Electronic Arts: Video games firm wants to stop being 'hated'

[Dakota Bob]

Alternate title: they seriously fucking charged 12 quid for an armor DLC pack for Dead Space 3?

Also, great quote at the end:

"Can a computer make you cry?" It's 30 years since video games giant Electronic Arts ran an advert asking that question, adding that it believed the medium had the potential to "bring people's thoughts and feelings closer together".

As the interview ends, there's time for one last question: Will EA deliver on its promise and make us sob for the right reasons?

"I think we're right about there," he says.

"Certainly the Mass Effect 3 ending caused a few people to cry, so I think we achieved some level of emotional impact towards the end of the last cycle. And as you look at the fidelity of experience on generation four, 'Can a console make you cry?' is going to be possible over the next several years."

[ThunderWulf]

*facepalm*

Wow.  It's like they're not even TRYING to hide that they're evil anymore.

EDIT:  3000th post!  Woot!! ^_^

[Art Vandelay]

They can stop being hated when they stop this anti-consumer bullshit that they do. Stop putting microtransactions into single player games, don't try calling always on DRM an "MMO" and think you can actually get away with it and just treat your customers with a modicum of respect. It's really not rocket science. After all, Activision managed to figure it out, did they not?

[chitoryu12]

"Mass Effect 3 is emotional!" doesn't mean shit when you didn't even make Mass Effect 3. That's on Bioware, not EA. The majority of EA's business comes from publishing and buying out smaller companies, not making legitimately good games themselves. They're no more responsible for the emotional impact of any of the games they published than Microsoft is for making the console it's played on.

[mellenORL]

Buy up all the talented development companies. All of them. Every last fucking one. By making offers they cannot refuse. Then, gouge back your investment capital by nickel and diming your customers. On everything. All the time. And while you're at it, use a tactic from the music industry playbook and dumb down every game franchise until it bleeds shit. The same shit. The same plot. The same tired tropes. Lowest common denominator across the board. Over and over, in every game. I miss anything, dudebro?

[Stormwarden]

I do like a few of their games: Dragon  Age: Origins and Brutal Legend, but I buy them used for several reasons. But primarily because EA has a bad tendency to be such idiots when it comes how they handle so many of their games (I'M TALKING TO YOU, MASS EFFECT 3, and oh yeah, all those yearly sports games). They don't bother continuing with what they get right (Dragon Age 2 is a LETDOWN), just screw it up.

[chitoryu12]

I do like a few of their games: Dragon  Age: Origins and Brutal Legend, but I buy them used for several reasons. But primarily because EA has a bad tendency to be such idiots when it comes how they handle so many of their games (I'M TALKING TO YOU, MASS EFFECT 3, and oh yeah, all those yearly sports games). They don't bother continuing with what they get right (Dragon Age 2 is a LETDOWN), just screw it up.

Dragon Age was made by BioWare Edmonton, with the console ports by Edge of Reality.

Brutal Legend was made by Double Fine.

Almost every game under the EA label was either only published by them or was made by a smaller studio that they later bought out. In some cases, they only bought the studio to take advantage of its IPs. The only development studios actually founded by EA have been EA Montreal (Army of Two, plus a few sports games and some minor stuff like Boogie Superstar), Europe Integration Studios (which exclusively does localization of games), and Visceral Games (Dead Space, The Godfather games, and a few James Bond games in the PS2/Xbox generation). The vast majority of EA's output even today is their sports games.

[RavynousHunter]

EA made Ascension shit and killed Westwood.  No, I'm not lettin it go.

Also...how's it "an offer you can't refuse?"  From what I recall, Godfather rules don't work so well when applied to companies; you can refuse any fucking offer you want.  I would, doubly so if it were an offer made by EA or Activision.

[chitoryu12]

Not to mention that at least 10 years ago, they had mandatory hours (not "crunch time" hours or overtime hours) of 9:00 AM to 10:00 PM seven days a week. If you were lucky, you'd get off occasionally on Saturday at 6:30 PM for "good behavior."

[mellenORL]

The original meaning of an offer you can't refuse is that it is so huge, it's hard to turn down. Sorry, but I didn't think about the mob slang. If your production company has gotten large enough, chances are you are selling shares on the market, since after all, video game production needs plenty of capital. EA can buy enough of the company's stock to wedge control of the board.

[agentCDE]

Speaking to the BBC, Frank Gibeau, EA's president of labels, acknowledges his firm has an image problem. "That type of feedback is disappointing personally for people inside of EA because we love our company and the games that we make," he says.

"Gee, I don't know what the hell people are talking about when they say they hate me for my huge ego! I love me!"

[erictheblue]

Stop putting microtransactions into single player games,

Gearbox charges a small amount for additional heads in Borderlands 2. Are they evil?

(Yes, I know BL2 can be played MP, but it has a SP campaign that allows you to enjoy everything in the game.)

[Art Vandelay]

Stop putting microtransactions into single player games,

Gearbox charges a small amount for additional heads in Borderlands 2. Are they evil?

(Yes, I know BL2 can be played MP, but it has a SP campaign that allows you to enjoy everything in the game.)

I wouldn't call anything outside of a fantasy story "evil", but I don't exactly approve of such shenanigans.

Remember when single players games had cheats that didn't cost any real money? That was kind of cool...

[RavynousHunter]

The original meaning of an offer you can't refuse is that it is so huge, it's hard to turn down. Sorry, but I didn't think about the mob slang. If your production company has gotten large enough, chances are you are selling shares on the market, since after all, video game production needs plenty of capital. EA can buy enough of the company's stock to wedge control of the board.

The latter is somethin I don't quite get, either.  I mean...selling stock in your company is optional, isn't it?

[chitoryu12]

The original meaning of an offer you can't refuse is that it is so huge, it's hard to turn down. Sorry, but I didn't think about the mob slang. If your production company has gotten large enough, chances are you are selling shares on the market, since after all, video game production needs plenty of capital. EA can buy enough of the company's stock to wedge control of the board.

The latter is somethin I don't quite get, either.  I mean...selling stock in your company is optional, isn't it?

If the stock is put on the market, anyone can buy it. Which means that if a company has enough cash, they can use the stock market as a way to quickly gain shareholder's influence.