EA Turns Its Back on Single-Player Games

[TJC]

you know... thinking about it, focusing on either single player or multiplayer is for me a perfectly fine concept. EA chose the latter option and I'm fine with that. I think they're doing it wrong but hey, if they got their profits figured out: Good for them. I sure as hell won't buy any of their games because I like me some single player games where I'm saving hyrule, beating up gods or chasing dragons. I also like me some local multiplayer where I'm smashing peach's face with king dedede's hammer or race towards my first carpal tunnel syndrome.

The whole SHARE WITH THE ENTIRE WORLD BIT BY BIT F2P approach just isn't appealing to me. Maybe I'm lacking the proper community to truly enjoy these games (because everything's better with friends) but even then I like to go back to my cave and do shit alone.

But... I honestly believe that the market for F2P games is getting uncomfortably crowded. Or at least too much to build a business plan around that market. Somehow I think they're vastly overestimating how long people will be playing and PAYING for such an experience. There's a limit as to how many games a person can keep up with if there's an entire community filled with relationships, responsibilities (sorta) and issues and the community is in the end the motivation to be invested in a certain game. Changing that is a hard thing to do and I don't see many people willing to do so and playing more than one or two MMOs (or sorta MMOs) isn't fun. It's tedious.

maybe I'm the one who underestimates the possible profits but then again, it's not my problem. I'll just do what I like to do. Buying games that are single player and maybe sometimes a game with online capabilities 8D

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

This is news?

I thought this had been official policy since at very least 2010.

I guess they just hadn't announced it until now.

 

[Programmed_For_Damage]

Fuck you EA. Trying to force me to deal with other people while gaming. Don't you know that's one of the primary reasons why I play video games, to get away from other people!

 

[beastro]

Didn't Valve say pretty much the same thing a couple of months ago?

I can set Steam to offline mode and still play all SP games if I want to should I expect an internet disconnection.

 

[Tentaquil]

It's as if EA feeds on our disappointment and sadness.

I miss Westwood and Bullfrog....

 

[6SteW6]

And once again EA manages to make themselves look like incredible assholes, and will still invariably make millions of dollars! Vote with your wallets people, vote with your wallets.

 

[Vulpis]

Heh. Keep in mind folks, that a) This doesn't mean no SP games at all, it means no SP-*only* games, and b) they're using the much broader definition of 'multiplayer' that means *any* interaction with other players, not just the 'team with/against while actually playing the game' meaning we generally associate with 'multiplayer'.

I mean, there's plenty of reasons to bash EA as a steaming crap hole as it is, make sure you've got the right ones. ;-)

As far as the original statement--that guy needs to stop going to Ballmer's speech coach. That line is right up there with "I haven't beaten my wife lately!"

 

[Vulpis]

Didn't Valve say pretty much the same thing a couple of months ago?

Indeed--but keep in mind that that refers only to Valve's *own* games--this is why they have a service that sells a couple of thousand other games, many of them single-player.

 

[cryofpaine]

EA absolutely destroyed my favorite franchise, and I curse them to the deepest fiery pits of Hell for all eternity. Everything they do is sheer naked greed, pure and simple. EA needs to die, everyone involved in making these asinine decisions needs to be fired (out of a cannon preferably) and they need to be taken over by someone who has a brain, and who will respect the players and honestly want to make great, quality games.

 

[DJjaffacake]

Do EA lack a research department or something? Arkham City was the highest reviewed game of 2011, topped the UK sales charts and was second on the US's when it came out, and was rented more than MW3. And it had zero multiplayer components. Or, you know, Skyrim.

Perhaps they also lack a memory, since Mass Effect 1 and 2 did just fine without multiplayer.

Someone needs to tell them, the key to making money is not multiplayer, it is selling things people want to buy. That's business at an incredibly basic level, and they are supposed to be businesspeople.

 

[Broken Blade]

Well, you've just alienated me, EA. I don't play Multiplayer components. I've almost NEVER played multiplayer components. Until the ending, the multiplayer part of ME3 was my biggest complaint. Thank you for helping me decide to almost certainly never buy one of your games again. It really saves me from having to spend my money.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

And I haven't bought an EA game in a decade. I wonder why.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

Um, question!

How's that going to work for Dragon Age 3? Because that could be really cool, or really, REALLY bad.

EA really needs a PR person to help these business people say things that won't alienate the very people they're trying to sell products to.

 

[antipunt]

you know what this sounds like to me?

>_>

"single player games get pirated; multiplayer sells. Look at Blizzard!!!!"

<_<

sigh...

 

[weatherfn]

Gah! They better not screw up the new Sim City at least... Though that may be the last game I buy from them, now that Mass Effect's over.

 

[Judgment90]

as a person who does not play multiplayer at all, this downright infuriates me.

this just proves that all higher-ups in EA are either so incredibly stupid it's funny, or so incredibly c**ty that all they are good for is provoking gamers to revolt against them.

 

[themilo504]

I don?t quite know how to feel about this I also noticed they don?t quite grasp what multiplayer is the fifa example they used is not multiplayer nor is the dragon age facebook game.
Overlooking the cancerous growth known as tacked on multiplayer what they seem to mean is that all their games will be in some way connected to the internet and maybe I?m wrong here but don?t all games basically do that already especially when achievements where invented.
I don?t mind if I can play some flash game for 5 minutes to get the ring of deadliness or if I own a certain game I get the armor of immersion breaking but knowing ea it means that the games are going to be full of pointless micro transaction who may prevent me from using certain weapons and spells already in the game and games that need to be always online what worries me even more is if they start removing entire parts of the game to give away with other video games imagine if like extra credits said in mass effect 2 the only way to use legion is if you bough Dante inferno or in dragon age 3 you can?t go to the mountains of certain death unless you buy battlefield 4 or fifa 2014.

 

[joshuaayt]

I like to think of EA as an awful parent- she boasts about this new amazing toy she's buying for her children, and onlookers are ambivalent at best. But then she presses a button, and knives pop out of the toy, and she starts beating them with it, and she explains to the horrified crowd that the knives are available for $3.50 on the EA store or something.

And then we fucking buy the knives anyway, because wow they're only $3.50.
Not really sure what exactly that means, but it does make one visualise EA beating people, so I guess you probably get a point, at least.

EDIT: Really, though, it is a little scary that this is one of the industry giants. "We can say WHATEVER the fuck we want, doesn't even matter if we piss off half of our consumer base, as long as our investors like what they hear."

 

[MURPHYCHACHO]

Ok, this next song is for EA. It's called "We Hate You, Please Die."

 

[Cheeseman Muncher]

It's as if EA seems to be staffed entirely by monkeys with typewriters...