EA Games Chief: "We Are on the Offense," Working on Mirror's Edge 2

Greg Tito

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Sep 29, 2005
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EA Games Chief: "We Are on the Offense," Working on Mirror's Edge 2



Frank Gibeau, chief of EA Games, said that the company has been aggressively rebranding itself the last few years.

When EA was founded by Trip Hawkins in 1982, it soon grew into a respected company exploring the burgeoning videogame medium. Over the last few decades, Electronic Arts grew into a publishing giant that owns developers that make games instead of making games itself. It seemed that EA of the Oughts was more interested in flooding the market with shovelware than really good games. The reputation it enjoyed in the 80s had vanished, and pundits within and without the industry continue to ask EA [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/2794-An-Open-Letter-to-EA-Marketing] to respect its fans and its videogames again. Frank Gibeau thinks that EA's attempts to positively rebrand itself have been successful by the way it holds up the culture of each developer within its umbrella. Oh, and they are working on a sequel to Mirror's Edge, for what it's worth.

"We've been in existence for 28 years, been on top, been challenged and are coming back, we're on the offense," Gibeau said. "Regaining your reputation starts at a creator level, customers and fans."

Gibeau said that the problem was that each studio EA owned started to feel homogenized. "One of the things I learned at EA when we were great and at the top of our game was each of the studios that were creating games had their own unique culture," he said. "So we purposefully blew the place up and the concept that we created was 'city states', which mean you had creative independence and autonomy to build a product."

He went on: "DICE is very different than BioWare, which is different from Visceral, which is different to Danger Close. Giving them the opportunity to create their identities, invest in their cultures and come into work - if you like coming into work you like building what you're building - fundamentally that was the key dynamic.

"A stupidly simple idea," Gibeau admitted in retrospect.

Well, what about the rumor that he killed a sequel to the fan favorite Mirror's Edge. "We're just trying to figure out how to bring Mirror's Edge back and in what way, that's part of the creative development process. I know there were some stories about how EA killed Mirror's Edge. I'm the guy that greenlights the games, I didn't kill it," Gibeau said.

"We're actively working on ideas in the Mirror's Edge universe; we just haven't locked on a way to bring it back so that fans will be excited and at the same time we get to a bigger audience. That's god's honest truth," he swore.

Given the other stuff Gibeau was saying, I'm not sure if I buy it. What do you guys think?

Source: Edge [http://www.next-gen.biz/features/frank-gibeau-interview?page=0%2C1]


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Fiz_The_Toaster

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Stop teasing that sequel damnit!

Unless I see hard proof of that sequel's existence, I'm gonna take what he says with truck loads of salt.
 

Woodsey

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Aug 9, 2009
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"Given the other stuff Gibeau was saying, I'm not sure if I buy it. What do you guys think?"

Why? They've been getting better since '08 (bar their marketing department, which admittedly seems more obnoxious than ever) - all he's said is you can't treat different studios as if they were the same, and that you need to be good to your customers and the people making the games.

I don't see how that is indicative of whether they're actually working on a game or not; its not like he benefits from lying about it.
 
Apr 28, 2008
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Just please don't turn the Mirrors Edge games into another god damn shooter. Please...

Also, a good way to help "re-brand" your image is to stop treating the PC gamers who actually buy your stuff like pirates. This means stop with the online checks. But the ones at install, and any others you may have. Every second you spend making me do an online check, or something else in order to play the game is a second that pirates are actually playing the thing without having to worry about it.
 

gigastar

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EA does have alot of rep to rip back from its ousted fanbase. You can only spend so much time brainstorming before you have to have an idea.
 

meowchef

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Spangles said:
"We're actively working on ideas in the Mirror's Edge universe; we just haven't locked on a way to bring it back so that fans will be excited and at the same time we get to a bigger audience. That's god's honest truth," he swore.
"...AND at the same time we get to a bigger audience."

So basically, yet again it's a case of not getting more of the same for those that liked the game... it's more like they want to give you something a bit similar, but changed in major aspects so the this time it'll also appeal to the people who didn't like it first time round.

I'm getting sick of this constant stream of crap.. we never end up getting what we want, it's always going to be changed in favour of a different audience... the constant, constant greed is just sickening.

This goes for everything now... they never give a fuck about the audience they have, it's ALWAYS about the audience they don't have but want even at the expensive of the people who gave them money first time round.
What do you expect them to do when no one bought the first game?
 

Tristessa

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I don't doubt that they're "actively working on ideas in the Mirror's Edge universe". I bet a company that big is often looking at their properties in effort to present them to consumers. It would be no stretch to infer that there's no game in production right now.
 
Jun 26, 2009
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Spangles said:
"We're actively working on ideas in the Mirror's Edge universe; we just haven't locked on a way to bring it back so that fans will be excited and at the same time we get to a bigger audience. That's god's honest truth," he swore.
"...AND get a bigger audience.."

So basically, yet again it's a case of not getting more of the same for those that liked the game... it's more like they want to give you something a bit similar, but changed in major aspects so the this time it'll also appeal to the people who didn't like it first time round.

I'm getting sick of this constant stream of crap.. we never end up getting what we want, it's always going to be changed in favour of a different audience... the constant, constant greed is just sickening.

This goes for everything now... they never give a fuck about the audience they have, it's ALWAYS about the audience they don't have but want even at the expensive of the people who gave them money first time round.
Damn EA for trying to earn money! That's totally not the point of a profitable buisness!
OT: I really want a Mirrors Edge sequel so bad. It's probably one of my most favorite games. As long as it doesn't become an average FPS I'll be happy with it. I think what would be a good idea for it would be to include some kind of co-op.
 

The Random One

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EA is the major heartless publishing behemoth that I respect the most, but that's because the only other one is Activision.

Still, I think EA is as good as the kind of company it is can be. You can't expect it to act like Valve.
 

notyouraveragejoe

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Fiz_The_Toaster said:
Stop teasing that sequel damnit!

Unless I see hard proof of that sequel's existence, I'm gonna take what he says with truck loads of salt.
Exactly. And I've wanted this sequel for so damn long...okay well not that long since the game has only been out for like 2 years and a few months. But still...I loved Mirror's Edge so PLEASE let the sequel come out soon!
 

Savber

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Straying Bullet said:
Let me see. Dragon Age II rushed. 14 months? Yeah, that's smelling on your end for sure.

Mass Effect II generic artbox? I bet it's EA once again. All in all, I am losing my faith the more games they spew out. Sometimes they have interesting IP's but for the most part, meh~..
DA2's rushed date... I understand but ME2's generic artbox?? Wha-?
 

meowchef

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Spangles said:
meowchef said:
Spangles said:
"We're actively working on ideas in the Mirror's Edge universe; we just haven't locked on a way to bring it back so that fans will be excited and at the same time we get to a bigger audience. That's god's honest truth," he swore.
"...AND at the same time we get to a bigger audience."

So basically, yet again it's a case of not getting more of the same for those that liked the game... it's more like they want to give you something a bit similar, but changed in major aspects so the this time it'll also appeal to the people who didn't like it first time round.

I'm getting sick of this constant stream of crap.. we never end up getting what we want, it's always going to be changed in favour of a different audience... the constant, constant greed is just sickening.

This goes for everything now... they never give a fuck about the audience they have, it's ALWAYS about the audience they don't have but want even at the expensive of the people who gave them money first time round.
What do you expect them to do when no one bought the first game?
Hardly no one but I know where you're going.

So it's not going to be Mirror's edge anyway, so why this garbage about pretending to give a shit about it and wanting to give a sequal when it's not going to be the same thing anyway?

Bullshit doubletalk all the bloody time.
It doesn't necessarily have to be exactly the same to be a sequel does it? Though I don't really agree with changing a game a great deal to cater to more people... when something doesn't sell, there really isn't much you can do. When it seems to be a pretty creative game like this, maybe they want to give it another try to keep it around. I don't know.