EA Makes Minor Tweaks To FIFA 12 For the Wii, Releases It As FIFA 13 105
An article at Nintendo Gamer highlights how Electronic Arts put almost no work into the latest Wii release of their FIFA soccer game franchise, but didn't hesitate to push it out the door anyway. Side-by-side screenshots show the Wii version of FIFA 12 got some minor graphical tweaks — a different splash screen, slightly modified logos, different colored socks on the players — before being re-released as FIFA 13. From the article:
"This is something that needs to be highlighted, because while it would be easy to pass it off and say 'meh, it’s just the Wii version,' the fact remains that this game does still sell relatively well. This isn’t guesswork – as journalists we receive confidential sales figures and though we’re legally bound not to reveal those figures, we can at least say with confidence that FIFA 12 did pretty well for a Wii game this close to the console’s death. The Wii U version of FIFA 13 will no doubt be a fantastic game, since it’ll share a lot (if not all) of the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions’ features. The 3DS version is a solid improvement over last year’s effort, and worth a look if you’re into some handheld football action. This, however – a £30 roster update – is unacceptable."
Modularity (Score:2)
Re:Modularity (Score:5, Insightful)
money
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asshattery
Re:Modularity (Score:5, Funny)
Why, technically, can't rosters be updated separately from the engine?
Whoa, you are talking about taking food out of the mouths of EA shareholders, ultimately damaging the economy and leading to the end of the world as we know it.
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And if you do that, then gay people will get married, and then everyone will be on drugs, and we'll be just like Europe, where everyone is unhappy, unhealthy, and the streets run with blood!
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Cat and Dogs, living together!
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Uh... those comments are the same comments that were posted last year, with minor modifications. It would be unethical for anyone to accept cash for them.
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Hey, one may dream, ok?
Re:Modularity (Score:5, Informative)
Why, technically, can't rosters be updated separately from the engine?
Obviously they can be, but that's not what you're asking. What I suspect you are really interested in is why those roster updates can't be released for free, or at least very cheap.
The answer is licensing. If you want to make a sports game using real team names, and real player names, and real player likenesses, then you need to pay a lot of money to the respective leagues and player associations. EA and 2K can't afford to release free roster updates every year while still paying those licensing fees.
If the rosters are what cost money (Score:2)
Re:If the rosters are what cost money (Score:4, Interesting)
Well first of all, programming the game isn't free, so even with fake teams, it wouldn't be free. Additionally, it's not like the NFL (or MLB or whoever) charges EA some amount of money per license sold. The terms would be more like EA pays X million dollars in exchange for exclusive rights for Y years. Given those terms, it doesn't make sense to sell versions of the game without the real rosters.
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So? You try getting hundreds or thousands of lines of data entry done. It isn't free.
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Actually, does someone really enter the data, or is it some sort of xml feed at a certain point in time that is extracted and uploaded into the game library?
I have a hard time believing that a company as big as EA, does not have some data import engine written that ALL their games use.
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EA owns developers (Score:2)
EA is a publisher, not a game developer.
Then allow me to rephrase: "I have a hard time believing that a company as big as $wholly_owned_EA_subsidiary, does not have some data import engine written that ALL their games use."
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There have over the years been various unlicenced sports game, sometimes where players can create their own roster. The public however are usually too lazy to want to do their own data entry.
Also, how is the business model of 'rosters for money' much different than what they do? Sure you go to store and buy a shiny disk and in most of the versions they try and improve some parts of the game, but ultimately the business question of whether or not people would rather a disk or download from the web seems to
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Licensing fees are one thing but why not just sell them as DLC?
Core game = Free to Play, random players
DLC = Individual players (so they can set their own licensing fee)
DLC = Teams (set of individual players minus a hefty discount for buying the entire team)
Season pass = all teams
Heck, you could even start selling old teams and have great players of the past square off against current teams, just buy the DLC for each... shit tonnes of money to be made this way I'm sure.
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Because they make more money doing it the way they do now???
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Ugh, don't give them ideas. I like to actually own the games I buy. This piecemeal approach to purchasing seems to require one to spend five times as much to get the full game. If they start selling players and teams piecemeal, why not plays as well? "Oh. you want to throw a curveball? That'll be 800 EA bucks, please. Why yes, they are sold in bundles of 750, why do you ask?"
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Who said EA had packaged an engine update with this?
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Re:Rosters (Score:4, Insightful)
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How would you feel buying a new copy of WoW every time they changed the stats on an item? Nonsensical.
The hard-core sports gamer cares about rule changes, rosters, stats, authentically detailed uniforms, stadiums and so on. What he wants to do is to recreate the experience he has seen live or on TV.
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Then I guess he should start to exercise really hard. I heard then they don't even have to pay money, they get money.
It's so win-win...
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Some of my friends and I had the TurboGrafx 16 (PC Engine). NEC hadn't bothered to get the rights to any of the sports games, so as a result we didn't really worry about the age of the game. In fact, it was a long time before a better baseball game came out on any platform.
It's not like the EA rosters were realistic anyway - I remember during the early 90's playing Madden Football on the Sega Genesis, and the players were endowed with talents that they did not have. You could scramble with Rodney Pete.
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Dude I know. In NBA Jam you could literally set the basketball on fire!
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"He's heating up!"
So... par for the course? (Score:3)
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The old Tigger games used to bring fun new stuff to the table, crazy characters and courses, target golf, speed golf and arcade-like modes. Then when '09 hit it got all serious and dull. I gave up after '11 when they started introducing almost compulsory DLC.
I haven't bought an EA game since and I can't say I miss them much.
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Except BulletStorm, but in my defence I didn't know EA had got their grubby mits on it till I got it home and saw the splash screen.
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Re:So... par for the course? (Score:4, Insightful)
I've gotta admit...though I dislike sports games, I would so buy a Tigger golf game.
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Sorry, my pet name for the series. Obviously not as common I as I thought.
Nothing Changes does it ? (Score:3)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Cup_Carnival [wikipedia.org]
So? (Score:1)
It's not like the game of soccer has changed much in a year. If you're buying the game for the first time get the '13 version. If you already own '12 then keep it.
Incompatible online (Score:3)
It's not like the game of soccer has changed much in a year.
It apparently changes enough that the old FIFA game is as as incompatible in online play with the new FIFA game as Quake III: Arena is with Unreal Tournament.
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through the magic of pure asshattery
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And somehow I guess it will be unfeasible in the near future to keep the servers running that host FIFA 12 games.
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Plus, even after both games have been out for over three years now, they can still be played, there are still servers for them.
Is it still possible to play FIFA 10 online?
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Plus, even after both games have been out for over three years now, they can still be played, there are still servers for them.
Is it still possible to play FIFA 10 online?
I stopped buying EA Sports games after buying Tiger Woods 11 in mid 2011' only for the online features to be removed before the year was out, presumably to encourage buyers on to Tiger Woods 12. I expect more than 6 months of value from a game.
Reminds me of a Hockey game review for the N64 (Score:2, Funny)
http://www.ign.com/articles/1998/01/01/olympic-hockey-nagano-98
"We'll post a new review when Midway releases a new game."
EA sports its in the name (Score:2)
EA owns the exclusive rights to organized football (Score:5, Informative)
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Good game but completely broken as soon as you learn how to do the halfway-line goal. Matches where both players know how to do it usually end up 40-41.
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Do licenses matter? (Score:3)
Personally I don't care what it says on the box or what color the uniforms are -- I care more about the gameplay.
Is that an unusual concept in sports games?
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Would you rather play a game with your favorite team and players? Or with fake names and fake players? You have to understand a sports fan first to understand why it matters.
FIFA over Mario Strikers Charged (Score:2)
Personally I don't care what it says on the box or what color the uniforms are -- I care more about the gameplay.
The majority disagrees with you and will choose FIFA over Mario Strikers Charged. They don't want to play football; they want to play as the home team.
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As a company, EA has lost 3/4 of its value since 2008. Down nearly 50% in the last twelve months. What went wrong? First they colluded with Microsoft to gut the PC game market in favor of locked down consoles and did fine for a while until the console market in turn began to be gutted by the shift to mobile gaming which is growing fast but is also filled with competitors and has per-unit pricing at a fraction of EA's traditional markets. Coupled with zero detectable product innovation and a shortage of heal
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call me a half-empty type (Score:3)
Do you mean they ever change? (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously, these game barely change from one year to the next anyway. If you buy one every 5 years, you will see the difference, but that's pretty much it.
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Server switch-off (Score:1)
Next year the servers for FIFA '12 will be switched off, and you end up with a virtually useless game. That's how it has been going on for a while: planned obsolence.
No surprises here (Score:2)
Better or worse than Tiger Woods on the Wii? (Score:2)
Hopefully when they make it for Wii U next time they'll use more of its connectivity features.
If it's unacceptable (Score:1)
Don't buy the game. Seriously, just play last year's version.
If you really want a roster update, then pay the price. If it isn't worth it (which seems the case), then don't.
As long as EA can make money off of this, they will. Especially if it's a considerable amount more than they'd make for actually taking time to update and create a better product.
That's business. Maximize profits and shareholder "value"
If customers don't by the product, profits go do, and they'll have to adapt if they want to make money
There will be lawsuits. (Score:1)
I thought Apple patented making tweaks and re-releasing it as the next big thing.
They did the same thing to NHL on the PC (Score:2, Interesting)
EA has a habit of doing this on systems they don't like or want to support. before they killed off NHL on the PC (fuck them for that)
they released absolutely horrible versions of the game on the PC claiming it was because of "piracy" when it was really just about terribly production values. Their last version on the PC was a PS2 port when the Xbox 360 and PS3 were getting far superior versions because EA claimed the PC was not "next generation"
The fact that EA is a dirty lying company really isn't news.
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Handheld football action? (Score:2)
worth a look if you’re into some handheld football action
Isn't that called rugby?
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