EA, cowardly moves... NFL is now EAs for 5 years...

[Nightz]

Though my thoughts on the nintendo situation. Next to Rockstar I can't think of a company that dislikes nintendo more than EA.

Wrong, actually EA is one of Nintendos biggest supporters they titles may not sell as well but it is profitable for them.

Why do you think EA dislikes Nintendo?

Look at it this way most major third parties have dropped GCN completly (rockstar, eidos), but all of EAs major games are on both nintendo platforms.

EA has healthy support of the new DS system, healthy GBA support, they supported the N64 and still support the Gamcube very well.

 

[speng]

What if...

The next ESPN football game, with made up characters and personas is even more involving, fun and creative than Madden NFL.

They would need a good ad campain and some features to influence people to forget about these "real" NFL players.

But we could see a major change for the better. Where the NFL gets punished for it's choice to allow exclusivity and EA gets beaten with a non-NFL game.

ESPN would have to beef up their player creation system and continue to improve the gameplay.

But I don't see this as a nail in the coffin, it might even force more innovation from pissed off developers, who says..we'll show ya what we can do with "made up" characters.

Speng.

 

[Acert93]

Those are some good ideas. Maybe Sega will develop a College-Professional series that emphasizes a total career aspect. Giving players indepth personalities that affect how they play with some more excellent presentation etc... the question is it would be a lot of financial investment and questionable returns. Maybe Sega could get an NCAA exclusive?

Gamespot has a good article on this. I thought this quote was funny:

"I really respect them, but the consumer really loses," one analyst told GameSpot. "EA is both evil and really smart."

I find it interesting that the NFLPA made reporters retract statements about this deal being in the works in the spring. Funny how it was true all along, yet they denied it to the point of forcing magazines to retract the statements concerning a possible exclusive deal.

 

[AzBat]

From what I read it seems not even ESPN/Sega can make a NFL game...

These five-year agreements -- which EA negotiated separately -- give EA the exclusive rights to the NFL teams, stadiums and players for use in its football videogames. Both agreements also include exclusive rights for console online features.

In addition to player names, it looks like EA got the rights to the team names and stadiums too. How can you have an NFL game without the team names? I seriously doubt ESPN or Sega will even get to use the word "NFL" in its game title. "ESPN Pro Football 2K6" just doesn't sound like a good game. Whoever said bring back Tecmo Bowl is right.

Also, no more online roster updates for non-EA games. No wonder Microsoft shutdown their sports titles.

Tommy McClain

 

[Inane_Dork]

What if...

The next ESPN football game, with made up characters and personas is even more involving, fun and creative than Madden NFL.

I'll tell you "what if." EA would run them into the dirt with PR and Sega would stay there.

Casual gamers, almost the entire football fanbase I'm guessing, want to play as the NFL stars. It's a nice thought, and I wish it would work, but I doubt it very, very much.

 

[Fox5]

wco81,

EA has been, lets say, less than ambitious with the Madden line at times. There were issues in the 16bit era where they actually had releases get worse and worse. They had a very poor 1st PS release--so bad it was cancelled because 939's GameDay was a LOT better. Even with the year delay Madden was no where as good as GameDay, or maybe even Acclaims football game. They had to claw their way back, the Madden name really saved them. When the PS2 came out they stripped away a ton of features and basically reintroduced them in following years.

It is ironic that EA's decision to not support the DC has come back to bite them. NFL2k series was born out of that spurned relationship. I think any Madden fan can attest to the fact the last 3 years Madden has done MORE to fix problems than ever before. It is not a coincidence that those same 3 years have seen IMMENSE competition from Sega.

So there is evidence that EA would be more than happy to slow down progress. We will never surely know, but the rapid changes over the last few years I think does indicate that competition was GOOD.

Without the competition I am not sure what will happen, but I can say this: It is not good for consumers. Not everyone likes Madden, so why should they be forced to go with Madden? The NFL has a monopoly, and to share the monopoly hurts consumers.

Here is an example: EA refused to do Xbox Live. So MS had Fever and ESPN on Xbox Live. So gamers who wanted to play online COULD with non-EA games. Competition dictated who was successful. Now think about this: There is no more Fever or ESPN. If EA decides it does not like Xbox2 Live, or hates Revolution, gamers will have no other options. I don't tell me EA is above that. EA did it to Sega/DC before, and as this agreement shows they will do anything for competitions sake.

I am 100% for them being successful, just as long as there is competition. History tells us lack of competition breeds complacancy, and EA has demonstrated this as being true with Madden in the past.

Just my opinion... and please note I LIKE Madden games, they are my favoritve football games. But I also appreciated the competition Sega provided, and in the end the NFL and Consumers were winners. Now, only EA and the NFL are winners.

Isn't the NFL2k team the old EA madden team from the genesis days? What where they doing for the rest of the 90s? I guess it took EA a while to replace the dev team they lost.

 

[Sonic]

EA still has yet to replace the team they lost. This is tragic news. EA is a dirty underhanded company and I may opt to never support them again. Not that it will matter much if I go that route. I will post more mon my thoughts of this tomorrow.

 

[wco81]

THere is nothing dirty about it. THe NFL and the NFLPA solicited bids from several other companies. So EA had to bid to win, unless they wanted to kiss their NFL games goodbye.

It's what every other company would have done. Now, I understand there is some resentment against EA for their practice of gobbling up promising developers.

But EA doesn't owe anyone but their shareholders anything. This is a ruthless move but it's also a rational business decision. They have a lot of money tied up in their NFL games so they had to win the bid.

Now it's not good for consumers but EA like every other company in the industry is out to make money.

 

[Fox5]

EA still has yet to replace the team they lost. This is tragic news. EA is a dirty underhanded company and I may opt to never support them again. Not that it will matter much if I go that route. I will post more mon my thoughts of this tomorrow.

Does EA have dev teams in the normal sense? They always seem to buy out companies(like westwood), and then fire all the employees and close the company. I assume they keep a good amount of people around though, and that maybe they shift employees from project to project as needed, and there is no Madden team, or Medal of Honor team, or what not since the people involved are always changing.

BTW, how high do you think EA would have gone with the bidding for the NFL license? Would it have been a level that sega couldn't afford, even with the massively increased sales to their football games it would bring in the future years?

 

[wco81]

EA does have a Madden team. They are EA Tiburon in Florida.

One thing ominous that Larry Probst said was that they will try to bring along all their development staff to the new generation, training where necessary but some of them won't be able to make the transition.

CNN has a column on this deal where they report the rumor that EA paid between $300 to $500 million for this 5-year deal.

With the only NFL game now, EA could affect next gen market share if they chose to award exclusivity. Their business model is obviously to be on all platforms but if MS or Sony paid for exclusivity...

 

[Acert93]

THere is nothing dirty about it... Now it's not good for consumers but EA like every other company in the industry is out to make money.

I agree wco91. EA did a smart business thing, but I do believe for many reasons this is a bad deal for the consumer because of the many reasons pointed out before. One thing I would say though is that while EA is accountable to their shareholders, public opinion is important also. While this alone may not turn people against them, the more things they do to hurt publical opinion of their company could hurt sales, and therefore shareholders.

Although I am a realist. I may boycot Madden, but I expect this to pay HUGE dividens for shareholders. Madden 2006 will do substantually better than 2005. I would even guess that 2006 is a better game to "prove" they deserved the license. The average consumer really loves Madden and this was a good move for EA. In my opinion it hurts consumers, and that is why I am upset. Oh well, I am replacable with all the NFL fans who bought ESPN who now have no choice but to by Madden now I know how this works... but I am not happy about it.

 

[Inane_Dork]

Chances EA will demand money to release each version of Madden 2006: 1/1

 

[thop]

So that pretty much means it'll only be roster upgrades in the next 5 years? I cannot imagine EA trying hard anymore after that deal.

 

[Acert93]

Interesting, DICE stockholders rejected the EA bid to buy them out:

http://www.gamesarefun.com/news.php?newsid=4026

Who knows, maybe since BF is a online game maybe they want to go the Steam route and make more fo the pie? Maybe the stock holders think BF can be a massive franchise? Dunno... interesting none the less.

 

[Fodder]

Who knows, maybe since BF is a online game maybe they want to go the Steam route and make more fo the pie? Maybe the stock holders think BF can be a massive franchise? Dunno... interesting none the less.

Or maybe someone finally looked at what happened to all the other formerly great developers EA swallowed up, put two and two together, and told them to where to stick their takeover bid.

 

[AzBat]

http://sports.ign.com/articles/573/573544p1.html

http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/7361/Midway-Announces-Blitz-Playmakers/

Looks like we won't have to suffer with nobody releasing non-EA pro football games.

The Midway game sounds cool. I also like the idea of a HOF or another NCAA game. I hope this NFL deal EA got comes to bite them in the ass.

Tommy McClain

 

[wco81]

Well if you want Xenon to do well, you would want the version of Madden which launches with Xenon to do well, help sell systems.

 

[Nappe1]

Interesting, DICE stockholders rejected the EA bid to buy them out:

http://www.gamesarefun.com/news.php?newsid=4026

Who knows, maybe since BF is a online game maybe they want to go the Steam route and make more fo the pie? Maybe the stock holders think BF can be a massive franchise? Dunno... interesting none the less.

yes! this is a good news. when their board of directors decided to accept the deal, there was _A LOT_ of discussion on the net about old EA devs that had experienced something what I don't call constructive working enviroment. Maybe that had something do with this.


(I admit that also I used all my connections that might have contact at DICE to deliver message NOT to accept the deal or DICE is going to be dead sooner or later. So, I do care about the business in all nordic countries. besides, DICE is "a flipper legend." )


there's no dev house that would have been suvived alive from EA. Even Maxis, though it's part of the EA, isn't anymore the same. quite lot of ppl have left or given flag to go.

 

[AzBat]

Well if you want Xenon to do well, you would want the version of Madden which launches with Xenon to do well, help sell systems.

True. You got a point, but I still don't like the idea behind this deal. Only way for this to be good for the consumer is for EA to loose the contract and allow other companies compete against them. I doubt it will happen though.

Tommy McClain

 

[thop]

I've been thinking how important are the names/faces really? EA also holds the FIFA license exclusively (for many years now), yet real football (soccer) fans always claim that Winning Eleven (Pro Evolution Soccer) is the better game anyway.

If ESPN is sneaky they are gonna make all characters fully editable, data with all characters faces and names will leak to the net in no time.