EA Buys Peggle Creator PopCap Games

[Frotality]

good. maybe EA will stop trying to turn all its games into peggle-esque simplistic crack now that it actually owns peggle.

 

[Nenad]

"EA Buys Peggle Creator PopCap Games"
No. No,no,no,no. "Plants and Zombies Creator", much better.

On topic: I'm staying positive as always, hope they'll be making (even) better games from now on.
EDIT: The open letter is awesome, Popcap rocks!

 

[Chibz]

Hey look. A large and evil corporation bought a more different poison in gaming.

And not a fuck was given that day.

 

[Delock]

Better than Activision, Ubisoft, or Capcom picking it up. As long as we're not talking about the EA that was going through restructuring after the change of leadership where the new boss had to pull all those merging developers in order to keep the company alive then I'm completely fine with this. Sure EA still has a bit of a DLC problem and EA Sports is still alive, but they seem to at least treat their dev teams right and there's no better publisher when it comes to advertising (if EA wants you to know of a game, you WILL hear about it).

Also, I'm surprised with how many people are "mourning" PopCap. Didn't people hate them not too long ago for making only casual games?

 

[Chappy]

Is it unrealistic of me to hope this means EA can release great games more frequently now that they have PopCap because of the extra money coming in and more recruitment avenues for people new to developing.

You know hire new people into Popcap, then form them into teams and make new or update current studios when they have some more experience working for EA?

Or is this just anouther cash cow for them?

 

[Rainforce]

WHAT......


NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
*standard links to youtube [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tim5nU3DwIE] and tvtropes [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BigNo]*

Life isn't fair :'(
everybody knows they will ruin it. DX

 

[Jin-Roh]

EA, ... @$$holes. So let the sucking start form popcap to ea of every thing good be lost. Need I just ref this show and call it a day. link [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/2794-An-Open-Letter-to-EA-Marketing]

 

[Cenequus]

My apologies I seemed to have replied to just another blind fanboy. Keep sleeping while the world moves on.

No, it was a serious question. The way you're talking about PopCap makes it sound like you think they're some sort of Social developer, when that couldn't be further from the truth. The only difference between 'hardcore' games and theirs is the difficulty.

So, have you played a PopCap game? You seemed to neatly avoid answering that. Never a good sign.

That's not what I was saying. I was saying that PopCap was gonna go this route no matter the deal with EA. EA is just a shocut for them to do that. Source? where i took 2 minutes and actually read the article: "Likewise, PopCap CEO David Roberts lauds the decision, saying, "We picked EA because they have recast their culture around making great digital games. By working with EA, we'll scale our games and services to deliver more social, mobile, casual fun to an even bigger, global audience."

 

[pppppppppppppppppp]

A year from now:

"EA has decided to close Popcap's doors after poor commercial and critical reception of "Bookworm 2: Crusade for a Vowel: Bloodbath Editon: Director's Cut"

 

[boag]

The Apocalypse grows closer.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

Spoiler: We picked EA because they have recast their culture around making great digital games. By working with EA, we'll scale our games and services to deliver more social, mobile, casual fun to an even bigger, global audience.

Yeah, EA's culture really did wonders for BioWare.

That's exactly what I was thinking.
Great, now they can add aspects of CoD to Plants vs Zombies, Bejeweled, and Peggle. ¬_¬

 

[MarsProbe]

But seriously, let's just wait and see what happens. As an aside, is there any chance we could have the "Thriller" zombie back now please? Disco zombie is lame, and makes no sense.

No, we can't. The whole reason we lost Thriller Zombie is because the Jackson estate(his parents), decided that since they weren't getting money out of it it was degrading...and they weren't getting money out of it so they threatened to sue to have it removed and now it's gone forever. Sorry.

Yeh, I heard that. I was just throwing the concept out there anyway. It seems a lot of stuff caught up with the Plants vs Zombies eventually. Note the little disclaimer we now get attached to the almanac description for the Zomboni zombie. Funnily enough, I never even knew that zombie was riffing on anything in particular until they put that disclaimer in there.

 

[Stryc9]

I actually wasn't aware of that one until I just looked at it. I haven't touched Plants vs. Zombies in quite a while because I pretty well wore it out when I got it for my DS, which has the stupid disco zombie instead of the Thriller zombie by the way.

As far as the actual topic, which I failed to comment on last time, I'm just gonna say that I've got a skeptical eye on this because I've seen what EA does to companies that they basically consume in this manner. I'm hoping that they don't let PopCap just make a couple of more games then disband them and redistribute the talent to other parts of the company.

 

[Chibz]

Hey, what've you got against PopCa- oh, right, casual automatically equals evil, nvm.

Actually, most of their games are trash regardless. But they're more... a minor poison. That causes numbness. The real threats include the app store and zynga. Those are the real deal threats to gaming.

 

[-Dragmire-]

I wonder if anyone has copywritten Poptronic Arts... I'd respect EA more if they changed their name to this.

 

[Chibz]

Are you being serious?

What other games do you consider to be killing the industry? This'll be fun...

Farmville, Mafia Wars, etc. Pretty much Zynga makes. I'd also argue that not only are zynga games harmful to gaming, they're harmful to the player.

 

[Chibz]

I guess that's arguable, but what why PopCap?

I see them as a slightly less evil sibling of Zynga. I don't hate them nearly as much as Zynga, some of their games are alright. But it's the same loathesome business model.

 

[Chibz]

How are they similar exactly? They make games that would appeal to the same audiences, but the similarities pretty much end there. I really don't see how they can be compared further than that.

@Popcap & Zynga
Die monster, you don't belong in this world!

It was not by my hand that I was once again given flesh. I was summoned here by humans, who wish to pay me tribute.

Tribute?! You steal men's souls and make them your slaves!

Perhaps the same could be said of all religions...

Your words are as empty as your soul. Mankind ill needs a saviour such as you!

What is a man? [tosses a goblet to the floor which breaks] A miserable little pile of secrets! But enough talk! Have at you!

Spoiler: Coherent version most people would understand

Like Zynga, their business model is built around addiction. And like Activision, they release pointless sequels. Peggle 2? Honestly? Plus their games cheapen the video game industry as a whole.

 

[Chibz]

So... I guess that's it. I've said my piece. Take it or leave it.

Edit: Although I would be interested to see what you mean by 'cheapen the industry as a whole', if you want to continue the discussion.

It... is more possible that I'm mixing them with a zynga-clone company. Also, glad you enjoyed that little bit.

By cheapening the industry, I'm referring more to games like Peggle that have little to no artistic merit. But usually I accuse the app store of doing this (Thanks Apple).

The App Store: Pretty much a collection of throw-away $2 games that you play for 15 minutes and forget about. It's why I can't take the iphone/ipod seriously as gaming devices. Apple CEO even bragged (although not in direct words) about the amount of cheap, garbage software & shovelware on it. As if it were a bragging point.