The EA Bashing thread

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 3:46 am

Since Arrogant Bastard really doesn't want this stuff in his thread, I felt it was time to give this topic its very own thread.

I first encountered EA when I bought Lakers vs Celtics for the Sega Genesis. The high production value they put in their games was just incredible. They really made you think that a huge professional corp was producing a game not just a few fat dudes with coffee stains on their transformer tshirts. I and many others bought a ton of their sports games. It even seemed like EA itself was actually keeping the Genesis competitive with the SNES(which had EA sports games but the ports often sucked for a variety of reasons). Once in awhile a competitor would challenge EA but they would often drop out of the running once it became obvious that EA's game quality was just too high to compete with. This would go on through the playstation era...

The dreamcast would be the system that exposed me to a gaming lifestyle that did not include EA sports. Visual Concepts took awhile to pick up steam but when they got going they were ready to take on Madden himself. Then EA took away the NFL license, bought out Criterion while stuffing burnout 3 full of crappy music, and now they're trying to buy out ubisoft and turn the company into ps2 port city. I couldn't abide this so I even passed up on burnout 3... I also used to be a huge NBA street fan, now my collection stops with vol 2. I've bought so many EA games that I even feel that I contributed to this monstrosity that we have today.

crithit5000 · Post by **crithit5000** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 3:56 am

>sighs<

Everywhere I go, EA bashing.

http://www.watluljenou.nl/antieacult/

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 4:50 am

^^^I understand your point, but can someone tell me one single thing that EA has done for the good of the gaming market as of late?

I imagine their meetings go like this:

EA CEO: Ok crew. Here are the plans for 2005. Release sports games based on licenses from the actual players associations, add the 2005 moniker to them. That is all, let's get to work, those rehashed sequels aren't going to program, market and fill with licensed music on their own, are they?

Honest. I swear I will dye my hair silver the day EA produces and publishes an RTS, for example. Or a sequel to the games that made them famous in the early 90's. Fairy Tale Story with Xbox graphics.. hmm.....

TWITCHDOCTOR · Post by **TWITCHDOCTOR** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:02 am

I have a lot of love for EA since back when their logo was ECA.
My first EA game? I think it was "The Bards Tale" . It was a "first person" turn based Role Playing Game, in the vein of Dungeons & Dragons.
This was back in 84-85? For the Commodore 64 computer.
Other greats where Lords of Conquest,Racing Destruction Set... again for the C-64
I won't even try to describe my love for the Need For Speed series.
Not to mention my favorite football game...John Madden(the first one on the Genesis as well as 93)

I continue to enjoy EA games. Don't forget, not every development team has the money to mass produce their stuff, and if EA buy's the rights to a game, or produces it, thats fine with me.
EA was always "big". However, not as big as Capcom, Konami, among others. Then again, EA was only making computer and console games.
The other companies had the "arcade market" down packed.

Anyway, since I don't hate EA, I just now realized...what the hell am I doing posting here?
I guess I'm just tired of hearing sensless bashing, just for the main fact that its trendy to hate EA these days...

Ever wonder why "trends" die? Because if they had and substance, then they would last.

Neon · Post by **Neon** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:07 am

road rash 3 on genesis is excellent.

I thought SSX tricky was okay.

Otherwise, their games don't appeal to me, but they do to a lot of people, often for the wrong reasons though. But since the goal of games companies is to make money, they're doing very well.

dave4shmups · Post by **dave4shmups** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:12 am

I agree that EA was a LOT better back in the day when they used to do more stuff then just stupid sports games.

Seriously they put out some high-quality, original games back in the '80s; they REALLY need to diversify instead of just churning out the same @#$#@$ing sports franchise games every stinkin' year.

They've certainly lost my respect, and my gaming money as well.

PsikyoPshumpPshooterP · Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:13 am

please dont make me start an EA fanboy thread!!!!!!

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:16 am

It's not that it's trendy to bash them, Twitch. When was the last time EA published a title that was as enjoyable, remarkable or just darn well made like the games you quote?

It's all sports, James Bond games (again?) Need for Speed, Medal of Honor, sports games, games based in actual sports, digitized sports stars, sportity sport sport sport. Sinners. The ghosts of M U L E and Axix Assassin will haunt them in their sleep.

It's not like they are going to listen even if 1 million gamers asked them to revive those classics, anyway. But game business is more than just doing the same game over and over with different graphics and characters. What do I care about Dennis Rodman's new mapped tattoes, or new players on NFL games? It's not like they reflect the performance of the actual athlete (Athlete. Snnnkk!) they are modeled after.

*runs off sobbing*

Reiki · Post by **Reiki** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:53 am

I liked EA back when they did Zany Golf, Jungle Strike and Road Rash 2. Sadly those days a long gone.

Andi · Post by **Andi** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:56 am

I think the best thing EA ever did was somehow magically put themselves into that 213 song "My Joystick".

The rest of that song is about sucking dicks and then all of then sudden Snoop is reciting the EA tag ("It's in the game.")

God damn, if I had the money to be in a Snoop song...

TWITCHDOCTOR · Post by **TWITCHDOCTOR** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 5:59 am

Specineff wrote:It's not that it's trendy to bash them, Twitch. When was the last time EA published a title that was as enjoyable, remarkable or just darn well made like the games you quote?

It's all sports, James Bond games (again?) Need for Speed, Medal of Honor, sports games, games based in actual sports, digitized sports stars, sportity sport sport sport. Sinners. The ghosts of M U L E and Axix Assassin will haunt them in their sleep.

It's not like they are going to listen even if 1 million gamers asked them to revive those classics, anyway. But game business is more than just doing the same game over and over with different graphics and characters. What do I care about Dennis Rodman's new mapped tattoes, or new players on NFL games? It's not like they reflect the performance of the actual athlete (Athlete. Snnnkk!) they are modeled after.

*runs off sobbing*

Well, they will continue to re-hash sports games, because sports fans are born every day. PLus, stores like Wal-Mart always need "bargain bins"!!!

Vexorg · Post by **Vexorg** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 6:36 am

Does anyone expect the Madden games to improve because of the exclusive license? Didn't think so. The whole purpose of the deal was to eliminate the competition. I actually know someone who recently took a job at Tiburon too. Even so, I've now added EA to my short "do not buy" list due to their business practices as of late (and I don't even bother with football games for the most part.)

Heck, for that matter, the whole industry could use another crash of '84 about now. Way too much garbage being produced.

vek · Post by **vek** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 1:37 pm

Specineff wrote:Honest. I swear I will dye my hair silver the day EA produces and publishes an RTS, for example.

http://www.eagames.com/official/cc/fran ... s/home.jsp

don't forget to post pictures please

and shocking as it may be, some people actually like games AND sports AND cars, and appreciate being able to play a game about sports or cars. i don't think ea's sports games are the best available, but if people buy them, what are ea to do? they're hardly going to say "er, stop buying our games! their's are better!" are they?

Brian · Post by **Brian** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 3:24 pm

Dr. J Vs. Larry Bird was the pinnacle of Basketball games when I was a kid, and to this day I still love it.

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 3:53 pm

You know, there is nothing wrong with sports games. They are just another genre of videogames just like shmups. Just like other genres, these games deserve innovation. Visual Concepts and EA pushed themselves to the limit to innovate in their football games. Each one pushed the other to make a better and better game. Without VC around, you really will get the EA of your nightmares. I was playing Jordan vs Bird waaaay before I played a proper shmup so I kind of feel compelled to defend the sports genre.

Minzoku · Post by **Minzoku** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 3:59 pm

I made the mistake of buying [not renting] Harry Potter: World Quidditch Cup, as I figured it'd be something I could play with my HP fan friends. Ugh, Quidditch is NOT designed to be played from a one-player perspective [it's a TEAM sport for a reason, right???].

Yes, EA made that. I wish they hadn't, it's quite a bit foul. It did teach me not to buy games on speculation, though, which just contributes to my newfound love of PC titles over console anything [that, and I'm increasingly too lazy to turn on a separate system when my computer is almost always already on].

Stormowl · Post by **Stormowl** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 4:12 pm

i've played burnout 3 more than any other game lately. i guess that makes me an EA whore. oh well.

now to just get 30 takedowns...

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 4:25 pm

My boycott of burnout 3 hurts the most...

Accutron · Post by **Accutron** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 4:30 pm

My first EA games were Worms? and Pinball Construction Set for the Atari 800XL + 1050 floppy drive, circa 1983. Still got em, and the diskettes amazingly still work. Worms? has a cool 'FMV' intro where the old square-circle-triangle logo dances around the screen to the tune of 'the worms go in the worms go out'...pretty fancy stuff for the time.

EA's current lineup doesn't interest me in the least. I owned Nightfire, MOH: Frontline and Rising Sun for a while, beat em, sold em. All three were excruciatingly boring and easy. If you get me drunk, I might admit to owning Nascar 2003 for a brief period...but only if you get me drunk. I don't think I've ever owned a single other EA title, and I won't be rushing out to remedy that anytime soon.

dave4shmups · Post by **dave4shmups** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 6:44 pm

Speaking of old Atari hardware, it was a partly a glut of poor-quality, cookie-cutter software for the 2600 that led to the video game crash of '84.

And if the current game market keeps on getting flooded with similar games, I have very little doubt that we'll see a similar crash soon, and developers like EA will be the biggest culprits. Sure, there are 3 next gen consoles coming out next year, but that will make very little difference, IMO, if the mainstream video game market doesn't get the serious injection of innovation and originality that it sorely needs.

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 7:00 pm

If there's a crash, nintendo is going to be among the many victims. They don't have too much market share right now and any kind of instability would send them over the edge. A Sony videogame monopoly kind of scares me but the playstation era wasn't that bad. Of course it would be a playstation era minus the n64. Well like I said the playstation era wasn't that bad even though the hardware sucked complete ass.

Vexorg · Post by **Vexorg** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 7:27 pm

Sure, the Cube may not be making them much money, but keep in mind that Nintendo still dominates the handheld market. If you look at the sales figures for any given month, you'll see that the GBA outsells everything else out there in terms of number of units. That would probably be enough to keep them around at least.

WarpZone · Post by **WarpZone** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 8:04 pm

TWITCHDOCTOR wrote:I have a lot of love for EA since back when their logo was ECA.

Heh, I remember that logo too. Whenever I saw it I always associated it with what would probably be a half-decent Commodore 64 game. A very different connotation than a lot of people have nowadays...

Oh, And I think the "C" in the logo was actually meant to be the world. I'm sure people might reach certain conclusions about that now.

TWITCHDOCTOR · Post by **TWITCHDOCTOR** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 8:13 pm

Stormowl wrote:i've played burnout 3 more than any other game lately. i guess that makes me an EA whore. oh well.

now to just get 30 takedowns...

I agree, Burnout 3 is a fast paced FUN arcade racer. I don't care who makes the game. If I find it fun, I play it and enjoy it.

Hating a game or refusing to buy it becuase of a certian company name is plain silly to me. Thats the total opposite of Fanboy-ism which is equally annoying.

vek · Post by **vek** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 8:28 pm

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=6462

amusingly, ea's revenues in europe last year have been announced as $666 million

Acid King · Post by **Acid King** » Thu Jan 27, 2005 8:31 pm

Vexorg wrote:Does anyone expect the Madden games to improve because of the exclusive license? Didn't think so. The whole purpose of the deal was to eliminate the competition. I actually know someone who recently took a job at Tiburon too. Even so, I've now added EA to my short "do not buy" list due to their business practices as of late (and I don't even bother with football games for the most part.)

Heck, for that matter, the whole industry could use another crash of '84 about now. Way too much garbage being produced.

I never had a problem with EA until they got the exclusive NFL lisence. That, no matter how good for business it is, is a great disservice to sports game consumers.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Fri Jan 28, 2005 3:12 am

I forgot to say that the RTS/Hair dyed silver bet applied only to non-already-existing franchises. I mean, a brand new, fresh RTS instead of rehashing one.

Does it still count?

Super Mega C · Post by **Super Mega C** » Fri Jan 28, 2005 3:32 am

I own almost a dozen systems and hundreds of games, but I've actually managed to never by an EA or Ubi soft game. Amazing, especially considering the amount of stuff both these companies churn out.

ArrogantBastard · Post by **ArrogantBastard** » Fri Jan 28, 2005 5:28 am

The n00b wrote:Since Arrogant Bastard really doesn't want this stuff in his thread, I felt it was time to give this topic its very own thread.

Thank you.

UnscathedFlyingObject · Fri Jan 28, 2005 8:29 am

Super Mega C wrote:I own almost a dozen systems and hundreds of games, but I've actually managed to never by an EA or Ubi soft game. Amazing, especially considering the amount of stuff both these companies churn out.

I have never understood what's all the fuss with EA and Ubisoft either. I don't hate them. I don't hate. It's their fault I find other games I am more interested in all the time.

shmups.system11.org

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