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EA Borgification of the games industry continues...

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Imperator Jora'h	Posted - 2008.02.25 18:28:00 - [1] Seems EA is at it again. Apparently they cannot stand to allow any innovation in the games industry exist opting instead for endless sequels. Yesterday EA offered $2 billion in a hostile takeover bid for Take Two Interactive (makers of Grand Theft Auto). Wonder when CCP will end up in their sights.
Imperator Jora'h	Posted - 2008.02.25 18:28:00 - [2] Seems EA is at it again. Apparently they cannot stand to allow any innovation in the games industry exist opting instead for endless sequels. Yesterday EA offered $2 billion in a hostile takeover bid for Take Two Interactive (makers of Grand Theft Auto). Wonder when CCP will end up in their sights.
Patch86 Di-Tron Heavy Industries Atlas Alliance	Posted - 2008.02.25 18:51:00 - [3] Thankfully, I believe CCP is a privately held corporation. That means that a "hostile takeover" is impossible- only a consented sale or merger is a possibility. ------ Originally by: Dark Shikari The problem with killing Jesus is he always just respawns 3 days later anyways.
Imperator Jora'h	Posted - 2008.02.25 18:55:00 - [4] Originally by: Patch86 Thankfully, I believe CCP is a privately held corporation. That means that a "hostile takeover" is impossible- only a consented sale or merger is a possibility. In some ways it can be worse. I remember when Microsoft acquired Bungie Software which made some of the best games around back then. I knew someone who talked with one of the owners and asked how he could let it go. He supposedly replied that while not easy when someone puts a check of that size on the table in front of you it is almost impossible to say no and walk away.
Patch86 Di-Tron Heavy Industries Atlas Alliance	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:09:00 - [5] At least it was his decision though. Imagine how terrible it must be for a group of successful and passionate developers to have their company taken away from them against their will- it'd be devastating. ------ Originally by: Dark Shikari The problem with killing Jesus is he always just respawns 3 days later anyways.
lofty29 Reikoku Band of Brothers	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:25:00 - [6] Edited by: lofty29 on 25/02/2008 19:32:52 Ok, I'm going to stop this whole 'EA IS EVIL EMPIRE ZOMG11' once and for all. EA are not a bad company. Their in-house developers are rather...crap...and known for slinging out the same sports titles yearly without fail (and people STILL buy them ). As a publisher, they are a developer's dream. They don't choke deadlines as much as some publishers, purely because they have so much ******* money already. They give the developer's free will to do as they wish. They let the developers run the project, not the hotshots in suits working for the publisher. Valve signed with EA because they let Valve stay as Valve, and publish over steam. EA makes a fair chunk of cash publishing retail versions of Valve games (Orange box most recently) and will continue to do so in the future. EA would likely take over Take-Two if their bid is successful (likely to be, as $2bn is more profit than the GTA series has made combined). Take-two / rockstar have alot of money, but not that much. EA would let rockstar stay as rockstar, but would likely make Take-Two merge into EA, and publish GTA for R. They would probably enable online distribution of it as well, through their questionable, but not bad, distrubution service. If anyone can name me a Developer that has suffered because of joining EA, please, let me know. They are a very very good publisher. Battlefield? BF2 was great, 2142 was ok. It wasn't EA's fault it suffered, it was the developers. It wasn't a good idea and it was rushed by them. The Sims? As far as I know, it's still as awesome as it has ever been, and yes the expansions are crap, but they always are. Pete Molyneux has total reign over what happens to the sims genre, as he's the head of the Development studio, not EA. The Ultima series? Richard Garriott hasn't made an ultima game since the 90s. He's probably not going to make one any time soon. EA have the rights to ultima, and he's *ed about it because he didn't have a choice in the matter. He got alot of money from the ultima series. People are just **ed at EA because they bought out alot of shares in alot of companies, but hardly enough for 'hostile takeovers' like some people seem to think they're trying to do. Stop thinking EA are bad, mmkay? EA inhouse devs = crappy EA publishing = developers dream. 族---族 Latest Video : Relentless
Rulkez The Wild Hunt Pure.	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:36:00 - [7] Edited by: Rulkez on 25/02/2008 19:36:45 Originally by: lofty29 stuff ^^ What he said + they now own some of the most talented development houses in the games industry. Criterion were given complete freedom to do what they liked with burnout, as im sure bioware will be with their next title, hating EA simply because they are a mega corp is old, please move onto vivendi-activision.
Sokratesz Rionnag Alba Triumvirate.	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:41:00 - [8] One dev team that got killed by EA: Westwood. Ever since red alert 2 they have released only semi-decent games. Yuris revenge was a joke, generals was okay but extremely unstable on LANs and most games resulted in massive turtling. Zero hour offered nothing extra and just added to the extremly slow gameplay of generals and even more massive turtling. C&C 3 was okay but much too short and severely lacking in innovation or multiplayer satisfaction.
Dark Shikari Caldari Sharks With Frickin' Laser Beams Mercenary Coalition	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:42:00 - [9] Edited by: Dark Shikari on 25/02/2008 19:44:07 Originally by: lofty29 Ok, I'm going to stop this whole 'EA IS EVIL EMPIRE ZOMG11' once and for all. EA are not a bad company. Their in-house developers are rather...crap...and known for slinging out the same sports titles yearly without fail (and people STILL buy them ). As a publisher, they are a developer's dream. They don't choke deadlines as much as some publishers, purely because they have so much ***** money already. They give the developer's free will to do as they wish. This is so far away from the truth it hurts. The primary reason EA games tend to suck is they cripple developers in every way possible--they give them specs for games that suck, and the developers implement them. They trash their budgets and give them impossible deadlines. They buy up companies and liquidate them, stealing their IP and making crap games out of it. They have bought over a dozen major studios so far, and every single one has predictably been ruined**. They refactor their games for the lowest common denominator instead of trying to make them good. See what happened to Maxis, or Westwood, for the most well-known examples. The problem is not in the games they publish--its in the game developers they buy up and destroy. They are notorious for buying studios solely for the purpose of liquidating them (Westwood) and destroying their talent. Haruhiists - Overloading Out of Pod discussions since 2007.
Spaced Skunk 9omH	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:46:00 - [10] Originally by: Dark Shikari Edited by: Dark Shikari on 25/02/2008 19:44:07 This is so far away from the truth it hurts. The primary reason EA games tend to suck is they cripple developers in every way possible--they give them specs for games that suck, and the developers implement them. They trash their budgets and give them impossible deadlines. They buy up companies and liquidate them, stealing their IP and making crap games out of it. They have bought over a dozen major studios so far, and every single one has predictably been ruined. They refactor their games for the lowest common denominator instead of trying to make them good. See what happened to Maxis, or Westwood, for the most well-known examples. The problem is not in the games they publish--its in the game developers they buy up and destroy. They are notorious for buying studios solely for the purpose of liquidating them (Westwood) and destroying their talent. I stand by this statement. To Spawny, a great guy, a great laugh. Rest in peace buddy.
Weeman Caldari Spartan Industries Triumvirate.	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:53:00 - [11] It looks like EA have learned from how they destroyed Bullfrog and Westwood respectively. This doesn't make them a brilliant publisher however, just less **** than they used to be after they buy something. In fact a director or whatever recently said that, they used to impose their middle management and corporate structure on new dev teams and it absolutely destroyed their creativity. That said i'm surprised Take Two hasn't been bought a few years ago, after their disastrous Driver 2 episode and probably deserve it. Problem is this definitely looks like going through, they've already been in priv negotiations and i can see the shareholders going for this one they've offered a VERY good price.
Patch86 Di-Tron Heavy Industries Atlas Alliance	Posted - 2008.02.25 19:57:00 - [12] Originally by: lofty29 If anyone can name me a Developer that has suffered because of joining EA, please, let me know. They are a very very good publisher. What are you on, Lofty? Westwood- arguably the founder of the whole RTS genre. When they were bought by EA in '98, EA attempted to homogenise them by reallocating staff to in-house development teams and downplay the Westwood brand, removing most creative control from the original team. As a consequence, many of the most high profile employees quit, and Westwood was effectively no-more. Bullfrog (Molyneux's company) was bought by Sims, and ceased to function as an entity. Due to pressures from EA, most of the staff quit the company in frustration. Molyneux and some others founded Lionhead Studios (which is owned by Microsoft, not EA) and many others founded Mucky Foot (of Startopia fame). Peter Molyneux has never been involved in any Sims game of any variety- you are probably thinking of Will Wright. Origin (Garriott's old company, of Ultima fame) was bought by EA a way back, and pottered along OK for half a decade. Since then however, the cmpany has largely been gutted- Garriott left in a fit of ill temper, all in-progress development was cancelled, and the staff roster was appropriately scaled back until the company was nothing but a support team for Ultima Online. As an active developer, they are near enough defunct now. As for their behaviour with The Sims franchise, it's pretty appauling. So they creat Sims 1, and it's a hit. They release a series of logical expansions (new objects, areas, interactions, etc). They take it a few expansions too far and release a few stinkers, but whatever. Then they release the much anticipated The Sims 2. Much to the chagrin of fans of the series, the initial retail boxed release contains near enough exactly the same features as the original The Sims release (with the sequel's most major changes in place, obviously). This isn't because, like with the original, they needed time to develop and nurture new ideas all the way from brain to disk. The reason they did it was exclusively so they could release a massive number of expansion sets, as with the original. Thats a market technique that has never been dared to be used by any other major publisher in gaming history, and is just plain atrocious. ------ Originally by: Dark Shikari The problem with killing Jesus is he always just respawns 3 days later anyways.
Roxanna Kell FinFleet Band of Brothers	Posted - 2008.02.25 20:28:00 - [13] Lets ask E.A and see what they think about this? Linkage
lofty29 Reikoku Band of Brothers	Posted - 2008.02.25 20:29:00 - [14] Meh, I stand by what I say even if some of it is off. I know EA liquidated Westwood, Bullfrog, etc (horridly raped ENB) but I'm not trying to argue that. EA give most of the developers they buy, especially the big ones, near free reign over their games. Crysis, Bioshock, both delayed to hell for a year or more, but EA let them. EA knew they would be good games, and they let them achieve their potential. People cry at EA for Bioshock not being as good as System Shock, but it's hardly their fault. Some people find Half life better than Half Life 2. It's Valve's fault if that's the case. The developers are the problem if a game doesn't reach its potential, not the publisher. Yes, alot of publishers horridly choke deadlines (THQ, Activision) but they're out for profit, not a good game. Stalker was choked by THQ because the Devs were wasting so much time trying to make their dream a reality (one seamless map, but the AI was giving them an issue over the maps, so THQ told them to stop because they'd delayed for 2 years already). They get a second chance at the seamless map in Clear Sky (due for release Q1 2008 (lol)) There's examples for every developer where they didn't choke tho. THQ didn't choke Supreme commander. That had been in concept development since Total Annihilation, and started development in 2003 / 4. EA don't choke Crytek, or Bioware. Activision choke most everyone, but they're ****s. What I'm trying to argue, even though I got sidetracked, is that EA are probably one of the best commercial publishers out there, because of 1. Their vast pockets, and 2. their lessened choking of deadlines. Valve are (imo) the best 'publisher', if you can all them that. Steamworks has made them the uberdev. I see no reason for any new developer to publish on anything other than steam now. Afaik all a major dev has to do to get published on steam now is contribute to valve's Steam server cluster. And minor devs (indie games) get to publish for free (valve get a small % of profits, something like 20%). 族---族 Latest Video : Relentless
Frezik Basically Outdated Stereo Equiptment	Posted - 2008.02.25 20:43:00 - [15] Edited by: Frezik on 25/02/2008 20:45:14 This isn't a "hostile takeover". They're simply offering bids. EA's CEO stepped down in Feb. 2007, and I think they've been a lot less evil since then. While they still turn out useless Madden sequels, they don't seem to gut their subsidiaries into a lifeless shell anymore, either. Edit: Anyone else find it ironic that EA was founded on the idea of strong individual developers (like Gathering of Developers was, or United Artists for the movie industry), but is now the poster boy for lifeless corporate game developers?
Patch86 Di-Tron Heavy Industries Atlas Alliance	Posted - 2008.02.25 20:58:00 - [16] Edited by: Patch86 on 25/02/2008 20:58:12 Originally by: Frezik Edited by: Frezik on 25/02/2008 20:45:14 This isn't a "hostile takeover". They're simply offering bids. The definition of a "hostile takeover" is offering bids for a large stake in the company against the company's board's will. Any company that publicly trades shares can in theory be bought up if their public shares are all bought. EA offered 50% more than those shares are publicly worth, meaning they're angling for a quick and huge stake in the company. If they were just after a small stake in the company, they would be buying on the open market as normal. And if they were after a mutual merger, they'd be making offers privately to the company's board. ------ Originally by: Dark Shikari The problem with killing Jesus is he always just respawns 3 days later anyways.
Imperator Jora'h	Posted - 2008.02.25 21:02:00 - [17] Originally by: lofty29 EA give most of the developers they buy, especially the big ones, near free reign over their games. Crysis, Bioshock, both delayed to hell for a year or more, but EA let them. EA knew they would be good games, and they let them achieve their potential. People cry at EA for Bioshock not being as good as System Shock, but it's hardly their fault. I'm pretty sure EA had nothing to do with Bioshock. Mass Effect was Bioware's recent product but it released all of a month after EA bought Pandemic and Bioware. Note how they snap up a company just prior to a big launch (not Take Two just 2 months before GTA:4). And of all the companied they have acquired innovation has pretty much come to a grinding halt. These were among the most creative of developers and after EA gets them they tend to churn out endless sequels. Did you see any more innovation coming from EA or those it bought? Maxis? Origin? Westwood? Bullfrog? Sooner or later they all succumb to the corporate juggernaut and get subsumed completely. Anything unique or interesting is buried under suits and marketing types.
lofty29 Reikoku Band of Brothers	Posted - 2008.02.25 21:04:00 - [18] Originally by: Imperator Jora'h Originally by: lofty29 EA give most of the developers they buy, especially the big ones, near free reign over their games. Crysis, Bioshock, both delayed to hell for a year or more, but EA let them. EA knew they would be good games, and they let them achieve their potential. People cry at EA for Bioshock not being as good as System Shock, but it's hardly their fault. I'm pretty sure EA had nothing to do with Bioshock. I'm giving up now. I can't think / quote properly why people are mic spamming on vent, yelling at me to find a TF2 match. 族---族 Latest Video : Relentless
Frezik Basically Outdated Stereo Equiptment	Posted - 2008.02.25 21:13:00 - [19] Originally by: Patch86 Edited by: Patch86 on 25/02/2008 20:58:12 Originally by: Frezik Edited by: Frezik on 25/02/2008 20:45:14 This isn't a "hostile takeover". They're simply offering bids. The definition of a "hostile takeover" is offering bids for a large stake in the company against the company's board's will. Any company that publicly trades shares can in theory be bought up if their public shares are all bought. RTA. The bids were private until recently, and the board refused them. Nor is EA trying to buy up the public shares.
Weeman Caldari Spartan Industries Triumvirate.	Posted - 2008.02.25 22:09:00 - [20] A list of the studios EA has bought and then subsequently closed. Frightening
Corstaad	Posted - 2008.02.25 22:15:00 - [21] There not doing anything wrong by buying out all these business. That said I wouldn't invest a lick in this company unless you day traded. There quality issue's are getting pretty much common knowledge even outside of the gaming community. If CNBC is talking about it during there morning show I'd say they have problems.
Mtthias Clemi Gallente The Space Bastards	Posted - 2008.02.25 22:26:00 - [22] I think that they have learned their lesson from the likes of Westwood, they have even admitted their mistakes in the way they handled this. Im all for giving them one last chance to do things right.
Patch86 Di-Tron Heavy Industries Atlas Alliance	Posted - 2008.02.25 23:38:00 - [23] Originally by: Frezik Originally by: Patch86 Edited by: Patch86 on 25/02/2008 20:58:12 Originally by: Frezik Edited by: Frezik on 25/02/2008 20:45:14 This isn't a "hostile takeover". They're simply offering bids. The definition of a "hostile takeover" is offering bids for a large stake in the company against the company's board's will. Any company that publicly trades shares can in theory be bought up if their public shares are all bought. RTA. The bids were private until recently, and the board refused them. Nor is EA trying to buy up the public shares. RTA yourself. Quote: Electronic Arts, which publishes hit games like the Madden N.F.L. and Need for Speed series, offered to pay $26 a share for Take-Two, a 50 percent premium over its share price of $17.36 on Friday. The offer was made publicly after a series of private offers to Take-Two were rejected by its board. After private offers for a merger were rejected by the board, they made the offer public in an attempt to woo shareholders. If they can persuade the shareholders to vote for a merger against the will of the board, thats a hostile takeover. ------ Originally by: Dark Shikari The problem with killing Jesus is he always just respawns 3 days later anyways.
Rawr Cristina Caldari Cult of Rawr	Posted - 2008.02.26 01:48:00 - [24] Edited by: Rawr Cristina on 26/02/2008 01:50:32 Maxis, Westwood, Bullfrog, Origin, DICE, Pandemic, Bioware, Rockstar, etc who next?
Meiyang Lee Gallente Azteca Transportation Unlimited Gunboat Diplomacy	Posted - 2008.02.26 09:35:00 - [25] Lets sort this one out with a little fact overload. Read this little piece of info about which studios AE aquired, and which they subsequently closed down. Their current CEO has admitted that in the past they made some rather large mistakes by trying to adapt a developers culture to suit their own, but they want to change that. So while EA has been the evil borg to some developers they bought out, they plan to change that. All their recent aquisitions have been left untouched as far as inhouse culture and setup goes, so here's hoping that EA will become every developers dream publisher given time. Because they can throw a lot of money around to promote stuff which can't be all that bad.
Surfin's PlunderBunny Minmatar GoonFleet GoonSwarm	Posted - 2008.02.26 11:07:00 - [26] Quick, everyone buy CCP stock before EA does something! Originally by: Avaricia look a goon lol

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