Rumor has it that EA is possibly exploring the idea of selling itself to an Equity Firm. O.o
Tag Archives: EA
EA’s Origin may be glorified Spyware…
In case you hadn’t heard already, Electronic Arts’ Origin is more than just a petty attempt to undermine Steam. It’s an insidious petty attempt to undermine Steam. The service has upset gamers since it installs Spyware, allowing EA to dig around in your hard drive as explicitly stated in the terms of service. The EULA says that EA can identify your computer, operating system, installed/uninstalled software/hardware, and use that information for marketing purposes while merrily sharing it with third party companies. It ‘s all fairly disgusting, and there’s no opt-out offer. If you don’t want EA to know everything about you and pass the information along, your only recourse is to not install Origin — which will mean you can’t play Battlefield 3 on PC at all…
via EA’s Origin may be glorified Spyware, causes mass upset -Destructoid.
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Wow.. Really EA? Damn does your marketing department have got balls and your programming team must have been outsourced… WTF is this? You, EA, provide products we buy, and that is where our relationship ends. You can ASK to see my system specs in order to see what the ‘normal’ PC is out there but you don’t need to know what I have installed. Nor can you make money off MY information with out ME getting a cut of it.
You can pay me for my personal information, otherwise ╭∩╮(°_°)╭∩╮
EA limiting digital and physical launch copies of Star Wars: The Old Republic
Electronic Arts is planning on putting a cap on the amount of players that will be able to access Star Wars: The Old Republic at the launch of the MMORPG this fall. While no specific number has been announced, there is an exact target of player volume that can be reached with a combination of physical and digital sales of the game. Once that cap is reached, Electronic Arts will halt sales of digital copies and wait until server performance can be stabilized to continue selling the potentially popular title. Official reps for Electronic Arts didn’t indicate how long the server upgrade process would be between sale periods.Since digital sales will be limited to the Origin store, it should be a simple procedure for Electronic Arts to halt sales of the game. It’s possible that this move will be perceived by the public as artificially limiting the supply of the Star Wars title to increase demand over time. Fans of the game could potentially become annoyed if the title is unavailable shortly after launch. In addition, this move could backfire on Electronic Arts if the game is heavily preordered, but falls prey to negative reviews from the gaming press which reduces the chances of future sales. The launch date of the game is currently unannounced, but the game will be going into beta testing in September with selected weekends that will allow players to try out the MMORPG. Bioware and Electronic Arts are expected to announce a fall date for the launch of the game to take advantage of the lucrative holiday shopping season. Assuming physical copies aren’t limited from being activated like digital copies once a player cap is hit, it’s also possible that the price of physical copies could skyrocket on third party sites like eBay and Craigslist. If Electronic Arts does plan to cap all copies of the game until servers are capable of handling the load, copies that are purchased for the holidays may not work once received.
via EA limiting digital and physical launch copies of Star Wars: The Old Republic.
Syndicate Remake Reveal Rumored For Gamescom
Electronic Arts revealed a few years ago that Starbreeze Studios, the developer behind The Darkness and the two Chronicles of Riddick games, was working on the mysterious Project RedLime, said to be based on a franchise that the publisher owned the rights to. It was later revealed by unnamed sources to be a return to the cyberpunk-inspired Syndicate series, though EA has never officially confirmed it. It looks like confirmation may be coming soon though, perhaps as soon as next weeks Gamescom.
via Syndicate Remake Reveal Rumored For Gamescom – G4tv.com.
Economy down! Economy down!
http://www.joystiq.com/2009/07/16/report-modern-warfare-2-triggering-uk-games-price-hike-ea-not/
We feel for our UK-based gaming brothers-and-sisters-in-arms. We’ve seen the gaming industry putting them through the financial wringer many times in the past, but a recent report from MCV describes the cruelest economic hardships they’ve ever had to face — Activision has kicked the UK price of Modern Warfare 2 up to £54.99 (close to $90), and according to the report, other publishers may plan to follow suit, raising the prices on their titles as we move into the holiday season.
The price hike is attributed to rising game development costs and the faltering strength of the pound — still, compared to last holiday season, when titles like Prince of Persia and Far Cry 2 hit store shelves for around £40, it’s a pretty sizable leap to make in just one year. However, not everyone is following Activision’s example — Electronic Arts responded to MCV’s report, confirming that it would not increase the RRP of its holiday releases. We’ll see which strategy pays off once the smoke from the holiday shopping season clears.
Report: Modern Warfare 2 triggering UK games price hike, EA not budging originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 16 Jul 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Guitar Hero IV to be a Rock Band knock off.
[Tech Radar] has a nice write up about some up coming features of the newest primary version of Guitar Hero, and low and behold.. they can’t come up with some original, so they are ‘stealing‘ ‘borrowing’ the Rock band idea by adding drums and a Mic.
Activision CEO Bobby Kotick has now gone on record, stating after Guitar Hero: Aerosmith, Activision will be concentrating on Guitar Hero IV. With the only ‘new’ feature over Rock Band is the inclusion of local band songs to the planned downloadable content.
Speaking of music, where as Activision has access to the Universal Music library, Rock Band has EA and MTV. Will they be able to compete? Can you have a Guitar Hero with drums? And will you be able to play those drums one handed?
(10 points to anyone that gets that reference..LOL)
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05/14/08 – Update
Fine, no one gets the points. 😛
Way, QJ.NET has [some updates] to this thread about what’ll be coming to GH4 which boils down to:
1) More then just Drums, Bass, and Vocals? It’s possible.
2) The ability to create your own guitar and drum sounds (?!.. why?)
3) Song Creation. Yep create your own track! minus the vocals.
4) Song ratings: You can help out bands by rating them high, which allows them to upload more songs.
5) ok, THIS is good.. ALL songs will be master recordings, and beside Def Leopard, look like ‘The Answer’, Van Halen, The Eagles, Linkin Park and Sublime will have tracks.
6) and a new guitar design from Red Octane which has an innovative input mechanic subject for patent. Now to search for the patent… =/
EA to get into the fitness game…
Fitness game.. HA! you get it? huh? did you? Well fine.. ANYWAY…
EA figuring there’s money to be made in the whole play games as a diet craze that’s starting to hit the Wii (Come on people. Moving around burns calories. Burn more then you take in.. you lose weight!!)
But [Eurogamer] is saying that Peter Moore wants to make you sweat, where as that concepts scares the holy jeebus out of me.. I’ll push though the fear to continue writing.
The newly created ‘Freestyle’ sub-division of the EA Sports divisionis working on a new game that will utilize the Wii balance board and focus on more ‘Western’ cardiovascular workouts.
Peter Moore went on record at the EA Sports showcase stating:
“We’re watching very closely what the Wii Fit board does,” he said. “We think we have to have a role to play with that mum – the kids have gone to school, she’s got 45 minutes on her own, the Wii is there, it’s the first console she’s ever liked because she can do things herself. And we’re working on stuff, trying to work out how we can use EA Sports applications there.”
“We also need to make sure we’re delivering something that’s truly exercise. I’ll call [Wii Fit] more eastern fitness, where it senses weight and balance, like Tai-Chi. It’s more about holistic fitness. I don’t think the board is going to take a pounding. We need to look more at western fitness in which I can actually be moving and start to sweat a little bit, and that’s what we’re working on right now.”
“It can’t feel like a workout, The team has to figure out, how do I smile while I’m doing this? You play soccer for 90 minutes; if I say you’re going to run five miles you’re not gonna want to do that. But you run for five miles playing soccer and you’ve had a good time.”
“The difference is you’re distracted. We need to distract people and not make this exercise feel like work, but like they’re having fun. So mini-games, things where you’re actually laughing out loud, that’s the stuff we’re working on. It’s something I’ve always been passionate about, and who better than us to go and play in that market?”
EA takes out a loan…
Where as this could be read as “so what?”, but this is a BILLION dollar loan..
According to [Kotaku], EA has borrowed 1 billion (put your pinky to your mouth when you say that) in order to buy out Take-two. EA has bee quoted to have said:
“There’s no news here,” said EA VP of communications Jeff Brown. “This is just a process point on something we announced in February.”
*sigh* EA in charge of GTA? Looks like GTA4 will be the last of the good GTA games.
Please big brother.. can I play the games I bought?
Well, now.. The publishers of Mass effect, and Spore are going to piss a lot of people off with this one.
According to a post on the Mass Effect (BioWare’s) website from Derek French (BioWare, Technical Producer):
Mass Effect uses SecuROM and requires an online activation for the first time that you play it. Each copy of Mass Effect comes with a CD Key which is used for this activation and for registration here at the BioWare Community. Mass Effect does not require the DVD to be in the drive in order to play, it is only for installation.
After the first activation, SecuROM requires that it re-check with the server within ten days (in case the CD Key has become public/warez’d and gets banned). Just so that the 10 day thing doesn’t become abrupt, SecuROM tries its first re-check with 5 days remaining in the 10 day window. If it can’t contact the server before the 10 days are up, nothing bad happens and the game still runs. After 10 days a re-check is required before the game can run.
So what that is saying is:
A) after purchasing the game you must request access to play it
B) you better have an Internet connection or you are SOL.
C) and the company doesn’t trust you enough not give a copy to your friends.
How’s that for stupid? Really, because I’m willing to bet money on the fact that the copy protection with a NO CD check crack will be out with in 10 minutes of the games release. Then people will want to use the pirated copy because it’s easier to install and use and no don’t need to worry about being online, and/or SecuROM messing with your computer.
Thanks again EA about worrying about the almighty dollar, rather then your customers. Try just using Steam next time.
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[Update: 5/12/08]
BioWare spokespersons told [Kotaku] “To all the fans including our many friends in the armed services and internationally who expressed concerns that they would not be able re-authenticate as often as required, EA and BioWare want you to know that your feedback is important to us.”
So they have been listening! Well and reading pretty much all the hate mail on the ‘net about all this stupid copyright BS. so NOW, it’s pretty much the same thing, only no it only authenticates the first time you play, then re-authenticates when you download new content. But you can still only install the game 3 times.
additional activations can be achieved by phoning EA support. Which, I’m betting, would be like phoning Comcast customer support.
Aerosmith sells out…
Now if you’ve been reading this blog you’d know that I reported a little while ago about the Guitar Hero: Aerosmith edition for all the major consoles.
According to multiple sources on the net, In a stoke of GENUIS from the execs at Activision the company has bought out the Aerosmith song collection!!
According to an Activision representative:
I can say that we do have the band exclusively, and their catalogue should be exclusive to us beyond the one or two tracks they had licensed out to Rock Band before we made our deal.
So what this means is besides the couple of tracks already on Rock band, There won’t be anymore Aerosmith on any game unless it’s licensed though Activision.
Now what this REALLY Means…
1) Aerosmith is now Activision bitch and we won’t see any more Aerosmith in Rock band. Point is.. do we care? Come on.. it’s Aerosmith! there’s a few good tracks, but come on!! it’s Aerosmith!
2) This would give the developers of the Guitar Hero series insider information about concerts and the ‘live style’ of a band that’s been together for a number of centauries. Elements that could play into the next version of Guitar hero.
3) Now the sad news, here comes the music battle royal. You thought the RIAA was a bitch, just wait until you see EA starting to gobble up new bands and tracks just to make sure they don’t get into the Guitar Hero series. Great news for bands, horrible news for gamers.
Corporate America has just ghostbusted the spirit of the Guitar Hero series
RIP Guitar Hero, it was fun while it lasted.
GamersVue 