The biggest sneaker endorsement splash by far this summer has been D. Wade’s jumping ship from Converse to Jordan Brand. Sneakerheads, and the like want to know…which Jay’s will he be rocking this upcoming season in the game? Can you share any insight into that?

(Laugh) In the game, right? (Laugh) I think it’s gonna keep changing. When we found out the news, I was talking to my guys at Brand Jordan, and they didn’t even know what he was gonna wear yet. Obviously he’s going to come out with a signature shoe. We don’t know when. We may be able to get in to Live, but…

Ah man, you guys know man, ya’ll know when… (Laugh)

Nah dude, I don’t even know when. I’m talking to the Director of Brand Jordan, and they probably can’t even tell me that stuff.

I’m just messing with you!

We’ll see. But for now we’ve got him wearing “The Jordan Hallowed Ground” and the Jordan Old School IIIs. So, those are the Jordans we have in the game. But, I’ve already seen photos of him wearing a bunch of different Jordans. So, I think it’s one of those things where D. Wade is probably gonna go through a bunch, see which ones feel the best for him. Out of the Jordan’s we have in the game, whichever one he decides, we can actually update that and send out an update online so users can change that. Or they can go in and change it themselves. That’s the great thing about having over 500 sneakers in our game. We have the ability to really change different footwear assignments for all the athletes.

Right…

But yea, I’m excited too man. I’m excited to see what his signature shoe’s gonna look like. I mean, a Chicago boy coming over to Brand Jordan. You can’t even write a story like that. It’s gonna be pretty sick with D. Wade rocking some Jays.

Recently, our staff has been discussing the possibility of potential unlocked players for Live ’10. Any chance you’re integrating Rosa Acosta and the other girls from Drake’s “Best I Ever Had” video?

(Laugh) Ummm…

C’mon man! Ya gotta have them in there!

Yo man, I think that would be sick! But, probably not gonna happen this year. (Laugh) But, that’s a great idea. I’ll keep that one in the pocket for Live 11.

You guys do that for Live 11, then you do a special download of them featuring us!

(Laugh) No doubt, no doubt…

Will we see holiday player exclusive kicks in the game; i.e. last year, Dwight’s Superman TS Commander, LeBron’s Chalk Edition, Rondo’s Nike Blue Chip Low…

 Yup! Yea, we’re gonna definitely have a lot of player exclusives this year. December will probably be one of the first times we release some new downloadable content. In that pack, you’ll get a bunch of new sneakers for these players. A lot of it is player exclusives. Like I said, we work with the brands really closely, and we try to follow whatever their plans are. For instance, when LeBron goes through his mid-season change up, we have that colorway ready in the game. We’re gonna be having special colorways for All-Star Weekend. We’re also gonna have special (NBA) Playoffs editions, hopefully Finals (editions) if guys make it out that far. So, we have the ability to support a bunch of different special colorways. We already got some cool LeBron VIIs for the first downloadable content release that isn’t on the shipped game right now. Definitely that is a huge part of it, and we might even have some cool promotions. So be on the lookout for some contests we might be doing where you might be able to get some special shoes in the game.

At times, do you feel compelled to release images of upcoming sneakers prior to their drop date?

 (Laugh) Once in a while, I do feel compelled. It’s definitely hard sometimes to keep that stuff in. Like when you see the LeBron VIIs for the first time, or Kobe Vs. Or you know, you’re picking it up in your hands and you’re feeling it; you’re see the material. You might even slip it on to see how it feels. It’s amazing, right? But, these guys…we trust them with our product, they trust us with theirs. It’s that understanding of making sure we’re really keeping this stuff locked down so it’s released at the right time. Definitely, the little sneakerhead in me would love to go into Nike Talk and just post pics of the new Kobe V. But you know I can’t do that.

Retro Jordans are always a fave for sneaker connoisseurs and bball fans alike. Ever consider implementing the whole Jordan Signature line within the game?

Yea! That’s definitely something for the future. If you remember in “NBA Street Homecourt” we actually did that. So we got all the Jays from the Is, all the way to…I want to say XXIII at the time if I remember right. But, we did that on a game already! So this year it was more about player exclusives, and we will have a few Jordan retroes. But, I think looking ahead you might see some cool things around Brand Jordan. Especially with the anniversary coming up, right…

Right…the 25th. What about Penny Foams?

Penny Foams…you know we had those back in NBA Live 2004. They’re not going to be in the game this year. But, they may make a comeback! I’m really pushing to see if, maybe we even get the whole Penny line man; I through IV, plus the Foams. That might be something we do next time. But, for year one, it’s really more about the on-court player exclusives stuff. I mean, who knows!? Say we get Legends next year. That could be the year we throw a bunch of the retro kicks in, right? It might make more sense to tie that all in together. But, I think people will have more than enough to choose from this year. And we kept a lot of the shoes around that have been in the game. So we still have the (Jordan) XIVs in, we still have some of the (Jordan) XIIs. There’s a bunch of retro kicks still in there that’ll satisfy the retro heads as well.

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