She's In The Game: Create Female Basketball Players in NBA Live 2019

With the constant surge in the number of female fans of basketball and video games, it was about time some video game developer provided the option of creating female players. For all the women gamers who are sick of creating male avatars of themselves, Electronic Arts’ EA Sports division has announced that the gamers will now have an option of creating female players as well. The female create-a-player comes right on the heels of WNBA players and teams being introduced in NBA Live 2018.
While this development might sound radical, it isn’t actually some kind of uncharted territory for EA Sports. They have had the option to create female players in their UFC series of games. Which makes total sense because a lot of female UFC fighters are as (if not more) popular as the male fighters. Former stars such as Gina Carano and Ronda Rousey have also gone on to have successful careers in showbiz, post retirement from the UFC. They have also become icons for female strength and motivated many women to learn Mixed Martial Arts. So launching a female create-a-player mode for the UFC game first, might have been the right move. However, the fact that the NHL series of games got a female create-a-player option before the NBA series is baffling. The National Women’s Hockey League (NWHL) started in 2015 and only has five teams on it. The WNBA on the other hand started in 1996 and has 12 teams. WNBA legends like Lisa Leslie, Sue Bird, Candace Parker and Diana Taurasi are almost household names.
Better late than never though. Basketball is a sport which is very popular among women and it’s about time they received some inclusivity on the video game platform as well. Not only does this game increase female representation in the eSports world, it will also allow women to insert themselves into the game in the same way that men have done for years now.
This move will also allow EA Sports’ NBA Live to close the gap between itself and runaway segment leader 2K Sports’ NBA 2K series of games. For almost 10 years now, NBA Live hasn’t even come close to sniffing the lofty success levels of the NBA 2K franchise. Based on how great NBA 2K19 looks, NBA Live might still be far behind. However, adding a female create-a-player option helps add a very unique aspect to NBA Live. This is bound to entice the female audience and add a completely new customer demographic. If for nothing else, female gamers will definitely buy NBA Live 19 to see how the female create-a-player option actually works.
The game is set for a September 7th release for Playstation and XBox One, four days before NBA 2K19 comes out for everyone. EA Sports’ producer of the game, Mike Mahar had this to say about the latest feature of NBA Live: “We wanted to make sure that our females were on the same footing as the males. They can play online in our head-to-head circuits, as well as in Pro-Am.”

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