discussion Gaming giant Electronic Arts bought in unprecedented $55bn deal (Saudi Arabia/Jared Kushner)

[MattShizzle]

I haven't bought anything from EA in well over a decade now. They destroyed the Sim City franchise after 4 and the Sims after 2. Then they required for anything their spyware/malware/trojan Origin...

 

[AlBetGam]

(Provided you care about EA products at all.)

The only EA products I even slightly care about are Mass Effect and KOTOR/SWTOR. KOTOR is decades old and beyond harming, Mass Effect was already poisoned in its sleep when they botched 2, and I haven't played SWTOR in years.

 

[Buttergolem]

The only EA products I even slightly care about are Mass Effect and KOTOR/SWTOR. KOTOR is decades old and beyond harming, Mass Effect was already poisoned in its sleep when they botched 2, and I haven't played SWTOR in years.

I undrstand why someone likes ME2 less than ME (less rpg, more pew pew) but saying they botched ME2 is quite an exclusive opinon.

 

[Republican Bear]

I loved BioWare’s games right up until Muzyka and Zeschuk left, after that, it’s been all downhill.

It felt like they were just chasing trends. So honestly, I see a change of ownership as a good thing. It might go badly, sure, but it’s better than the current direction,
which was clearly not working. Sometimes you need that kind of disruption if you ever want a course correction.

And yeah, I don’t really feel pity for the current employees either. If you go back and watch/read their interviews and social media posts over the past years, most of them were fully on board with the changes that drove so many veterans out. Culture isn’t just dictated from the top, it’s shaped by the people who stay.

 

[WigglyWorld84]

All the great EA games mentioned are from acquired studios... I cant think of any true in-house EA property other than the Madden franchise.

Maybe all those studios will be sold off... I would love to see the "Ultima" series back in the hands of... anyone... else (Richard Garriet has kinda gone off the deep end, so not expecting him to save anything.

The dream of Maxis coming back.

Might as well turn this into a pipe dream. why not?!

 

[Republican Bear]

All the great EA games mentioned are from acquired studios... I cant think of any true in-house EA property other than the Madden franchise.

Maybe all those studios will be sold off... I would love to see the "Ultima" series back in the hands of... anyone... else (Richard Garriet has kinda gone off the deep end, so not expecting him to save anything.

The dream of Maxis coming back.

Might as well turn this into a pipe dream. why not?!

Wouldn't bet on it as EA has been sitting on IPs for forty years and doing nothing with them.

Reports even suggest no one wants BioWare or any of it's IPs either as EA tried to sell them this year.

 

[Elezghar]

I haven't bought anything from EA in well over a decade now. They destroyed the Sim City franchise after 4 and the Sims after 2. Then they required for anything their spyware/malware/trojan Origin...

Indeed, luckily we have cities: skylines now from a dev team that actually care about the product.

I play the sports games mainly because they basically have a monopoly so there is very little choice but play waaaay less than I used to when EA actually did create good games.

I'm not fan of the saudis and ofc. This is done at least partly as part of their ongoing sports washing but tbh I don't really care as long as they make good games.

 

[AlBetGam]

I undrstand why someone likes ME2 less than ME (less rpg, more pew pew) but saying they botched ME2 is quite an exclusive opinon.

It's one I can expand on.

Basically, the problems with ME3 stem from their handling of ME2. ME set up a very clear premise for continuing the franchise: the Reapers are coming, everyone knows it, Shepard has to find a way to stop them, clues can be found in the wreckage of previous civilizations they wiped out, and he's a Specter with a permanent "do what I want and get away with it" badge and a loyal crew and awesome ship.

Logically, ME2 should follow up on this: Shepard and crew seeking out knowledge of the Reapers. This is where the franchise should explore things like where they came from, what they're after, how to stop them, etc. Instead ME2 abandons basically all of that in favor of hitting a pointless reset button and recentering the franchise around Cerberus. The Reapers are barely mentioned, everyone basically acts like their attack on the Citadel never happened, Shepard spends almost zero time trying to learn about them, the only significant clue he gets is essentially happenstance (the Collectors turning out to be Reaper servants) with little payoff (if I recall correctly, even retrieving the Collector base doesn't have much impact on the story for 3). And his ship is blown up and crew scattered; the first is mostly pointless because he's immediately given a new one, the second there's some point to because game wants to develop a new crew.

But the upshot is that with everything from the first game either ignored or reset, and the second game spending all its time on either companion missions or what amounts to a giant glorified sidequest, the narrative of the overall trilogy isn't progressed at all. Which I think is what really broke ME3- everything that should have been developed in 2 had to be stuffed into 3, and they continued screwing up by doing a bunch of it essentially offscreen or in a rushed and weak way. The Crucible comes basically out of nowhere, because no time was spent on looking for things like that in the last game. Major revelations like a living Prothean or the Reaper's orgin and creators are stuffed into DLC and arrive narratively at the last minute instead of being integral parts of the story much earlier. Half the game is spent fighting Cerberus, even where it makes no sense, because they're the only enemies that were developed (and not wiped out) in 2. And the thing everyone harps on, the ending choice to the whole trilogy where "your choices matter" has been one of the defining features comes down to "which color explosion would you like" because utterly fundamental questions like "why are the Reapers doing this" and "what is this conflict about" were completely ignored for the entire second game and now it's time to ship the third game and there has to be some kind of answer.

TL,DR: EA botched ME2 by not using it to follow up on the important elements of ME1, which meant ME3 struggled and failed to follow up to either game.

 

[AlBetGam]

Wouldn't bet on it as EA has been sitting on IPs for forty years and doing nothing with them.

Reports even suggest no one wants BioWare or any of it's IPs either as EA tried to sell them this year.

Honestly I wouldn't want BioWare either at this point. Its glory days as a studio are long past, and the flagship titles everyone loved them for have mostly been run into the ground and/or abandoned.

 

[Buttergolem]

TL,DR: EA botched ME2 by not using it to follow up on the important elements of ME1, which meant ME3 struggled and failed to follow up to either game.

Thank you for your explanation. I understand some of your points, while I extremely disagree with ohers. Sadly I don't have the time to reply now, but I will write my thoughts down on sunday. Have a nice weekend.

 

[jkj34]

I have a hard time reading this as bad news. In terms of commercial practices, EA is not exactly an upstanding corp and most of their games are sports game, which are incredibly formulaic, Sims (just DLC predation) or shovelware (looking at you BW). Some good indies but indie studios don't need EA. Bottom line, either EA remains the same (so no difference), they get scrapped (one less scumbag company, good news) or the Saudis somehow and regardless of motives improve EA (also good news)

EA was already a pretty awful company. Maybe now they'll have games that involve beheading and stoning people to death.

I thought the same about Microsoft and Activision/Blizzard. How could anything be worse than Bobby Kotick?

I played Hearthstone for 6 days the week for the last 5 years and now I am quitting. Why?

Let me tell you same things that changed under Microsoft.

Dev are lying.

HS is pay to win now.

HS is a gacha game now.

More technical difficulties than ever.

Maybe that’s because Microsoft fired many people.

Prices for digital products are rising with every update.

No communication with the players or even the people in the creator program.

We have almost the same meta for 24 month now.

I was a fool than I thought it could not getting any worse and I am certain you will feel like one too.

(Provided you care about EA products at all.)

I would like to add that every fucking person is missing the giant issues of this deal


When a American company microsoft wanted to buy a American company activison everyone lost there shit even had a mini protest and the ftc went to court for 15 months.


When a foreign company took over tictok everyone in the govt lost there shit


Saudi araibia goes to buy a American company that has a shit ton of data and kernel level programs on pcs 0 fucking people care the deal was allowed and finished in a week.


Do you see my issue here?

No terms like M$ no investigations on what they want to do nothing.



Also this will be a huge impact to EA there is no way the new owners will allow alot of the shit they had before sims lgqbt content? removed any worker not straight fired i can go on but you see my point. Remember every video game that is sold there has its own version like china but worse they even banned spiderman ps4 for awhile because of a pride sticker/flag.

 

[1nstonE]

I would like to add that every fucking person is missing the giant issues of this deal


When a American company microsoft wanted to buy a American company activison everyone lost there shit even had a mini protest and the ftc went to court for 15 months.


When a foreign company took over tictok everyone in the govt lost there shit


Saudi araibia goes to buy a American company that has a shit ton of data and kernel level programs on pcs 0 fucking people care the deal was allowed and finished in a week.


Do you see my issue here?

No terms like M$ no investigations on what they want to do nothing.



Also this will be a huge impact to EA there is no way the new owners will allow alot of the shit they had before sims lgqbt content? removed any worker not straight fired i can go on but you see my point. Remember every video game that is sold there has its own version like china but worse they even banned spiderman ps4 for awhile because of a pride sticker/flag.

You make some good points but they are explainable.

When MS bought Activision, everyone lost their shit because it was truly unprecedented, unlike now. There were arguments to be made about oligopolies, antitrust issues and whatnot. These arguments and the FTC failed miserably and now the goalposts have moved. If someone tried to make the same arguments here, EA will be like "well, you let MS have it way" and they'll be right. We have opened this Pandora's box. It's not a good thing but it is a thing.

Tictok was not nabbed by any foreign company - it was a Chinese company. Which was a political issue for the US, because in terms of relations with the US, China sits somewhere between necessary evil, bitter rivals and borderline Cold War-style enemies. That was during the Biden days too. The Saudis do not have quite that image. They are the ridiculously rich guys who make stuff for other ridiculously rich guys, buy our ridiculously expensive stuff, and whom the rest of the world wants to keep happy lest they turn off the oil tap.

There is probably some under the table stuff going on to push the deal quickly and silently along (especially with the current administration), and they likely kept it under blankets until the very last minute, but even over the table, there's little to be said. The line should have been drawn at Activision, can't put that cat back into the sack.

As for your last line - depends on one's political affiliations. Some see it as a good thing. The only thing I'll say is the West is hardly any better or less hypocritical but on the opposite side. I still remember Nexus banning the no pride mod, which wasn't even a mod - it just changed a setting to trick the game to think it was the Saudi version - i.e. an officially-made version tailored for that market. If Disney/Marvel had any real principles, they would not keep all their virtue signalling easily editable and removable. If the Saudis clamp down on that stuff, at the very least they will be more principled than their western counterparts. It's all conjecture at this point.

 

[lewdv]

So does this make Titanfall 3 more likely or less likely?

 

[Buttergolem]

Basically, the problems with ME3 stem from their handling of ME2.

I totally disagree with that. Is ME2 kind of a filler episode – yes. But if it and the ME3 content based on it would be removed (or replaced with reaper story), would that make ME a better series. Absolutly not. And I only need one point to explain this. I completed over 200 games in my life and ME3 has by far the worst ending i have ever experienced. Some god-like entity thinks: „I fear that the aliens might build machines that will destroy them. I will prevent this by building machines that will kill the aliens.“. The end is not salvageable. And elaborate on the reaper story would not make this any better.

We could discuss your 2. text block. There are reasons why the citadel is „ignoring“ the reaper attack and why Shepard is going after the collectors instead of the reaper. But in the end it comes down to „you think a flashed out reaper story would be better than the collector sidequest“. I think that is a personal opinion based on feelings, like me feeling that ME2 has the better story. I think you totally overestimate the potential of a reaper story. I am pretty sure we won’t find a middle ground on this point.

Sometimes you have to realize both sides have different opinions that are also both valid. And that’s okay. I accept your strange fringe opinion ^^.

Sorry for the late answer, but better late than never. I hope you have a nice day.

 

[AlBetGam]

I totally disagree with that. Is ME2 kind of a filler episode – yes. But if it and the ME3 content based on it would be removed (or replaced with reaper story), would that make ME a better series. Absolutly not. And I only need one point to explain this. I completed over 200 games in my life and ME3 has by far the worst ending i have ever experienced. Some god-like entity thinks: „I fear that the aliens might build machines that will destroy them. I will prevent this by building machines that will kill the aliens.“. The end is not salvageable. And elaborate on the reaper story would not make this any better.

I'm not saying that fleshing out the Reapers would save that ending, to be clear.

I'm saying that actually addressing what should have been the trilogy's central driving question would have left them with sensible answers to that question, and thus an ending that made sense. Instead of, as you rightly criticize, "to prevent organics and machines from wiping each other out, I've created machines that wipe out organics, now what color lights do you like?" ME3 should have had a different ending entirely, one built off of a framework the player spent the last 2.5 games putting together themselves, and not the oh-crap-this-is=due-tomorrow garbage we got.

We could discuss your 2. text block. There are reasons why the citadel is „ignoring“ the reaper attack and why Shepard is going after the collectors instead of the reaper. But in the end it comes down to „you think a flashed out reaper story would be better than the collector sidequest“.

Well, mainly I think it would be a story at all. As it is we got the first chapter of a story in ME1, a bunch of largely incoherent sidequests in ME2, and for ME3 the bucket Ralph ralphed into after getting force-fed ten cans of alphabet soup.

I think that is a personal opinion based on feelings, like me feeling that ME2 has the better story. I think you totally overestimate the potential of a reaper story. I am pretty sure we won’t find a middle ground on this point.

Sometimes you have to realize both sides have different opinions that are also both valid. And that’s okay. I accept your strange fringe opinion ^^.

Sorry for the late answer, but better late than never. I hope you have a nice day.

You too!