EA Chief: Recession Is A "Blessing For The Game Industry"

[Estarc]

You know, it is actually rather irrelevant - the recession, that is. The days when small, independent companies produced wonder games are dying - next generation graphics are just too damned expensive. So we, the gamers, killed games ourselves by constantly demanding better graphics.

 

[SimuLord]

The funny thing is Riccitiello is correct - this recession will eliminate a lot of riffraff like, oh, I don't know, companies that cling to traditional design and distribution models hostile to their partner developers and carrying massive amounts of overhead like, oh, say, EA.

I'll say it for the over nine thousandth time: The big winners in this upcoming industry shakeout will be Valve, Stardock, and Paradox Interactive, and any company wise enough to use Steam/Impulse/GamersGate as their distribution platforms rather than signing the rights away to a publisher like EA or Ubisoft. The fact that I can get Empire: Total War off of Steam, preload it, and be playing on release day in less time than the 2 hours (counting install time and authentication and such) it would take for me to walk to Best Buy, buy the game, and go home...the future is here and I quite like it.

You know, it is actually rather irrelevant - the recession, that is. The days when small, independent companies produced wonder games are dying - next generation graphics are just too damned expensive. So we, the gamers, killed games ourselves by constantly demanding better graphics.

Mount & Blade, the enhanced editions of Children of the Nile and The Witcher, and Hearts of Iron 3 would like a word with you.