Electronic Arts on the Future of Gaming

GameDaily.biz has up a discussion they had earlier in the week with Frank Gibeau, EA's Senior Vice President of Marketing, North America. Mr. Gibeau holds forth on where EA is going (and therefore, where the industry is going) as regards next-generation platforms, the prices of future game titles, and the cost of making games. He also comments on Nintendo's position in the market right now. From the article: "I think the Nintendo customer is so entrenched and loyal that the company knows that they have a base of customers that they are building off of. Is it the same size that it was on 8-bit? Certainly not. They definitely have seen their market position erode in the face of market introductions by Sony and Microsoft."

Comments

EA Speaks

[Safety Cap]

"We will burn out wave after wave of our own programmers, until we ship the product!"

Sure...

[grub]

EA peers into the crystal ball...

"I see programmers tied to oars in a galley..."
"Pestilence if you do not row 16 hours per day..."
"A plague on thee who speaks ill of The Captain..."

Hopefully . . .

[Anonymous Coward]

We won't need to rely on EA to determine the future of video games. If Nintendo really does plan to attract indy developers with its Revolution console, I look forward to new, innovative titles instead of EA's well-polished, but derivative, hollywood games.

Re:Hopefully . . .

[Winterblink]

This might come as a shock to you, but EA is a pretty fucking huge game production machine, and does dominate gaming in much the same way Microsoft dominates the home PC operating system market. Whether you like it or not, being the big boy on the block means that EA *could* conceivably direct the industry how they see fit. They already do, when you think about it.

I'm not saying it's a GOOD thing considering their shitty practices. I'm as hopeful as you that other entities in the industry step up with real innovations, and we don't see the same games year after year. I'm still shocked they just don't just slap a "2004", "2005", etc. additive to "Medal of Honor" or "Battlefield".

Re:Hopefully . . .

[MilenCent]

This might come as a shock to you, but EA is a pretty fucking huge game production machine, and does dominate gaming in much the same way Microsoft dominates the home PC operating system market.

Actually, it comes as a pretty big surprise to me.

I haven't bought an EA game since SimCity 3000, and before that it was the Genesis days. EA is big, but it's not *that* big, it's certainly not a Microsoft level behemoth, for the plain fact that there are substantial other studios that still substantial other products -- and many of them.

Further, in a way it's apples and oranges, comparing Microsoft to EA. Microsoft is the top OS manufacturer, but that wouldn't matter so much if they weren't the top office suite manufacturer. EA *just* makes games, so they don't have that same kind of synergy, and they are unable to lock-out other game developers from making whatever they want.

These kinds of anti-competitive measures are what make Microsoft's foothold so difficult to topple, things like purposeful incompatibility with other software, playing games with file formats, embrace and extend, etc. EA may be really big, but they don't have anything like that to secure their own position.

Paraphrased Interview

[CrazyJim1]

Interviewer: Where do you think the future of gaming is going?

EA: We feel that we'll dominate the market and the competition will fall to the way side. So all in all, we're happy.

how about the developers?

[ubrkl]

I don't want to hear about the future of games from the bloody Senior Vice President of Marketing. I'd much rather hear from the developers, engineers and content creators directly, not some corporate mouthpiece.

Re:how about the developers?

[Lurple]

The developers, engineers, and content creators don't really have any say in the direction EA takes. They generally just do what they are told.

Re:Well...

[bersl2]

The highly ironic thing is in EA, the epitomy of everything that is wrong in gaming, owning Maxis, who are creating something that appears to be the epitomy of everything that is right in gaming (see the story and especially the video on Spore).

Re:Nintendo user base size

[GameSlave]

http://johndiesattheend.com/ningraph.gif
which i got from this : http://www.pointlesswasteoftime.com/games/manifest o.html

The Vice Prez

[Master Asia]

Has anyone ever seen this guy in person? http://img-nex.theonering.net/images/scrapbook/ori g/9263_orig.jpg

Here's what it comes down to

[buffer-overflowed]

Whether or not people realize what they really want. Hardware or Software.

I feel sorry for Sony fans. They have nothing to really be fans of except bad laser assemblies and a bad controller that's been around so long we're so used to it that it doesn't matter how bad it is anymore. Certainly not games, because outside of a few titles(notably Gran Turismo), Sony doesn't make games, they make platforms. The games have only been coming because most people buy the platform to get the games that haven't come out yet. You could just as easily substitute a 360, or a Revolution for that PS3 and the exact same thing would happen. PS3 projects would be retooled to go to whichever system has the marketshare.

The games are also why Nintendo is always a safe bet, if you like their stuff that is. Because you know over the course of the hardware's life you're going to get a certain set of titles, as well as some new ones, and if you enjoy those titles you've justified your cost of admission. Third party titles are a bonus.

That's also why Microsoft is a safe bet if you love Live and Halo enough. If you like console ports of PC properties. Any third party titles from the old boys are a bonus.

Imagine the best piece of computing hardware on the planet coming out, but there's no software for it, and it's released by a company that isn't known for their software. Would you buy it? I wouldn't, it's a sucker's purchase.

Anyway, here's what I see happening, and it's all because of the PSP. Everyone who wanted a PSP probably has one by now, but not enough people bought them to overturn the DS's 2:1 lead(which in turn is wayyy behind the GBA). In turn, we aren't seeing many exciting games coming out for the PSP, nor have we heard much about new in-development games of any magnitude. We are seeing some cool toys hitting the DS. So the wait and see people will likely gravitate over there if they go anywahere. If this cements itself, and continues up until the PS3 launch(I'd say this is a safe bet), all of the early adopter, "Sony's totally gonna get all those great 3rd party games," people are gonna be a bit gun-shy about the PS3, on the tail of the relative failure of the PSP.

Toss in Sony muscling devs to make PSP games if they want to make PS2/PS3 games, and boom, the game is Microsoft's and Nintendo's to lose. And that's a SEGA v. Nintendo style battle right there. It's gonna all come down to marketshare, development difficulty, and licensing cost. It's wayyy too early to call it, but if I'm not overestimating my fellow gamers, Sony's gonna wind up the loser.

If I'm wrong, and if Sony wins round three mainly because Square wanted more space for FMV 10 years ago, I'm going to be a sad sad panda.

Oh and as to EA. Who cares what they have to say? So they're the #1 publisher? Nintendo's #2(sometimes even surpassing EA by hitting the #1 slot) and no one seems to listen to them because of that.

Re:Here's what it comes down to

[Lehk228]

All Nintendo has to do to get my money is make another Super Smash Bro's game, that is all, if the revolution ships with Smash in the drive and the drive glued shut i would still buy it.

Oh, EA. You big silly...

[DeanMeister]

So long as the games industry remains what it is (aside from hardware and technological improvements, or even the money going into the industry) EA will not be the top of the gaming industry, now or in the future. They can swallow up as many companies as they want, and they can aquire as many liscenses as they feel like. At the end of the day though, a company of a couple hundred dedicated people with an original idea will always, ALWAYS, beat out a giant corporation. Especially one like EA. EA is like the Wal-Mart of the videogame industry, and I'm getting sick of it.

Re:My prediction on the next gen.

[rAiNsT0rm]

Once again you show your ignorance while trying to find holes that aren't there in my argument. Ya know, sometimes people do actually know what they are talking about, and yes sometimes it is counter to your beliefs. I know I took the low road first with the assclown comment but I truly want you to understand where you are wrong here.

You again are basing your 7 titles and points 1 and 2 on a *summary* of the real article that leaves out huge chunks of what Midway Actually said. Here is the real article: Midway to support PS3 at launch, but not Xbox 360 The amazing thing is the article was edited after the first day to take out the stament where the CEO of Midway calls the Xbox 360 "a niche player" and replaced it with: "pretty small install base..." removing the niche comment. To also puncture your attempt to make it seem as if I'm not up on Midway or the game industry... from your article it states: "Midway is fully supporting the Xbox 360 and we have games in development at all of our internal studios," (emphasis added) The first part also was never actually said by Midway, it was claimed by an update on the gamespot article, I spoke with a rep. (its funny too that they state this statement comes from an un-named "rep.")from Midway and they stated no one would be authorized to make that statement at this time

I have been in contact with five developers for five different studios - one being owned by MS, and he is the only one that had anything good to say but also stated there were issues he was aware of at the moment that he couldn't go into. The others all openly stated their displeasure with the architecture of the 360, the toolsets so far, the costs and time involvement. One even went as far as to breakdown a current game development cycle and approximated a 360 title and the cost rose by over 50%.

Again, I understand that /. is filled with B.S. and B.S.'ers but I am not one and I can back up all of may claims quite easily, my game and game industry knowledge goes back to the Atari 2600, I wouldn't make a statement if it wasn't fact or couldn't be backed with fact and claim it to be so.