EA Forms Wii-Centric Studio

Despite analyst assurances that there would no longer be many console exclusives, EA is forming an entire studio for Wii titles. Larry Probst revealed this tidbit in a very interesting interview with Newsweek's N'Gai Croal. They've since acquired Headgate studios, rebranding it EA Salt Lake. From the article: "I don't think the Wii is going to be any different than all the other Nintendo platforms. Nintendo is going to have a very significant market share, and all the third party companies are going to have market shares that are single-digit or low double-digits. We think that we can be very competitive in that environment. We don't have any expectations that we're going to have a 30 percent market share, as we have had on Xbox 360, on PlayStation 2, or what we're targeting on PlayStation 3. But I think we can have a meaningful market share on the Wii platform, and be in the number two position behind Nintendo."

Comments

I thought...

[Lectoid]

I was originally going to say that I thought Ubisoft was aiming for number two, but that was meant as number two behind EA.

http://games.slashdot.org/games/06/11/27/1919234.s html

Either way, good to see companies fighting over making games for the Wii.

Re:I thought...

[Phisbut]

I was originally going to say that I thought Ubisoft was aiming for number two, but that was meant as number two behind EA.

Ubisoft wants to be number 2 globally, which is for the Wii, PS3, Xbox360 and PC combined. In that combined market, EA is first. However, on the Wii (or GameCube, or NDS, or GBA, or just any console made by Nintendo), Nintendo is by far and beyond the first developer, and I truly doubt anybody will ever catch up to them. Even EA can't make something as successful as Zelda, Squeenix either.

Even if there is extensive 3rd party support for the Wii, 4 Nintendo franchises will sell more than 50% of all software : Mario, Zelda, Metroid and Pokemon. Final Fantasy and Madden can't even dream to get that big a market share.

Uncompetition

[HappySqurriel]

In the long run I expect to see the Wii (if it is popular enough) to be handled by developers in a very similar way to how handhelds have traditional been dealt with. In almost every major third party release for the home console a handheld version was made at the same time because of how much less expensive it was to develop and the size of the userbase for the handheld system. It is possible that you could see Final Fantasy, Metal Gear or GTA (or whatever) being released at the same time for the Wii and other platforms but the Wii version could be drastically different.

EA Has A Million Little Studios

[Anonymous Coward]

EA has a million little studios all over the world. Even if you already know that EA is a big company, the number of little studios the company continuously is buying or setting up is staggering. So this is a pretty meaningless 'development'. It is pretty much the equivalent of a smaller company hiring or making one employee their 'Wii guy'.

There has been some friction inside EA with the Wii, most people want to focus on the PS3 and think the Wii is a distraction. So letting a small group focus on Wii specific stuff is a good option and lets the people at RS and the other main campuses focus on their PS3 titles.

Re:EA Has A Million Little Studios

[Rycross]

Ahh anonymous PS3 astroturfer. For someone who likes to paint the Wii as irrelevant, you sure seem to expend a large amount of effort spreading FUD to discredit it.

I've not heard of any friction concerning the Wii. Maybe if you had some sources, this would be more believable. But it is nice of you to pull the old "I know a lot of game developers who don't like the Wii" trick out of the hat again.

I really can't imagine anyone being so committed to a video game console. Seriously, you act like people are kicking your dog if they dare say anything short of glowing praise for the PS3 and utter disdain for the Wii.

Re:EA Has A Million Little Studios

[nEoN nOoDlE]

So this is a pretty meaningless 'development'.

I agree that EA has a million little studios so opening one up just for the Wii is pretty insignificant. What is significant, though, is that they said they want to be the number 2 developer of Wii titles. That is more than just opening a little studio that will throw out a game every 8 months for the Wii. That declaration will hopefully make other developers think about making Wii titles, since EA thinks it's now a viable market.

my how things change

[grapeape]

Concidering most talk of the Wii as if its just a glorified gamecube, isnt it rather odd that the company that was most vocal about offering minimal gamecube support now wants to be #2 behind Nintendo on the console.

So far I am overwhelmed by the support announced for the Wii, I would not be surprised at the is point to see square even meander back to its original home with more support. It may not win the consumer side of the console wars (I actually think it will) but its clearly won the hearts and minds of developers. Perhaps the original name "Revolution" should have been kept because its certainly introducted an expected spark of creativity and love for platform that most developers thought of as near death.

Re:my how things change

[Pojut]

you know, at first I was mad (like so many others) about the shift from the "revolution" name. Then the more I read the various reasons behind the name change, the more I not only understood it but embraced it.

Revolution, it seems, was used to incite one. Wii, it seems, is used to describe such a revolution. Think about it. As silly as it may seem to some, part of the reason for the name (the "ii" representing people playing together) is actually smart. Small, insignificant, but smart. Look at what Nintendo has pushed with this. The system is not what was the Revolution. The social networking and community that the platform will (hopefully) develop (as it already is starting to) will trump any other social network for any other console in history.

I don't mean because multiplayer will be amazing or anything like that, I mean because the system encourages people to play together. It encourages FAMILIES, not just the kids, to play video games. It provides a way for a family to interact with one another. It provides a way for grandma to get in on the fun.

Like I said, at first I thought the name was pure marketing bullshit. Upon further inspection, however, I understand and applaud their efforts. I consider myself a fanboi of ALL consoles, mainly because I see the good and bad in all of them...it is very rare for me to NOT like a console.

That being said, the Revolution was just the beginning. The Wii is the free world that forms after the revolution.

Also, this frees up Nintendo to use the name in something that truely is revolutionary. As amazing and fun as the Wii is, I can assure you that there are places the technology can go that Nintendo is just beginning to discover.

Re:my how things change

[KingVance]

I can say this with all certainty.

My mom has always hated video games..ever since I got a NES when I was 8 or so. She would play duck hunt but that was it.

I brought my Wii home a day or two after I got it proclaiming "mom, get ready to see the coolest thing in the world"

I got the typical "yeah yeah, just another souped up nintendo"

I showed her wii sports...specifically bowling.

Well...lets just say that my Wii is still at her house and shes gone through 3 sets of batteries.

When I first brought it over, i showed up around 8pm. She played til 5am..woke up at noonish...and played until midnight.

Nintendo acomplished their goal in my family. They didnt grab marketshare...tehy expanded the market.

I have already bought my mom a Wii for christmas....because she said "Son...this is what I want for christmas"

Re:my how things change

[Chris Burke]

And to further abuse -- I mean extend -- your analogy, it's as if traditionally everyone was making rhubarb pie, and trying to make better rhubarb pies to get more of the rhubarb pie eating market. Then Nintendo decided that maybe they should try making an apple pie and thus get people who might like a pie but don't find rhubarb appealing. And the other pie makers made fun of Nintendo because their apple pie wasn't as huge as their pies, and didn't have as finely textured a crust. But a lot of people don't care, they just want a pie they can sit down and eat and find tasty right off the bat without having to aquire a taste for rhubarb.

And something about how you used to have to hit buttons and levers in various sequences to get the rhubarb pie into your mouth, but Nintendo thought it'd be easier for people to be able to just move a fork through the air to get pie into their mouths.

Ooh, and Nintendo got this idea after their successfull experiment in an innovative new snack cake that came with two little fruit pies, one cherry-filled and the other not, along with a toothpick in one portable package. People thought that was a dumb idea too because everyone else was just making smaller rhubarb pies like they did for people's homes.

Okay I'm done.

Early statement

[Programmer_In_Traini]

I'm making a bold early statement here but I predict the Wii will end up largely winner of this third gen console war, not because its powerful but because its so goddamn fun and innovative.

Re:Early statement

[chrismcdirty]

It may only been the third generation since the original PlayStation, but it's actually the seventh console generation.

Hmmm

[PingSpike]

Despite analyst assurances that there would no longer be many console exclusives, EA is forming an entire studio for Wii titles.
I'm not sure why analysts thought the Wii wouldn't have a lot of its own excusives, even from 3rd party developers. Porting to the Wii a game that was designed with the other two big consoles in mind presents two challenges:
1) The Wii has less graphics horsepower.
2) The controller is completely different.

Downscaling the graphics may not be terribly difficult, but I suspect adding Wii controller support onto a game that was built trying to work with traditional control schemes as well, or worse didn't even consider them at first, will have crummy results. Look at the poor porting results of console to PC titles, with interfaces that don't change to take into account the advantages different platform offers. I suspect a similar thing will happen with the Wii. The best and most competitive games in the Wii market are going to be ones that were designed for the Wii from the ground up and take advantage of everything that it has to offer. Which is really no different from any other console.

Re:Hmmm

[Yvan256]

Porting to the Wii a game that was designed with the other two big consoles in mind presents two challenges:
1) The Wii has less graphics horsepower.
2) The controller is completely different.

1. The Wii has less graphic "horsepower" (we're measuring graphics in kinetic energy now?), but since the other two consoles "have to" render in HD, they need to be four times as powerful as the Wii. So, once you take the resolution into account, I'm pretty sure all 3 consoles are as powerful as the other (except maybe the Xbox 360, which wasn't designed for true HD graphics in the first place - if you get below 30fps that's not powerful enough in my book). And the Wii can do 480p, which is as high as regular DVDs, which many people think is "good enough" unless they have HD displays.

2. The controller is completely different, yet it's still the same. Think of the Wiimote+nunchuck as a "gamepad analog stick+mouse" combo. Some games will actually play better on the Wii (if coded properly) than on the Xbox 360 or PS3. CoD3 is a good example - I don't want to play such games with a stupid analog stick to aim. It just doesn't work. That's like trying to play Super Mario Bros with a mouse. And, worst case scenario, the Wiimote can be held like a NES gamepad with rotation just like a PS3 "Sixaxis" controller, Gamecube controllers can be used, and there's also the "Classic gamepad" option. So really, the Wii isn't some "special beast that can't do what the others can't" in the controls department. In fact, aside from the number of buttons (which, frankly, was getting ridiculous in the last generation), the Wii can do more than the other two.

Re:ps3 vs wii

[jrieth50]

Yes, Wii Sports is the pinnacle of the graphical power of Nvidia's chipset technology. After making the GPU that powered games like Resident Evil for GameCube they sat down to create a GPU more powerful and that could handle rendering Fisher-Price lookalike balloon-headed guys with almost no textures. I think its safe to say we'll not see a game with better graphics than the free pack-in multi-game title Wii Sports on this console.