Irridium:
snicker

CardinalPiggles:
snack

goes the vorpal blade!

Anyway, be careful what you wish for, remember their earlier boasting that they have not green lit a single core game that is single player focused.

Just think on that for a few minutes, and what that would mean for a Mirrors Edge 2.

On the bright side, this means they might not be buying out any other studios soon.

Sight Unseen:

They should have known Warfighter would fail when the last medal of honour failed. It was a stupid risk imo to pump so much money into a tired IP that has drastically waned in popularity and relevance in recent years.

Umm the last medal of honor game did not fail.

"2010's Medal of Honor title, which sold over 2 million units in its first two weeks"

Selling two million in the first two weeks is not a failure.

FelixG:

Irridium:
snicker

CardinalPiggles:
snack

goes the vorpal blade!

Anyway, be careful what you wish for, remember their earlier boasting that they have not green lit a single core game that is single player focused.

Just think on that for a few minutes, and what that would mean for a Mirrors Edge 2.

I thought they said they haven't greenlit anything without a multiplayer component? And Mirrors Edge had competitive leaderboards. How hard would it be to add real time parkour races like driving games?

CardinalPiggles:

FelixG:

Irridium:
snicker

CardinalPiggles:
snack

goes the vorpal blade!

Anyway, be careful what you wish for, remember their earlier boasting that they have not green lit a single core game that is single player focused.

Just think on that for a few minutes, and what that would mean for a Mirrors Edge 2.

I thought they said they haven't greenlit anything without a multiplayer component? And Mirrors Edge had competitive leaderboards. How hard would it be to add real time parkour races like driving games?

It wouldn't be like that. It would just be first person shooting in gritty brown enviroments with one said as the all-american heroes and the others side as the evil Nazis/Russians/Arabs. The parkour with be shoved to the side at best. And they'd have a completly broken unlock system that meant everyone would just use the one gun once they hit a ceartain level and anyone not using that one set would die instantly. Just like every other multiplayer FPS made by the big publishers. I don't want Mirrors Edge 2, because I love the first one and I don't want EA to screw it up with a godawful sequel.

So EA just plans on milking every last dime from current franchises instead of coming up with new ones.

This is hardly a prediction more like an observation..............

Thoric485:
On the bright side, this means they might not be buying out any other studios soon.

No no, I'm pretty sure they consider buying studios and milking their already establish franchises into the ground, instead of coming up with their own part of there business model.

Oh you off EA? Well see you later, I'd like to say it was a pleasure knowing you but my mother raised me not to lie.

Or make good worth while games......

*shrugs*

EA makes MAYBE 1 game every 4 years i give more then a second glance. this pretty much ensures i won't even see that 1 i guess

Gearhead mk2:

CardinalPiggles:

FelixG:

goes the vorpal blade!

Anyway, be careful what you wish for, remember their earlier boasting that they have not green lit a single core game that is single player focused.

Just think on that for a few minutes, and what that would mean for a Mirrors Edge 2.

I thought they said they haven't greenlit anything without a multiplayer component? And Mirrors Edge had competitive leaderboards. How hard would it be to add real time parkour races like driving games?

It wouldn't be like that. It would just be first person shooting in gritty brown enviroments with one said as the all-american heroes and the others side as the evil Nazis/Russians/Arabs. The parkour with be shoved to the side at best. And they'd have a completly broken unlock system that meant everyone would just use the one gun once they hit a ceartain level and anyone not using that one set would die instantly. Just like every other multiplayer FPS made by the big publishers. I don't want Mirrors Edge 2, because I love the first one and I don't want EA to screw it up with a godawful sequel.

You need to have a bit more faith ;)

Little Gray:

Sight Unseen:

They should have known Warfighter would fail when the last medal of honour failed. It was a stupid risk imo to pump so much money into a tired IP that has drastically waned in popularity and relevance in recent years.

Umm the last medal of honor game did not fail.

"2010's Medal of Honor title, which sold over 2 million units in its first two weeks"

Selling two million in the first two weeks is not a failure.

Inaccuracy of the original post aside, a game with a big enough budget can be a failure even if it sells 2 or 3 million copies. The marketing and promotion for Warfighter was terrible - it just made the game out to be more of the same as the first.

I've said this before and I'll say it again - EA should hire me to do their PR for them, because they do an abhorrent job of trying to do it themselves. Every week has another oft-criticized statement from one EA exec or another, and the only thing they seem to know how to do is lash out against fan campaigns and try to shut people up at conventions. Telling your hardcore base that you don't care about new IP's is a foolish thing to say.

crazyrabbits:

Inaccuracy of the original post aside, a game with a big enough budget can be a failure even if it sells 2 or 3 million copies. The marketing and promotion for Warfighter was terrible - it just made the game out to be more of the same as the first.

I've said this before and I'll say it again - EA should hire me to do their PR for them, because they do an abhorrent job of trying to do it themselves. Every week has another oft-criticized statement from one EA exec or another, and the only thing they seem to know how to do is lash out against fan campaigns and try to shut people up at conventions. Telling your hardcore base that you don't care about new IP's is a foolish thing to say.

They did what to fans? I am honestly asking, I can't get enough of EA's stupidity and haven't heard about them attacking their fans directly, (for what, campaigning for or against them?) or attacking them at conventions. No need for links, just tell me enough for me to google it, if you can ;D.

Well my hopeful side reads this and considers that maybe, just maybe, EA will stop buying quality gaming companies that do make risky bigger budget projects and turning them to shit.

Ronack:
I quite understand that they are in a business of making money, but ... why go further away from the direction that the gaming consumers want? That just doesn't make a lick of sense. They really need to stop saying what they want us to want to have. What we want is new I.P.'s that are innovative, inventive and tons of fun. The reason why Warfighter failed to produce is because it's a horribly, horribly mediocre game because of the fact that it doesn't even bother to try and be innovative, inventive or fun.

"big brands + big marketing budget + high production values = $$$" may have "finally run its course in the core space." Going forward, Levy believes, EA will focus on smaller games that will provide a bigger return on the publisher's investment. "As far as I can tell from publicly facing information, creating innovative, new IPs just isn't a priority for the organization."

That entire statement is them telling us that they are lousy at blockbuster games and just want to become Zynga 2.0.

I sincerely hope that this means they will never buy another developer, as they will surely ground them deeper in to the ground than they usually do anyways.

EA, challenge common sense.

EA can't afford the skyrocketing dev costs for next gen, shich is expected to be 120-150 million.

Keep in mind GTA IV spent 100 mill and got its money back because its popular. Not all AAA games can pull that off.

Ultratwinkie:

Ronack:
-snip-

EA can't afford the skyrocketing dev costs for next gen, which is expected to be 120-150 million.

Keep in mind GTA IV spent 100 mill and got its money back because its popular. Not all AAA games can pull that off.

EA might have more funds to finance a $150 million game if they didn't insist on spend literally $100 million purely to market the things!
http://bf3blog.com/2011/04/battlefield-3-launching-this-november-with-a-100-million-ad-campaign/
I know raising awareness is important, but spending the same amount on adverts as you do on creating the game in the first place is beyond ludicrous.

Sight Unseen:
Am I the only one who was terribly confused by this article when they seemingly referred to Warfighter as a big budget new IP that failed and this Simpsons game which I had never heard of, but is seemingly a "new" idea (although the simpsons IP isn't new, this game might be a new type of game we haven't seen before) as a successful franchise?

And then they said from this logic that EA should avoid making new IP?

It was the big budget long standing (mediocre) IP that failed, and the new game that nobody had done before that was successful... EA why you no logic?

EA has horrible logic, in fact their advertising slogan should be:

Electronic Arts: Failing logic forever since 1982

mykalwane:
What I find the most interesting of this article is Mirror's Edge and Brutal Legend,these are the examples of quote unsuccessful games. Well these is the games I bought(new), while I didn't buy Dead Space and Dragon Age. Guess they don't want me as a customer then.

That the case to the rest of you?

both games made a loss and therefore were unsucesful. while i didnt like mirrors edge and havent played the other one, i am usually in the same situation - my favorite games are ones that arent making money.

What a genius that employee is. EA shifting it's focus from high-risk, big-budget games? I WOULD NEVER HAVE GUESSED.

...how is this even news.

Actually no, I'm disturbed that EA thought it was taking chances with new IPs before.

still afraid to change and make the smart thing.
well, im actually still waiting for mirrors edge 2. part 1 its still one of my favorite games and i still play it today. even when i swore i will not get a game anymore with a €A logo on it, i still would get my self mirrors edge 2.

Wait a minute, I just had a huge epiphany. We've got it all wrong, completely wrong. We've been assuming all this time that EA is greedy and only loves money. But don't you see? We're completely wrong about EA, they don't love money, they hate it! They're actually desperately trying to get rid of it. That's why they're pumping all their money into these games which are so terrible they have no chance of breaking even. That's why they're putting as much money as they can into graphics, marketing and multiplayer, the three most expensive parts of making a game. Plus, the few good games they did have were making waaaay too much money for them, so they've been doing everything they can to make them unappealing. See? It all makes perfect sense now. Obviously we've been really unfair to poor EA and I think we owe them an apology, they're only trying to get rid of their money.

Why not just make all those interesting, innovative ideas with lower standards, to see how they're received, and then go for the full-blown big-budget gorgeous graphics etc version for the inevitable sequels of those IPs that do garner a significant enough fanbase to warrant it?

Eventually, all the people interested in making real games will bail, go elsewhere or set up shop themselves. It might change where we get our shit from but I can't imagine it'll disappear - people want to make it and people want to play it.

Circle of life, ya dig?

Frankly, if this guy is correct, and I'm dubious as his status as a -FORMER- E.A producer is made abundantly clear, then WOO!
I am so, so, SO sick of E.A games being the trotting out of the same old maggot ridden bloated carcass that vaguely resembles a pony OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER.
If they shunt their focus on big budget titles to favor IOS games that people like me don't even care about, then cool! Less overall impact from E.A on my daily life is a biiiiig plus.

EA:
"big brands + big marketing budget + high production values = $$$"

Pfft, hahahahaha.

Yeah, because that worked out SO well for the TORtanic didn't it?

DoveAlexa:

They did what to fans? I am honestly asking, I can't get enough of EA's stupidity and haven't heard about them attacking their fans directly, (for what, campaigning for or against them?) or attacking them at conventions. No need for links, just tell me enough for me to google it, if you can ;D.

A lot of Mass Effect fans choose to forget (or outright ignore) that EA actively tried to stifle fan campaigns over the past few years. The most recent example was the Child's Play/cupcake donation drive. EA execs were quoted on gaming blogs expressing surprise that fans had the gall to tell them how to write their games, and subsequently used their PR machine to try and discredit said efforts.

They're also on record by various forum users and blogs as outright refusing to allow people to ask questions about the third game's ending and/or the controversy with EA, even months after the backlash died down. Then there's the various Bioware/EA employees who have told fans they just didn't "get" ME3 (up to and including main staff members like Chris Priestly and Ray Muzyka), acting as if it was the fan's fault for criticizing the shoddy writing.

Bioware went the way of the dinosaur months ago - all that's left are a bunch of bones still capable of putting out a product every now and then. This news is nothing surprising to me, because it just validates that they've already gone well past repair. They're only capable of making F2P disasters and sequels to franchises that didn't need more.

Every generation has been met with less and less creativity. Does anyone remember the SNES, where things like Dinosaurs for Hire were a common site? Feels like back then games could be about anything, now it's all either space marines, street thugs, or modern soldiers.

It's all about target markets, and right now large groups of uncreative people are telling the creative people to make uncreative games for uncreative target markets.

This is the story of humanity, and it's subtitled; "Decline".

Id be more inclined to think that they just are not going to come up with new IPs but are still going to go ruin everybody else s...... you know just like normal.

How is this news? EA has been following that trend for several years now.
Meh, whatever. It doesn't matter what EA does, I'm still not buying anything they publish.

It does make sense from EA's financial standpoint.

It's probably not a good direction for gaming, but it's a fairly sound, if depressing, financial plan. I mean, let's face it: As bad, stale, or stagnant a franchise like WoW or Battlefield gets, you know it'll always get at least a good million or so sales with its subsequent release.

The name of the game is money, as depressing as that is.

DVS BSTrD:
Now they're trying to destroy *existing* franchises (cough) Medal of Honor (cough).

What do you mean trying? I'm pretty sure Warfighter has buried the franchise at least for another ten years or so after poor sales ande a dreadful critical response. (I have played it, awful campaign, mediocre multiplayer, not a finished product).