What, specifically, has E.A. done? *I seriously don't know*

[Zeckt]

I bought SWTOR and created an active subscription and my game is still a trial, and talked to multiple customer service reps who would continue to ping pong me back and forth between swtor / origin reps who continue to transfer me to somebody who does nothing but transfer me to somebody else. They then proceed to send me back and forth between origin / swtor customer service.

Nevermind the fact that I spent 50$ on the game and my active time is being spent right now. On a trial. SWTOR was the FIRST game I bought on origin after 3 years of not having a single issue with steam. I doubt they are going to give me a refund, I am so sick of dealing with their customer service wasting my time for a problem I never asked for. I am seriously thinking of pursuing legal options for wasting my time and stressing me out and selling me a product I'm paying for right now I can't use. One thing is for sure though, any motivation I had to play SWTOR and use origin is forever gone.

 

[Adam Locking]

The last EA game I bought was "Shadows of the Damned" which is a fairly niche title for them, and while nobody from the studio has outright came out and said it, it's fairly clear from playing it that it was rushed straight out the door and not quite finished. I find it hard to believe that the studio themselves were responsible for this, as most Grasshopper Manufacture's games feel quite polished.

That and the fact that the game had nonexistant advertising and tanked despite reasonable-to-mildly-positive reviews makes it all the more likely that EA's reputation for meddling sabotaged it.

 

[MammothBlade]

This is the main reason why, summed up into one webcomic:

They don't allow studios independence. And once the acquired gaming studio has outlived its usefulness, they suck it dry of all its juicy IPs and kill it. They're parasites.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

snip

There was also a 'drama blog' called The Mare's Nest that kept it a secret who they were. They tracked drama on the Sims forums and in the community. The most popular users were all asked by Simgurus (the moderators) if we knew who they were.

Nobody did but they would have probably laid the smackdown on them too.

 

[rob_simple]

That and the fact that the game had nonexistant advertising and tanked despite reasonable-to-mildly-positive reviews makes it all the more likely that EA's reputation for meddling sabotaged it.

Complete and utter conjecture. I bought the game after I watched some Achievement Hunter videos and it looked/is fun. But you could be right as far as advertising goes, because I certainly hadn't heard of it prior to AH or the ZP review.

OT: I can understand why a lot of people have an axe to grind with EA, but for the majority of people it's like the unpopular kids at school hearing that Katy Perry is popular now and coming in the next day wearing a Katy Perry shirt and hat, saying they've bought a ticket to everyone one of her shows etc...what I'm getting at is that most people use EA as a punching bag to sound clever or fit in, when they actually know nothing about how a business is run or that most of their choices are done out of necessity rather than just to be bastards.

It is interesting to note that, in the post somewhere above which laid out many of the smaller companies EA consumed, most of them had been churning out nothing but sequels for several years, meaning that there's every chance they'd have gone under because no one cared anymore as opposed to EA's 'meddling'.

 

[Palademon]

They were founded promising to do their best to make good games as they could, and make art. They ar enow a money grubbing company that will buy and disssolve any less rich company that happens to make good games.

 

[Tropicaz]

I'm going to go ahead and use FIFA 12 as my example, specifically fifa 12 ultimate team, cos that's the ea game i play most. THis is a game mode where you play matches to win coins, which you use to buy packs which cointain players/buy players from auction. You can also buy these packs with real money. What EA do, is make teams of the week and special players with boosted stats, which are only available for a short time. This encourages people to buy packs with real money to try and get these valuable players. EA make these boosted players INSTEAD of fixing various glitches and bugs which have caused problems with fifa since day 1. Over on the FIFA forum people started asking about these glitches and problems with the game, and EA went ahead and banned any talk of them at all. So they're a money-grabbing, slightly draconian company with no regard to improving their service to the customer.

 

[DoPo]

Jim Sterling psychically pre-empted your question, and made this handy video for you [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/5946-Why-Do-People-Hate-EA].

The one TC talked about in the OP and said it didn't give him the information? Yes, I'm sure watching that would help.

OT: Actually, I don't think I can add much to the video. The closing down of companies has been mentioned, but also there are the bad business practices - Day 1/on-disc DLC[footnote]For the record, I am absolutely fine with the idea behind those. But there are concerns that they could be misused. And EA has shown that we shouldn't trust them not to abuse the thing[/footnote], trying to charge customers more for buying second hand games, making games for the sake of making more products, as opposed to making them good (yearly releases and "widening the target audience"), to build on that - monopoly over the sports games, which lets them do whatever they want with those (every year, too).

Other than those, there is the fact that they treat their customers...below the reasonable expectations, so to say. They've thrown some ridiculous DRM at things and only hurt their legitimate customers. Case in point: Spore - it had to have the DRM stripped down a lot, due to an avalanche of complains about people who couldn't play the game. At all. The one they bough and it told them "Trololo, no you don't get to do that!". I am pretty sure that had something to do with the high piracy rate there[footnote]For the record, Spore was the most pirated game for 2008, according to TorrentFreak. And it was released in September, so it got the most downloads in less than 3 months. Also, for reference, it had 1 700 000 downloads, while the second one (Sims 2) had 1 150 000[/footnote] - legitimate customers were most probably forced to pirate it, in order to play it. Aside from this basic disregard of people, EA is well known to have banned people and denied them access to their games for, get this, complaining on their forums. "Hey I don't like X..." "Sorry Fuck you, you won't be playing any of our games any more." You have to admit, OP, that is pretty disgusting thing to do.

 

[Joccaren]

when they actually know nothing about how a business is run or that most of their choices are done out of necessity rather than just to be bastards.

Personally I find this point irrelevent. They ruin games to keep themselves earning money, so we should be happy about that?
No, its a problem. I don't care whether its out of necessity or in the interests of being a**h*les, but its something that shouldn't just be accepted because some big company needed to do it to stay afloat.

It is interesting to note that, in the post somewhere above which laid out many of the smaller companies EA consumed, most of them had been churning out nothing but sequels for several years, meaning that there's every chance they'd have gone under because no one cared anymore as opposed to EA's 'meddling'.

The problem isn't in releasing sequels. Sequels are fine, and often loved. When the sequel is rushed, half assed and a 180 degree turn from the rest of the series, however, is when problems arise. Take DA2 as an example. Its a sequel, but people hadn't had many problems with Bioware sequels before. DA2 comes out and its rushed, it lacks polish, it feels like something they started on a whim, got bored of and never finished, and it was pretty much the anti-game of Origins.
Was EA responsible?
We cannot prove that. However, Bioware - and numerous other studios who've gone through the same thing - were able to make sequels that were liked and enjoyed before being bought by EA. Post EA, most sequels were rushed and generally poorly recieved by fans. There is definitely a correlation between being bought by EA and game quality dropping, and I'd say its a fair bit that its a causal relationship.

Would people have eventually tired of DA had it continued along the same lines as Origins?
I don't really think so. Look at games like CoD. Sequel after sequel of the same old stuff. Its loved, and played over and over. If a game fills a niche, and has little competition - hell, even with competition sometimes - its not likely to fade from popularity to that niche. 'sides, Bioware have gone through a number of IPs, its not like they HAD to keep making DA over and over. New IP, new story. I'd wager it would probably have gone the same for most companies EA bought, though we'll never be able to know.

 

[Saviordd1]

Popcawn heah, get yah popcawn! Freshly popped popcawn! Only use real buttah!

Why does your popcorn seller have a Maine accent?

OT: The list is large but it boils down to "Not giving a fuck about their customers"
My personal grievances are rushing products, horrible customer service, hurting studios, day one DLC, expensive DLC that's utter crap, and their websites/DRM.

 

[NortherWolf]

Why does it always feels like these threads are just started to troll the shit out of people? And badly?

I'm going to be different, I hate EA for Origin, for EA and Bullfrog and all that stuff...But what really made me hate them is the fact that they're in all aspects one of those companies that run a sweatshop in the third world, yet they do it in the West and they're surprised when people notice their douchbaggery!
Take EA Spouse for example and the things she revealed. To me that was what pushed me into "I don't like you guys" and to "Okay, fuck you guys with a pineapple"

And then they just keep on being more evil by each passing day and their fanboys come creeping into every discussion with : "They're not so bad. You're over-reacting"

 

[wintercoat]

Popcawn heah, get yah popcawn! Freshly popped popcawn! Only use real buttah!

Why does your popcorn seller have a Maine accent?

OT: The list is large but it boils down to "Not giving a fuck about their customers"
My personal grievances are rushing products, horrible customer service, hurting studios, day one DLC, expensive DLC that's utter crap, and their websites/DRM.

Bostonian, actually. I have a mild Bostonian accent(I live in southeastern Massachusetts), but when I project my voice, it gets rather thick. That right there is less accented than the way I sounded when I worked over the summer at a small carnival selling popcorn during the 4th of July when I was 16. To be more accurate, it'd be something along the lines of "Pahpcawn heah, ge' yah pahpcawn! Freshly pahpped pahpcawn! Onleh use reeahl buttaaaaaaaaah!" And yes, the a would be dragged out, for about 2 seconds. Apparently, it was funny for the out of towners, who tipped well. ^_^

 

[kingpocky]

I'm surprised no one here has mentioned the whole advertising department being a bunch of morons who make gamers in general look bad.

I'll let EC explain this one.
http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/an-open-letter-to-ea-marketing

 

[Saviordd1]

-snip-

Ah fair enough.
Mass and Maine accents tend to sound semi-similar to us CT'ers.

 

[Zeh Don]

This nicely sums it up.

EA Games requires year-on-year growth, like all publicly traded companies. Games, and I mean good ones, can take over five or six years to actually complete, not including any R&D that went into them.
EA Games allows a developer two years from conception to release. Two years for the entire project - engine development, asset construction, marketing, internal testing, etc. - is simply not enough time.

It's as simple as that. EA Games buys developers, owns their I.P.s, and forces them to work to impossible deadlines.
They're not the only ones, of course. Activision Blizzard has closed eight high profile studios in six years. We're unable to determine how many smaller studios it has acquired, robbed, and closed.

 

[Squilookle]

Never forget. You will be in our hearts forever!

Oh yeah, as well as those other guys.

'Specially Maxis.

They ruled.

 

[rwllay]

essentially its a games company that would rather make money than games, and this leads to conflict with a consumer base who just want to play their games without jumping through hoops such as DRMs, and their attitude to DLC.

They do a number of other things wrong as other people have stated, some of which harm the industry significantly, but i think most people's anger comes from that

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

They force insane deadlines on their studios because they're a bunch of shortsighted greedy morons who don't know the first thing about their own fuckin' market. With insane deadlines developers have to cut corners which means the final product will not be of same quality as the last one. That means less people will end up buying it. Eventually, sales will drop to a point where the numbers will tell them that it's more profitable to shut down the studio and buy another small studio to destroy. They're like locusts. And they've been doing it for years. These days you can add terrible DLC business practice on their list. They will probably shut down Visceral Games after Dead Space 3 because there is just no way that Dead Space 3 will sell 5 million copies. Especially not after what they've done with it. Bioware is also next on their list. The quality of every game made by every EA studio just keeps dropping because of what EA forces them to do in order to earn a quick buck. As I said, shortsighted greedy morons.

 

[ProtoChimp]

Basically, it's because they have a reputation for running smaller companies into the ground, like you said. Here are some examples.

Westwood Studios: Well known and loved for their Command and Conquer series. Bought out by EA in 1998. EA maintained a lot of control in the game making side of things. Last game was "Command and Conquer: Renegade", a complete departure for the series, and not well received, causing Westwood to be shut down.

Origin Systems: Known for "Ultima" and "Wing Commander". Bought out in 1992. "Ultima VII Part 2: The Serpent Isle" was well received, but "Ultima VII: Pagan" and "Ultima IX: Ascension", were...not. Meanwhile, Wing Commander III was considered the peak of the series, with Wing Commander IV being rushed by EA to meet a 12-month deadline (failing to do so by 2 months). Closed down in 2004.

Bullfrog Productions: The original company of Peter "mouth too big for his own good" Molyneux. Bought by EA in 1995. Molyneux left to form Lionhead two years later, with Bullfrog closing down in 2004 after being merged with EA UK.

Maxis: The mind behind "Simcity". After being bought by EA, they went on to make "The Sims", which has a reputation for being dragged down with expansion packs. "Spore" did not go over too well either, being massively pirated. Nowadays, pretty much nothing other than an EA brand name.

Pandemic Studios: The geniuses behind "Star Wars: Battlefront" and "Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction". Partnered with Bioware in 2005, making "Destroy All Humans!". Bought by EA in 2007 when EA bought Bioware. Went on to make "Mercenaries 2: World in Flames", "Lord of the Rings: Conquest", and "The Saboteur", all of which did not meet sales expectations, before being closed down.

Also, EA has a reputation for making the same game over and over, such as with "Madden NFL."

If I give you credit for this can I use this in a video on youtube? Cos that was just a perfect summing up.

 

[rob_simple]

when they actually know nothing about how a business is run or that most of their choices are done out of necessity rather than just to be bastards.

Personally I find this point irrelevent. They ruin games to keep themselves earning money, so we should be happy about that?
No, its a problem. I don't care whether its out of necessity or in the interests of being a**h*les, but its something that shouldn't just be accepted because some big company needed to do it to stay afloat.

But whether or not they actually ruin games is debatable. It's worth remembering that for a lot of fanbases, any change to their beloved franchise is tantamount to ruining it (See: the upcoming Devil may Cry from Ninja Theory). To put it another way: I've never played an EA game I didn't like, and I can't help but feel that may have something to do with the fact that I don't let myself get attached to a franchise because I'd rather see an idea grow than be shackled to tradition in the name of pleasing the unpleasable fans.

It is interesting to note that, in the post somewhere above which laid out many of the smaller companies EA consumed, most of them had been churning out nothing but sequels for several years, meaning that there's every chance they'd have gone under because no one cared anymore as opposed to EA's 'meddling'.

The problem isn't in releasing sequels. Sequels are fine, and often loved. When the sequel is rushed, half assed and a 180 degree turn from the rest of the series, however, is when problems arise. Take DA2 as an example. Its a sequel, but people hadn't had many problems with Bioware sequels before. DA2 comes out and its rushed, it lacks polish, it feels like something they started on a whim, got bored of and never finished, and it was pretty much the anti-game of Origins.
Was EA responsible?
We cannot prove that. However, Bioware - and numerous other studios who've gone through the same thing - were able to make sequels that were liked and enjoyed before being bought by EA. Post EA, most sequels were rushed and generally poorly recieved by fans. There is definitely a correlation between being bought by EA and game quality dropping, and I'd say its a fair bit that its a causal relationship.

Would people have eventually tired of DA had it continued along the same lines as Origins?
I don't really think so. Look at games like CoD. Sequel after sequel of the same old stuff. Its loved, and played over and over. If a game fills a niche, and has little competition - hell, even with competition sometimes - its not likely to fade from popularity to that niche. 'sides, Bioware have gone through a number of IPs, its not like they HAD to keep making DA over and over. New IP, new story. I'd wager it would probably have gone the same for most companies EA bought, though we'll never be able to know.

Sequels are a huge problem in the industry, in my opinion. It's true there is nothing inherently wrong with a sequel, but unlike you I feel that the best sequels are the ones which do a 'complete 180' and change the format, (See: Resident Evil 4,) taking an established universe with characters we like and putting them in a new setting with new mechanics.

I will never understand these people who just want to play sequels that essentially amount to nothing more than expansion packs; a new collection of levels/maps within which the player can do the exact same thing they've been doing for years and years (See: Mario, Zelda, not CoD because it was following a narrative).

As to the rest of your post, I would point out that for every company acquired by EA that end up shutting down, there are just as many who stay independent and end up shutting down anyway. It's the nature of the business. Correlation with EA buying companies and them shutting down, there may be, but I don't necessarily see it as causation.