The change was teased on the franchise's Facebook page earlier this week and was confirmed to Official Xbox Magazine, as well as Kotaku, recently. In a statement to Kotaku, EA Sports touched on what is to come and why the change: "We knew it was time to leave the past behind. We have exciting and significant changes coming to our NBA game this year that will usher in the future of basketball videogames," a rep said. "We look forward to releasing information on exactly how we'll be doing that over the next few months."
The Elite series will kick off with NBA Elite 11--a basketball game that will, apparently, "usher in the future of basketball videogames." I'll be wearing my special mind-blow-protector-hat-thing in preparation for the game's reveal. Hopefully, that'll be at E3. (It tends to chafe.)