So IGN decided to ask "why do people hate EA"

[Kroxile]

I really don't like IGN, I mean, they are owned by the same people that owns FOX.

This article also reminded me a lot of something that I would hear on FOX news...

Precisely, of course they are gonna draw EA in a sympathetic light and portray them as not as bad as everyone knows they are.

Fucking conservative tripe, blah.

 

[Aeonknight]

IGN is ignorant, hypocritical and is constantly sucking corporate dick. Most of their articles are laughably misinformed and bias and it bewilders me that anyone visits their site.

And you think the Escapist is any different?

You'd think we were on the Valve forums with how highly it's praised around here. Which is ironic, because even the actual Valve forums have more bitching about Valve than here.

IGN loves it's corporations. Escapist loves anything "indie".

 

[shrekfan246]

You know, I actually made a post a few weeks ago that would perfectly compliment this thread.

Considering their track record... I'd be willing to say yes.

Westwood - Acquired in 1998, closed in 2003.
Mythic - Acquired in 2006, have only released Warhammer Online since then.
Maxis - Acquired in 1997, died after Sim City 4 and were folded into another studio. They had a final "Hurrah" with Spore and whatever reanimated husk is being thrown at Sim City 5, it's not Maxis.
Bullfrog - Acquired in 1995, released two decent games and a few "shovelware" games until 2001, closed in 2003.
Pandemic - Acquired in 2007, released three games, closed in 2009.
Origin Systems - Acquired in 1992, released their last game in 1999 and were closed in 2004. - These were the guys responsible for Wing Commander, System Shock, and the Ultima series. And they still got crushed by EA.
DICE Canada - Closed after Digital Illusions CE was acquired by EA in 2006.

Maybe other big publishers have lists that are just as bad, and sure EA still has a bunch of studios still kicking around, but I'd say that's some pretty damning evidence if I ever saw some.

DICE tried to up the ante a bit with Mirror's Edge, and so far that's mostly been relegated to a cult hit even though it generally had pretty decent reviews. So they're chugging along with Battlefield titles with rumors of a sequel being sprung and squashed almost constantly.

Bioware has met probably the largest amount of scorn I've ever seen spewed out at once over Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 3, and for some people Mass Effect 2.

Crytek is living entirely off of the Crysis series now (with Far Cry having been sold off to Ubisoft), and most of the people who were fans of the first are all pissy about the different directions it's taken because of moving to consoles.

Visceral Games has had a studio in Australia close down recently, and the only thing they're actually known for in the last four years is Dead Space (a decent if not particularly scary survival-horror third-person shooter) and Dante's Inferno (the less said about the game, and how EA advertised it, the better).

So yeah. I like the games EA publishes (most of the time, at least). But I hate them as a business, because they're a terrible business.

And actually, Mythic was recently folded into Bioware, too.

 

[Lovely Mixture]

I humbly submit that all that EA hate is much more intense than is justified, and that electing EA to be the 'Worst Company' is the epitome of a First World problem. Compare EA to how the BoA crippled the economy, and EA seems like a harmless little kitten.

I don't particularly like the Origin policies, but as far as I know, they softened them down a little. Even if not, though: Outright hating them is too much. Anyone who goes as far as saying that s/he hates EA clearly has no perspective about real problems and real issues in this world. Or real bad companies.
It is just mastubatory "Oh, you hate EA? I hate EA, too! Let's rant about them and feel good about ourselves!" at this point.

Now, you don't need to like them -- I don't like them, either (I'm indifferent towards them). You can even give voice to reasonable criticism, surely. But hating and condemning them? Some people here even said that if they had billions of dollars, they would use them to crash EA into bankruptcy. Seriously, get a grip.
If you don't like them, don't use their products and ignore them. Negative publicity is still better for them than just ignoring them. You want to damage EA? Stop caring, then.

Edit: Or, as somebody else said: "It's just a fucking video game company, how bad can it be?"

This is the second time I've seen this: "I don't think it's worthy of hatred in comparison to other issues, therefore I don't think people can be actually hating it" argument. As you say "get a grip" I say get off your high horse, not everyone shares your values.

Don't generalize the "masturbatory" behavior of some people into the whole of people who have legitimate criticism of EA. Ignoring the problem doesn't solve the problem.

Saying that there are "bigger fish to fry" is not an argument. It doesn't justify what EA does. I was gonna comment on IGN on doing it (see below), but you just did the same thing.

If the focus of your hate is working conditions at EA, I want to gently suggest you also consider clothing factories in southeast Asia or diamond mines in southern Africa, or fast food outlets in the mid-west.

"X is bad, but Y is worse. You should probably go yell at Y more."

IGN is ignorant, hypocritical and is constantly sucking corporate dick. Most of their articles are laughably misinformed and bias and it bewilders me that anyone visits their site.

And you think the Escapist is any different?

You'd think we were on the Valve forums with how highly it's praised around here. Which is ironic, because even the actual Valve forums have more bitching about Valve than here.

IGN loves it's corporations. Escapist loves anything "indie".

He's talking about IGN's staff and their articles, not IGN's forums. Comparing their staff to these forums makes no sense. Every forum has its overzealous belligerents.

 

[Emiscary]

"There are worse companies than EA!"

Gee, thanks tips. They should've hired people like you to do PR after the Columbine High shootings, you coulda dropped this bomb on everyone:

"This is *nothing*. The Holocaust? Now that was a massacre. Y'all need to get a grip."


I'll just leave off on that note.

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

A site owned by an evil mega corporation writes an article defending another evil mega corporation's business practices? Move along nothing to see here.

All right to add something meaningful to the discussion, I will say that many of us hate EA not because they are a corporation that makes a lot of money rather that their business practices coupled with their awful PR and marketing leaves a bad taste in many gamers' mouths. So it's not much of a surprise that they garner so much hate.

 

[mrdude2010]

"If they don't, they'll go broke"

HAHAHAHAHAHA

They already charge $60 a game, and with the increasing number of gamers, game companies are doing just fine. Screwing up the DLC to try to get more money out of us isn't going to save a bad game maker, and not screwing up the DLC to try to gouge the customer isn't going to kill EA. Try harder.

 

[MiriaJiyuu]

DRM, bad customer service, releasing games that turn out to be unworkable, absorbing of good game developers just to hog their properties while picking bought dev companies to pieces, immature marketing that gives video gaming a bad public image, and Sim City Societies.

You forgot rendering some older games unplayable by shutting down old servers, releasing a $60 game and then $40 worth of DLC, oh and refusing to release games on Steam for poor reasons.

Also the one thing almost every major publisher is guilty of: charging the same price for digital download and physical games.

 

[EHKOS]

A lot of that article is absolutely right. I mean, I love most EA games that came with the "Challenge Everything" screen. But now they are disrespecting franchises. A new Most Wanted, without even a 2? That just baffles me.

 

[cahtush]

Why is EA a terrible company? I'll tell you why.

After SWTOR came under attack from religious conservative over the issue of gay marriages in the game, a website called AllOut started a petition to show their support for EA.

EA, of course, decided the best way to react to this was to submit thousands of bot generated signatures. How? By having PCs that were running Origin submit them automatically.

That's right. EA turned your computer into a spam bot so it could give itself a big pat on the back.

Also, that whole ME3 kerfuffle.

No way... Please tell me you're one of those crazy people that think the govt. watches us sleep at night.

Oh that's not even the best part of that story. The names on the petition are pure gold. Such gems like Roland from Poland, Olivia from Bolivia, Chad from Chad and Fred from Fred. Also a bunch of the signatures' comments are exactly the same when posted within seconds of each other. Then you get names that don't fit the country at all like Peter from Saudi Arabia and Rick from Pakistan. Here's the link to the examples given.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.365863-EA-is-at-it-again#14269604

Dont forget the fine chaps like George, Rudolph and Nick from North Korea

 

[Something Amyss]

I love that the solution to asking people why they're disliked is to ask them.

 

[Waaghpowa]

IGN loves it's corporations. Escapist loves anything "indie".

I didn't say the escapist is better, but they don't write stupid ass articles. Like that douche bag who went on about how fans had the right to complain about the changes made to Cole in Infamous 2, but then turned around and called those same people entitled whiners with the whole ME3 debacle.

It may seem silly, but you could generate IGN articles with this and probably not notice the difference.

 

[Bloodstain]

This is the second time I've seen this: "I don't think it's worthy of hatred in comparison to other issues, therefore I don't think people can be actually hating it" argument. As you say "get a grip" I say get off your high horse, not everyone shares your values.

Don't generalize the "masturbatory" behavior of some people into the whole of people who have legitimate criticism of EA. Ignoring the problem doesn't solve the problem.

Saying that there are "bigger fish to fry" is not an argument. It doesn't justify what EA does. I was gonna comment on IGN on doing it (see below), but you just did the same thing.

If the focus of your hate is working conditions at EA, I want to gently suggest you also consider clothing factories in southeast Asia or diamond mines in southern Africa, or fast food outlets in the mid-west.

"X is bad, but Y is worse. You should probably go yell at Y more.

It doesn't justify 'hate'. It justifies negative criticism, but it doesn't justify the strongest of all negative emotions. You can very well be annoyed by EA, see it negatively and give voice to your criticism, and probably rightly so -- but hate? Hm.

It also doesn't justify naming them the worst company in America, the land of so much more troublesome companies.

Of course it is important to deal with small issues even if there are bigger problems at hand. I absolutely agree on that, really. But hate? Okay, fine, you may be right that I impose my views on others, fair enough. Hate, if you feel it's necessary. I didn't even see that as a problem worth complaining about before anyway -- but bestowing the 'Worst Company' award upon EA is just beyond unjustified, seeing as it's a comparison of all American companies, including the really big problem makers.

 

[ElPatron]

Okay, I am sorry but I was having trouble with my mouse and I reported someone's post accidentally. Problem is that I have no idea who it was. So... Sorry about that.

Anyway, companies have the right to exist "just to make money". But when you are providing a bad service that includes icky stuff like Origin, banning people for no reason and effectively trying to "broaden the audience" for a specific franchise I'll respect you as much I respect burglars.

It may seem silly, but you could generate IGN articles with this and probably not notice the difference.

"What Beyond Good & Evil could learn from Farmville"

"Should Minecraft be illegal?"

That link made me laugh, think about stuff - but most of all - wasted so much of my time. Life well spent.

 

[martyrdrebel27]

http://investor.ea.com/stockquote.cfm

wow that chart is pretty interesting. notice how right around the 2008 mark the share price almost instantly dropped from $50 to $15? and it never really recovered. i think that right there shows that people have had enough of their shit.

 

[EternalFacepalm]

I already knew IGN was terrible, but I at least thought they proofread their articles. It's a bit difficult to take news seriously (although I wouldn't in the first place) when it's filled with errors.

 

[mitchell271]

Oh look, an article by IGN specifically made to piss off gamers. Stop the fucking presses.

In all seriousness, IGN doesn't have a whole lot of credibility at this point. The only person I can stand there is Destin LeGarie and only because he used to be the anchor of Hard News on screwattack. Their reviews are based on ad-revenue (mostly) and they post articles like this one just to piss people off. Most gaming sites are like that now, except screwattack and (usually) the escapist.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

http://investor.ea.com/stockquote.cfm

wow that chart is pretty interesting. notice how right around the 2008 mark the share price almost instantly dropped from $50 to $15? and it never really recovered. i think that right there shows that people have had enough of their shit.

I noticed that, but I figured that had more to do with the global recession then it did anything they did themselves. This was around the time Mirrors Edge and the first Dead Space were released, so if anything confidence would have been higher not lower... but all major business were feeling the fallout.

 

[martyrdrebel27]

http://investor.ea.com/stockquote.cfm

wow that chart is pretty interesting. notice how right around the 2008 mark the share price almost instantly dropped from $50 to $15? and it never really recovered. i think that right there shows that people have had enough of their shit.

I noticed that, but I figured that had more to do with the global recession then it did anything they did themselves. This was around the time Mirrors Edge and the first Dead Space were released, so if anything confidence would have been higher not lower... but all major business were feeling the fallout.

hmm, you're almost certainly right about that. i didn't bother looking up what EA was doing in 2008, i just assumed they were shitting all over us like they always do, but the year of Dead Space and Mirror's Edge should have been a good one (i loved both those games), so yeah, it probably had more to do with the overall economy. Still, fuck those guys. haha. I have already made peace with the fact that Mass Effect 3 was the last EA game i'll ever play. That's not to say they won't release a game i want, they almost assuredly will, but the reason boycotts and protests no longer work is that people just give in to something they want regardless of the ramifications.