Five Publishers Split NBA Deal

autojive writes "According to a Reuters story, 'The National Basketball Association on Tuesday signed long-term video game licensing deals with five publishers, bucking the recent trend of sports leagues making exclusive arrangements with a single company. Electronic Arts Inc., Take-Two Interactive Software Inc., Midway Games Inc., Sony Corp. and Atari Inc., all current NBA partners, signed new deals with the league.' I guess not playing favorites can get you deals worth a reported 500 million dollars total while hopefully keeping most players and publishers happy."

Comments

No Sega?

[mrwiz]

Ouch... no Sega! Are they just cash strapped or what?

Re:No Sega?

[jokell82]

Sega sold their 2K Games division to Take Two Interactive.

Game Prices going down?

[kniLnamiJ-neB]

I wonder how (long term) this will affect the story from a week or so ago where games were going to be more expensive... surely the game companies can give us po' boys a break since they're not forking over all the dough on contracts like this?

Re:Game Prices going down?

[Golgafrinchan]

According to economic theory, the price game companies charge for their games are independent of the costs. Once they've paid these costs, all the companies want to do is maximize revenue.

If they aren't constrained (i.e., they aren't forced to charge at least $X per game), they'll charge whatever price they think maximizes their revenue. That could be $19.95 (as in Sega's series) or $49.95 (as in EA's series before last year).

In other words, I don't think this deal will affect the price consumers would have paid without such a deal.

Re:Game Prices going down?

[cgenman]

You have to remember that publishers aren't the greatest at economic theory, even if it is their field. No offense to a lot of the great publishers I've worked with in the past, and I have worked with some good people, but some of them used to be toothbrush salesmen. They're not likely to see a price drop as advantageous if they just spent 100 million in licensing. The whole concept of sunk costs isn't as prevalent as it should be, and the natural instinct is to raise prices when you've invested more... in this case probably a lot more than they should have. You need to recover your cost, so you raise prices, sales curve be damned.

If this doesn't effect consumer price, it will more than likely effect quality. At 400 million dollars for 6 years at 6 companies, that's 11 million dollars per game. If these games already had 20 million dollar budgets (and here's a hint: they didn't), that leaves 9 million to actually develop them.

Reprozentin

[NashCarey]

Yo Yo Yo, Da EA wont be crackin da NBA like dey did doze pigskin mo fo's. Props to da roundballers for keepin it real.

Peace out biatch.

Re:Reprozentin

[NashCarey]

My post was labeled troll because I think the ebonic's (a piece of the humor), was clouding the point.

Here is the translation from before:

EA will not be permitted to monopolize the Basketball Players Association like they did the NFL. I was giving my respects to them in this matter. Take Care.

Your find on the Rabbi is a strange coincidence.

Incomplete

[Will2k_is_here]

Now if the NBA could just get the players to sign a deal we'd be on easy street.

Improve What?

[superpulpsicle]

When you cut a deal 5 ways, it's like no cutting a deal at all. NBA is the big winner with so much more cash. The game themselves didn't change.

Sports game history has shown that any player (cough cough.. Jordan, Barkley) can opt out of being in a video game. Can this contract guarantee every player as well as players of the past will be in the game?

I want to see the 80s Celtics in full or the 80s Lakers. This contract does none of that. There is really no improvments made in the game except it assures you EA won't be a monopoly slut.

Blow to EA

[Elranzer]

This must be a blow to EA. Their attempt at monopolistic control of all sports genres fails when NBA signs a deal letting four more companies make official NBA games too.

Promoting competition? Perhaps not...

[Golgafrinchan]

From the article:

EA and Midway will alternate years with their arcade-style games, "NBA Street" and "NBA Ballers" respectively.

Alternate years? That sounds like a restriction on competition to me. I'm sure EA and Midway won't be too heartbroken. When NBA Ballers 2 comes out, they'll have 12 months of arcade-style basketball monopoly until NBA Street V4!

Five for the NBA and Adverts for All?

[FearTheFrail]

Was I the only person to notice this?

A crucial part of the new arrangements will be advertising. In-game ads are a fast-growing revenue stream for publisher and licensors, and Silver said the NBA planned to take full advantage of the opportunity.

"In the online games, we can insert virtual signage in the same way we do during the telecasts," he (COO of NBA Entertainment) said. "As part of the reality we're going to be selling advertising in the same way we do in our arenas."

Not that this is a new idea, but is this just becoming the way of the virtual world?

It's almost understandable to rationalize by saying "Well, there's advertising all over these arenas for x and y sponsors," but at the risk of showing off a mildly offtopic example, there's no Burger King Modein most of the college basketball that I've seen.