I want to say that EA’s NBA Live franchise has been a proper contender to Take-Two Interactive’s NBA 2K franchise similar to the dynamic between games like FIFA and PES. However, NBA Live has never performed all that well in both critical reception and sales.

It’s highly likely that the history of poor performance is why EA has decided to pull the plug on NBA Live 20. According to a report by Polygon, EA chief executive Andrew Wilson spoke to the company’s investors earlier this week and informed them that they won’t be making an NBA Live game for this season to focus on what can be done with next-gen consoles.

“We’re not launching a new NBA Live HD product this season. Instead, we’re expanding our vision, leaning hard into the new leading-edge platforms, and taking time to ensure we deliver against the opportunity for our players.”

– Andrew Wilson, EA chief executive.

NBA Live 20 was initially planned to be released in the second fiscal quarter of 2019 and then delayed to the third fiscal quarter of the year which is between 1 October and 31 December 2019. In other words, this news of cancellation comes at the very last minute after being delayed before the game even had a specific release date.

This is the fourth time that EA has shut down an NBA Live game from a home console release within this decade. NBA Live 11 was mobile-only, NBA Live 12 never came to be due to a change in development studios, NBA Live 13 was cancelled, and 2017’s NBA Live Mobile was… well, mobile only.

Without a serious competitor, NBA 2K will continue to monopolise the basketball games market. It’s quite disappointing because it means that basketball games fans just have to accept whatever issues the NBA 2K games have. It’s also worth noting that NBA Live 18 was the first basketball games to feature a full WNBA roster, something that has never been done by the NBA 2K series.

Hopefully this all means that EA is focused on making a great entry in the form of NBA Live 21.