This is because EA have delayed "not yet ready" NBA Elite 11, which will introduce "several breakthrough features" not seen in the basketball genre.
October 8th was the intended release date for the major NBA game but EA Sports has scrubbed that plan, and is yet to reveal a new time frame. "This year, we set extremely ambitious goals for our new franchise, NBA ELITE," blogged Peter Moore.
"We are creating a game that will introduce several breakthrough features that have been missing from the basketball genre. Unfortunately, NBA ELITE 11 is not yet ready and we have made a decision to delay next month’s launch. We are going to keep working until we’re certain we can deliver a breakthrough basketball experience."
NBA Jam will retail for Nintendo Wii October 5th as planned with XBLA and PSN versions due "in time for the holidays." EA Sports is offering an apology to NBA LIVE 10 players by giving them free content and services "throughout the 2010-11 season," he said.
"We will also provide free Dynamic DNA updates, daily, for the entire season. That’s a full season of basketball with new rosters and updates, free."
"The decision to delay NBA ELITE was hard because the game has great promise. But ultimately we feel this is the right thing to do. We’ve been making steady progress on basketball for the past few years and it’s going to take extra time to make the game."
There you have it - no NBA Elite 11 is likely to arrive this year because of all that pent up ambition brewing over at the studio. At least NBA Jam is next-gen bound.
