EA/BioWare Deal Finalized, Nets EA Ten Franchises

Gamasutra notes that the announced deal, where Electronic Arts was to purchase BioWare/Pandemic, has now been formalized. This arrangement will fold ten new franchises into the EA family, from the just-released Mass Effect all the way back to BioWare's classic titles. "EA Games president Frank Gibeau will oversee both studios within his organization, and BioWare's Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk have each been named as vice presidents of EA and co-general managers of BioWare. Similarly, Pandemic's Andrew Goldman and Josh Resnick have each been named vice presidents of EA and co-general managers of Pandemic, while Greg Borrud has been named vice president of EA and chief production officer of Pandemic Studios. "

Re:In related news...

[Hitman Hart]

No, it would be Madden Effect 2010. 2K studios uses the "2KX" formula.

Re:The Collapse Of Microsoft's First Party Support

[Anonymous Coward]

Right. I forgot this was Slashdot. I forgot that Microsoft was a total failure of a company. Has cheated to get where it is today, and has been dying for 10 years now, with each new product having fatal flaws that will kill the company.

Face it. So far Microsoft is in a solid second place, and thanks to the high attach rate and traditional style, probably number one as far as most 3rd party game companies are concerned.

Can Sony pull it together and do better? sure, it's possible, maybe even likely. Maybe Nintendo will start getting some serious 3rd party development and not the shovelware it seems to be getting.

Re:Like Bioware wasn't already stuck in that rut?

[rhombic]

Did you play KOTOR? And KOTOR 2? And you can say with a straight face that Obsidian is "the Honda to their GM"?? Jeezus, KOTOR was a terribly fun game, and ran pretty well on the Xbox. KOTOR 2 ran horribly, had major, game ending bugs, apparently used five year olds as the level designers, and left more plot lines dangling than a daytime soap, and made the Sopranos look like a well-thought out, complete ending. To top it all off, they left all the voice acting to a fantastic, unimplemented ending in the final product, rubbing it in for us. Bioware's not the best ever, but if Bioware is GM, I'd suggest Obsidian is Zastava (maker of the famous Yugo).

What a sad day for gaming

[40ozFreak]

And baby Jesus wept.

That EA is allowed to buy out all their competition rather than be forced to produce top notch titles in an effort to battle over the market is a farce to me. They did it with Madden as well by scooping up the NFL license just as Visual Concepts' ESPN NFL 2k series was starting to show signs of seriously competing with Madden. They can't be allowed to continue doing this. Why would BioWare want this for themselves? Doesn't anyone inside gaming feel that EA needs less help than anyone? Stay independent! Fight the urge to conglomerate!

Re:The Collapse Of Microsoft's First Party Support

[Anonymous Coward]

Your arguement boils down to "Xbox is bigger than PS3 now by a large margin overall, but not in countries other than US, UK and Australia". US, UK and Australia make up the bulk of sales for American games anyway. So when Microsoft no longer has those American developers under their tight control, it still doesn't matter because the console has the biggest install base overall right now and will continue to have the biggest install base in the countries where their games will sell most for a long while to come. They're playing a different game now. They have settled in to a good position and now are adjusting to take advantage of that position.

Also, 5 years down the line we will have a new Xbox because it will be 7 years old by then. We will also probably see a new Nintendo console. The PS3 may stick around for a while, but if you really think developers are waiting for 5 years for the PS3 to catch on and everybody with a PS2 to hop on board, you are sadly mistaken. The PS3 will be weak in comparison to the hardware in the successor to the Xbox 360. The game resets every 5 - 7 years with consoles and everybody starts at zero.

Re:Attach rate counting what?

[Tim C]

Alternatively Wii games, by their nature, may have a higher replay value and greater longevity, leading to fewer sales because why buy more when you're still playing the ones you have?

From what I've seen of the Wii (= the games my ex has for hers) they're mostly about team/party play and replayable games, with games with a definite beginning, middle and end being in the minority - puzzle games, mini games like Wii Sports, etc.

Re:EA ruins another developer.

[syn1kk]

Example 3 - Origin Studios:
"In 1997, they released one of the earliest and most successful graphical MMORPGs, Ultima Online. After this title, Electronic Arts decided that Origin would become an online-only company after the completion of Ultima IX in 1999. However, within a year's time, EA canceled all of Origin's new development projects, including Ultima Online 2, Privateer Online, and Harry Potter Online. Richard Garriott left Origin shortly after and founded Destination Games in 2000."

Example 4 - Westwood studios:
"In August 1998, Westwood was acquired by Electronic Arts (EA) for $122.5 million in cash, and at the time Westwood had 5% to 6% of the PC game market.[1]. In response to what was perceived as an unwillingness to maintain the Westwood brand and independence from EA, many long-time employees quit over the next few years. ... One of the last games released by Westwood, Command & Conquer: Renegade ... failed to meet consumer expectations and commercial goals Westwood and EA had set for it. In March of 2003, Westwood Studios (along with EA Pacific) was liquidated by EA and all willing staff were assimilated into EA Los Angeles."