EA Sux
I've been quiet on EA's recent behavior although I really meant to write a Rant about the EA widow and the guy who worked his tail off on The Urbz only to be canned for wanting to work smart and not as part of an organized labor camp mentality: long hours for the sake of filling some bean counter's spreadsheet and idea of what a successful project looks like. And maybe I still will.
For now, I'll just admit that I'm really pissed off at what they're doing to the gaming industry, not to mention well-intentioned individuals who care about artistry and good game design only to get chewed up in the gears of a large machine intent only on world domination. Hey, wait a second: That would make a great game!
A bit of history. Electronic Arts was one of the first game studios to make an impression on me. Back in high school, I bought their Pinball Construction Set for my Commodore 64 - and I loved that it came in a thin, square box that defied the conventions of videogame software packaging. (Of course, back then many game floppies just came in clear plastic ziplock bags.) They were viewed as a collective that stood for the artist and they took game design to a new level.
Today, they're just a lean, green money-making machine. And while there's nothing wrong with that to a certain degree, when they start limiting competition to ensure their success you have to wonder if it's really in the best interest of gamers to stand behind them and hand over their credit cards in tacit endorsement of this behavior.
I'll fall short of calling for an all-out boycott. Last night I picked up Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath because I'm a long-time fan of Lorne Lanning's skewed satirical take on an alternate universe. In this case, EA is only the publisher - Lorne's Oddworld Inhabitants did all of the heavy lifting, and they only turned to this Evil But Lucrative Empire after another spurned them.
I'll post my Oddworld impressions, along with those from some other games I've been playing, soon. In the meantime, remember you - the gamer - do have some say in how things play out. .
-=Gamewatcher
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This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on January 27, 2005 9:11 AM.
The previous post in this blog was Sucks To Be You - EA lays off 60.
The next post in this blog is Yet Another Game Delay - Battlefield 2, Far Cry Instincts.
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Comments (1)
Hm, this is an old post I just came across, but I had to comment. It's funny that you mentioned Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath, because I worked on that game for EA, and it's a perfect example of the EA machine (which hasn't changed since you posted this). It's my favorite game I worked on in 3 years of working there, containing a lot more creativity, beauty, and fun than most EA games. However, when they had trouble porting to PS2, they decided to drop it, and to just release it quietly on Xbox, w/o any kind of marketing push or support for the title, pretty much dooming it to relative obscurity. It's really a shame that they decided not to support such a great game. I don't know if you realize this, but it's also (supposedly) the reason that Lorne Lanning decided to quit developing games and work on other media projects for some time. He was definitely unhappy with the treatment he got from EA.
Posted by Dave | January 9, 2010 11:54 PM
Posted on January 9, 2010 23:54