 would have moved an estimated 1 million copies, Madden NFL 11 and FIFA 11 have performed well enough to offset much of the losses.
Image courtesy EA Sports
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