What is EA actually doing wrong as a developer?

[Tech Team FTW!]

It seems that every 12.8 seconds EA releases a sequel title. By far the best example of this is Medal of Honour. Why would a developer continue to repackage the same game over and over? MoH Vanguard and MoH Airborne I am looking at you.
The simple answer is that they sell. So to every gamer out there, if you want to see less of sequels then stop buying them.

Can anyone name a good EA game that isn't a sequel?

Is there actually anything wrong wih wringing a franchise until it last drop of preciuos money oozes from it broken carcass?

Edit: What I am actually trying to do here is find out why EA has gotten the reputation it has.

 

[BirdKiller]

If sales of Dead Space and Mirror's Edge proved anything, then the answer would be no given that even though EA developed/published new IPs, we gamers didn't buy them as much as we did for sequels and well known franchises.

 

[Tech Team FTW!]

If sales of Dead Space and Mirror's Edge proved anything, then the answer would be no given that even though EA developed/published new IPs, we gamers didn't buy them as much as we did for sequels and well known franchises.

Are you saying that a game developed by EA needs repeated sequellage to be polished and fun to play? Or that gamers are afraid of new things?

 

[Frybird]

I seriously think EA improved since last year (or last 2 years, dunno). They bring out new franchises, buy Brutal Legend so they can sell it to us (and so we can play it) and finally seem to stop working on Medal of Honor. Also, Battlefield Heroes will be free and they try to make Need for Speed good again.

In the end, i think they try hard on a positive image, and gamers as a whole don't really give a shit. (And yes, Gamers ARE afraid of new franchises, it seems)

I think it's time to lay off the EA hate, given that they are no longer the meanest kid in town (that would be Activision, imho)

(Dead Space, Skate 1, Rock Band 1)

 

[Doug]

If sales of Dead Space and Mirror's Edge proved anything, then the answer would be no given that even though EA developed/published new IPs, we gamers didn't buy them as much as we did for sequels and well known franchises.

How about 'they can't make anything new and good!'

 

[BirdKiller]

If sales of Dead Space and Mirror's Edge proved anything, then the answer would be no given that even though EA developed/published new IPs, we gamers didn't buy them as much as we did for sequels and well known franchises.

Are you saying that a game developed by EA needs repeated sequellage to be polished and fun to play? Or that gamers are afraid of new things?

For the first question: No. I would think huge number of gamers buy these sequels because the franchise have proven to be enjoyable or at least satisfactory to begin with: it's a safe choice to pick. On the other hand, buying a completely new game, especially in an unfamiliar genre, is risky. I do believe gamers, including me, are afraid of new things.

How about 'they can't make anything new and good!'

Dead Space Meta Review score:
Xbox 360: 89
Playstation 3: 88
PC: 86

Mirror's Edge Meta Review score:
Xbox 360: 79
Playstation 3: 79
PC: 80

How the heck are those not good scores?

 

[Crash486]

I actually thought Deadspace was a fine game... As was mirror's edge. The biggest complaint anyone could come up with for mirror's edge was "it's too short." Other than that it got pretty high marks in every area. It was new, it was experimental, and it was fun.

EA is a MASSIVE company, just because they have franchises and release sequels doesn't make them a bad company. Do you have any idea how large the EA umbrella is? It's gigantic, and now they've even incorporated Maxis, Bioware, and Mythic. All of which have been very successful studios in the past.

EA has taken some huge steps forward from what it used to be. Sure it has it's franchises, but its also taken leaps and bounds into the world of experimental gaming with mirror's edge, and mature titles with dead space. And I have full confidence that in the future both Mythic and Bioware are going to develope some excellent games as well.

 

[crazyjackal]

EA are mainly publishers not developers.

They have published many great games:
Populous (with Bullfrog Productions)
Ultima Online (with Origin Systems)
Command & Conquer (with Westwood Studios)
Dungeon Keeper (with Bullfrog Productions)
Battlefield (with DICE)
Crysis (with Crytek and Valve)
The Sims (with Maxis) - I don't like it but clearly many people do.
Spore (with Maxis) - I don't like it but clearly many people do.
Many more.

They bring the money to help realise the vision of several great developers whether it be Peter Molyneux back when he was doing Populous, Will Wright when he was doing The Sims and Spore, Tim Shafer for Brutal Legends or developments like Bioware's Mass Effect.

Dead Space was by all accounts a "good game". It is what Survival Horror should be.
Resident Evil has become a Survival Action game.

Mirror's Edge (with DICE) must be commended for taking risk in steps for innovation and not producing the mainstream norm.
The game has first person momentum-based platforming, emphasis on a non-violent approach and level designs with colours aside from grey, brown and black.

I don't hold EA in a bright shiny light, they have done horrible things in the gaming industry as well (e.g. SecuROM) but if you're going to take the piss out of a developer for producing sequels to milk the cow, why not go after EVERY other developer who does the same?

What has Bungie done since Halo? For the past 9 years, they have been resting on the laurels producing sequel after sequel.
What has Infinity Ward and Treyarch done since Call of Duty asides from sequels?
How about Epic Games (Gears of War), Rockstar North (Grand Theft Auto), Square Enix (Final Fantasy), et cetera?

Whilst Valve, Nintendo and several other companies are to be commended for being great developers with innovation and diversity, you shouldn't jump on the band wagon of popular opinion and blame EA for the pumping out of sequels when it is a major flaw in the entire games industry and there are plenty others who are guilty of such acts.

 

[Therumancer]

The industry moves in cycles, we're in a down period right now. Eventually the gaming industry will turn to new IPs more to survive.

When it comes to long-running franchises in many cases I see no real need to change what isn't broken. It's sort of like how people complain about how almost all MMOs use the same basic interface style as World Of Warcraft. While innovation is decent, certain things simply work well, and while someone might come up with something better, simply doing things differantly for the sake of doing something differant tends to cause disasters. With SOME of EA's titles that are aimed at casual players (like say their sports titles) I understand their logic.

My biggest problem with EA is that I think they are too greedy, they seem to have been at the forefront of this entire "microtransaction" thing that I feel is ruining gaming. The idea itself was good, but it's turned from an easy/cheaper way to release expansion packs to save gamers money, into a way to get people to effectively pay more money to unlock features of a game they already bought that might actually be on the disk. Effectively turning a lot of games into glorified Shareware where you pay for the demonstration copy (ie pay to unlock the full game).

Game companies are out to make money, game designers are trying to make a living at it, okay I get that, no problem there. But there is a point where you simply get too greedy and it becomes an unreasonable annoyance.

I think EA's lack of popularity (well somewhat) isn't the result of one thing, but a lot of little annoyances that add up in people's minds.

But then again keep in mind that I have a grudge against them for buying out Origin. I sort of blame EA for the lack of a decent single player Ultima game (formerly my favorite CRPG series which I grew up with). They more or less kept UO alive, but ceased to develop the franchise from there on, except for the mess that was "Ultima: Ascension".

>>>----Therumancer--->

>>>----Therumancer--->

 

[Aperama]

As a PC developer? Putting out poor console ripoffs, which often just plainly don't work, and have prohibitive activation fronts / SecuROM styled protection which actually make it harder for people who buy the game legitimately to play it.

As a console developer? Well, it might be the sequels.. but more likely, it's the fact that they're just generally not willing to put their neck out on the line. They're going to go with the safe bet, every single time. (I'd class 'big' titles like, say, Spore as still being a 'safe' bet, for instance.) Sequels are just that - the safe bet. You have a pre-existing fanbase that is easily going to be appeased - you just have to essentially follow certain steps. They're rarely stepping out of line, and so a fan will tend to know exactly what they want, and what they're getting, before they pick up a new game. Even the Madden (etc) games are all just about 'new rosters' - no real new gameplay modes to speak of, generally.

Also, EA gives extremely poor support for the majority of what it puts out - generally leaving it to the actual game creators (they're typically more in the publishing side of things, I'll remind) to pick up the slack, which is never a good thing when EA is primarily coming in just to put on copy protection and leave the game in a seething pile of unworkability.

What's EA doing wrong? Well, I used to look at EA Games, back in the late '90s, as a sheer product of quality. You got something from EA - you knew you were getting what you paid for.

These days, you still are.. so long as it decides to work for you.

 

[StarStruckStrumpets]

The new games they're developing hit the market like human excrement on a car window.
As hard as it may of fallen, you'd never want it there in the first place.

 

[Tech Team FTW!]

EA are mainly publishers not developers.

They have published many great games:
Populous (with Bullfrog Productions)
Ultima Online (with Origin Systems)
Command & Conquer (with Westwood Studios)
Dungeon Keeper (with Bullfrog Productions)
Battlefield (with DICE)
Crysis (with Crytek and Valve)
The Sims (with Maxis) - I don't like it but clearly many people do.
Spore (with Maxis) - I don't like it but clearly many people do.
Many more.

They bring the money to help realise the vision of several great developers whether it be Peter Molyneux back when he was doing Populous, Will Wright when he was doing The Sims and Spore, Tim Shafer for Brutal Legends or developments like Bioware's Mass Effect.

Dead Space was by all accounts a "good game". It is what Survival Horror should be.
Resident Evil has become a Survival Action game.

Mirror's Edge (with DICE) must be commended for taking risk in steps for innovation and not producing the mainstream norm.
The game has first person momentum-based platforming, emphasis on a non-violent approach and level designs with colours aside from grey, brown and black.

I don't hold EA in a bright shiny light, they have done horrible things in the gaming industry as well (e.g. SecuROM) but if you're going to take the piss out of a developer for producing sequels to milk the cow, why not go after EVERY other developer who does the same?

What has Bungie done since Halo? For the past 9 years, they have been resting on the laurels producing sequel after sequel.
What has Infinity Ward and Treyarch done since Call of Duty asides from sequels?
How about Epic Games (Gears of War), Rockstar North (Grand Theft Auto), Square Enix (Final Fantasy), et cetera?

Whilst Valve, Nintendo and several other companies are to be commended for being great developers with innovation and diversity, you shouldn't jump on the band wagon of popular opinion and blame EA for the pumping out of sequels when it is a major flaw in the entire games industry and there are plenty others who are guilty of such acts.

I may be jumping on a band wagon, but it is because I cannot recall any game which had the EA logo stomped all over it that I actually enjoyed (ie. one made almost entirely by EA itself).

The Call of Duty series took a turn for the awesome with cod4, changing the dynamic of the series almost completely. I have heard far too many people bash GTA4 for not being as good as GTA San Andreas, I mean at least GTA4 tried new things with a proven format. What do you expect with JRPGs? In my opinion, if you have played one, you have played them all.

 

[ratix2]

pi_fighter: what the hell are you talking about? cod4 didnt do ANYTHING that previous cod games hadent done. it was literally cod2 in modern times, it didnt do anything to chance the dynamic of the series, or even anything that the series hadent done before save teh setting.

valve had nothing to do with crysis.

while ea gets a bad rap the thing people NEED to realise is that so much of this was done under eas previous administrations. currently the heads of ea are trying to change that image, putting out more orginal ip's, taking more chances and changing things up with their existing ip's and improving customer and post release support. ea wasant the first to use securom 7, that was actually 2k with bioshock, ea followed a year later after other publishers such as ubisoft and activision tried it with a few games as well, and ea is one of the first to ditch securom 7 as well, so if you bash them for using it you ought to praise them for being one of the first to stop using it.

 

[ratix2]

sorry for double posting but i have a text limit.

games like dead space and mirrors edge are examples of what ea is doing. dead space was a refreshing game, it wasant the scariest and its sources of inspiration are so easy to tell, but the gameplay was solid and unique, the atmosphere was very well done and overall it was one of the best games of last year. mirrors edge, while not the best game, was at least something that hadent been tried before. sure it wasant that great, but its better to come out with a bad game with a good idea and then develop it into something truly spectulacular then to never even try in the first place.

finally, sequals (madden for example) provide a few things. first off, game development isnt cheap, with most of todays AAA titles costing in excess of $20 million to make. sequals provide a good source of revenue to fund the development of these games and new games. second they allow developers to test things such ai, physics, new graphical effects, etc.

 

[ratix2]

sorry again, damn ps3 browser.

ea has done some shitty stuff in the past. closing down westwood, the DUMBEST decision a publisher has EVER made, for example. but as i said eas current administration is trying to change their image and become a better company. if you want a developer to bash, try activision. activision decided to publish a whopping FIVE of the dozens of games that vivendi had lined up to publish. things like ghostbusters, brutal legend, further developments on world in conflict, etc. ONLY because, and i quote "these games cannot be taken advantage of to become franchises to be released on a yearly basis". activision has become what ea used to be, and people still praise them and bash ea when the two companies have basically switched souls.

 

[Tech Team FTW!]

pi_fighter: what the hell are you talking about? cod4 didnt do ANYTHING that previous cod games hadent done. it was literally cod2 in modern times, it didnt do anything to chance the dynamic of the series, or even anything that the series hadent done before save teh setting.

valve had nothing to do with crysis.

while ea gets a bad rap the thing people NEED to realise is that so much of this was done under eas previous administrations. currently the heads of ea are trying to change that image, putting out more orginal ip's, taking more chances and changing things up with their existing ip's and improving customer and post release support. ea wasant the first to use securom 7, that was actually 2k with bioshock, ea followed a year later after other publishers such as ubisoft and activision tried it with a few games as well, and ea is one of the first to ditch securom 7 as well, so if you bash them for using it you ought to praise them for being one of the first to stop using it.

I meant that cod4 changed the way the game delivers the plot. Instead of being a generic American war hero and being told before each mission, "the plan is to kill Nazis/Japanese. The way you will do it this mission is..." you actually had decent characters and a good story, and the combat engine seemed a lot different from cod2.

Actually I haven't been following the corporate nonsense at EA's head office... just how do you define an administration in a corporation, and how do you show it is different from the previous?

 

[Sensenmann]

They rush their games out, making them suck.

They fake things (screenshots of Sims 2 made people assume mechanics that did not exist)

Making sport games and releasing new one every year, with minimal change(double crime).

Treating customers like crap and in some cases taking away their games (thinking that a Lisence Agreement denies the customer "ownership" of their copy).

DRM (enough said).

 

[Jandau]

My main complaint as far as EA goes is that they are too interested in the money and not enough in quality. Now, before some smartarse comes with the usual "Gee, a company who wants money? lol!" sarcastic comment, I don't mind them making money, it's just that they often neglect to ensure a quality product.

Namely, EA games often come out too early. Even when it's a solid game, it's painfully obvious it should have stayed in development at least a month or two more (if not more). Be it bugs or unfinished content (hello Dead Space!), the game would have been so much better if they let it simmer for a while longer.

Next, they seem to steer developers away from supporting existing games. EA games don't get patched much, despite the issues mentioned earlier. If I have to choose between developers forsaking the product of their creativity or EA making them do new games, guess which sounds more likely.

As for the Generic Sports Game 20XX, I couldn't care less. Those are marketed to a totally different demographic than I am, and in all fairness doesn't effect me in any way. Since they keep shoveling them out year after year, I guess it has its market and works there. Let them have fun with it.

Their entire approach to DRM and preventing piracy is unprofessional, clumsy and displays a lack of knowledge about the very business they are in.

Overall, EA is a game publisher that doesn't know a thing about games, gamers and making games. I'm sure the people heading it are great businessmen, but they might as well be selling cars or kitchen appliances, I doubt they'd notice the difference...

 

[sneak_copter]

Mirror's Edge was good. Dead Space was alright.

However, Dead Space was developed by an affiliate of EA named Redwood Shores.
Mirror's Edge was only published by EA. Developed by DICE.

 

[Nutcase]

I was a C&C fan, but EA killed it. Only EA game I have ever bought is Crysis. I was really looking forward to Mirror's Edge and was mildly interested in Mass Effect as well, but the over-the-top DRM -> no sale.