What is going on at EA?

noodler

FutureGuy wrote: »

ME3>>>>>>>>>ME1

Captain Chaos wrote: »

Not a hope. ME3 was the nail in the coffin of the ME franchise. Talk about jumping the shark.

I struggled through ME1 to be honest.

It was a bit of a labour of love.

There is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that 2 and 3 are better. In just about every way possible too.

Azza

ShadowHearth wrote:

I wonder who is to be blamed for poor sales on DS3? Maybe because DS3 was a horror survival fan game and the idea was to shoot out the limbs of the monsters. EA dipped its cock in to DS franchise and went "you know what, shooting off limbs is too damn complicated, just make it less scary, more actiony and throw micro transaction in top of that!"

Maybe it has to do with the fact that its a decent but not a particualr spectuaclar game. It doesn't deserve to sell 5 million copies in my opinion buts it still a good enough game.

Shooting off limbs is still in the game as it was in Dead Space 2, I have no idea how making a game more or less scary would effect this mechanic more or less complicated.

Yeah its more actiony. But it also suffers from the fact that the enemies can no longer invoke any sense of fear because we are so use to them by now. Dead Space 1 lost its horror atmosphere a few horrors in for the same reason.

Microtransactions are completely optional.

As I said before its still a Dead Space game. It looks the same, controls the same, has the same weapons, has the same enemies etc.
It also introduced new elements to try an freshen things up.
An optional co-op which introduces a different type of atmosphere into the game. Its pretty fun.
It has a crafting system.
Human enemies.
Optional missions.
More types of enviorments. Ships/spacewalks/frozen planet.

Its lacking the atmosphere of the first and yes that hurts it as it did the second one. It along with the dismeberment mechanics, inventive U.I are what set the orginal Dead Space apart from the rest. But the atmosphere did not last in that game for more than an hour or two. It simply fell back on its solid and then unique gameplay mechanics to carry it the rest of the way through. But the sequels didn't have that luxury and that has been there biggest downfall. There just too the same. Even though Dead Space 3 trys to mix up the formula its still too the same. Its good game it just can't make the impression the orginal did at the time.

Franchise in my opinion has run its course and needs an overhual before the consider making another one. But overall I still enjoyed the 3 games.

gizmo

ShadowHearth wrote: »

Thanks to this attitude Franchises die and Developer studios close down. Next time the one who pays should ask piper if it is a good idea to play Funeral March on the Wedding day.

Visceral Montreal were closed down after they had shipped Army of Two: The Devil's Cartel. The cancellation of the pre-production of Dead Space 4 seems to be a result of that, not a cause.

As for the situation in general, as much as I don't lke Jim Sterling, I can't help but agree with this:

Dead Space failure isn't about microtransactions, it's about bloated publishers killing middle-tier games and needing every game to be huge.

Dead Space is the very definition of a mid-tier game and, as I said above, it was never going to sell the five million copies EA wanted in anything resembling its original form. For it to survive as a profitable franchise it simply needed a sensible budget and to stick to what it was best at, survival horror.

The problem here is that you're essentially asking a public company to devote limited resources towards projects which aren't designed to bring in maximum revenue. I can't imagine many shareholders being too pleased with that and I (unfortunately) don't think pleas of such moves generating good will within the gaming community would be well received either.

ShadowHearth

Azza wrote: »

Maybe it has to do with the fact that its a decent but not a particualr spectuaclar game. It doesn't deserve to sell 5 million copies in my opinion buts it still a good enough game.

Shooting off limbs is still in the game as it was in Dead Space 2, I have no idea how making a game more or less scary would effect this mechanic more or less complicated.

Yeah its more actiony. But it also suffers from the fact that the enemies can no longer invoke any sense of fear because we are so use to them by now. Dead Space 1 lost its horror atmosphere a few horrors in for the same reason.

Microtransactions are completely optional.

As I said before its still a Dead Space game. It looks the same, controls the same, has the same weapons, has the same enemies etc.
It also introduced new elements to try an freshen things up.
An optional co-op which introduces a different type of atmosphere into the game. Its pretty fun.
It has a crafting system.
Human enemies.
Optional missions.
More types of enviorments. Ships/spacewalks/frozen planet.

Its lacking the atmosphere of the first and yes that hurts it as it did the second one. It along with the dismeberment mechanics, inventive U.I are what set the orginal Dead Space apart from the rest. But the atmosphere did not last in that game for more than an hour or two. It simply fell back on its solid and then unique gameplay mechanics to carry it the rest of the way through. But the sequels didn't have that luxury and that has been there biggest downfall. There just too the same. Even though Dead Space 3 trys to mix up the formula its still too the same. Its good game it just can't make the impression the orginal did at the time.

Franchise in my opinion has run its course and needs an overhual before the consider making another one. But overall I still enjoyed the 3 games.

Dead space 1 had brilliant atmosphere. It stayed with me all the game. Wheres Dead space 2 had more action in it, it was an awesome game. I loved it. I finished it few days ago and atmosphere was still fantastic in it. Let alone one of the chapters where you

Go back in to Ishimura! I **** you not, it was one of the coolest moments in my gaming history. It was scary and bringing so many memories. The whole "lets try to clean up" surrounding just nailed it for me!

. I loved the new enemies in DS2

The creepy bastards, who hide behind the wall and go " i see you, but i wont go near you, i will go to other place and wait for you to be in crap position". Those new enemies were AWESOME!

. Then again i was playing on survivalist mode, so i had my nipples torn off quite often too. I loved the challange and i did managed my items up to the last boss.

Dead Space franchise has still a lot of fuel to make great horror survival games. Its universe is really interesting and there is a lot of potential to make good stories. I would not even mind to get other playable character. Maybe even "blue shift it" or "OpFor it".

The only thing that makes me quite interested in DS3 is the Second player character. It has some interesting mechanics. He sees stuff main player does not. then here is a problem. I HATE COOP GAMES IF I AM NOT PLAYING WITH A FRIEND. I have no one to play DS3 with, due to taste differences. No way i am playing with a random monkey on internet.

Yatzee has quite spot on with his review. Yes, i know, you need to take everything he says with a truck load of salt, but he has a point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMOoJZTy1p0

ShadowHearth

gizmo wrote: »

Visceral Montreal were closed down after they had shipped Army of Two: The Devil's Cartel. The cancellation of the pre-production of Dead Space 4 seems to be a result of that, not a cause.

As for the situation in general, as much as I don't lke Jim Sterling, I can't help but agree with this:



Dead Space is the very definition of a mid-tier game and, as I said above, it was never going to sell the five million copies EA wanted in anything resembling its original form. For it to survive as a profitable franchise it simply needed a sensible budget and to stick to what it was best at, survival horror.

The problem here is that you're essentially asking a public company to devote limited resources towards projects which aren't designed to bring in maximum revenue. I can't imagine many shareholders being too pleased with that and I (unfortunately) don't think pleas of such moves generating good will within the gaming community would be well received either.

That does make sense. Franchise is/was great for people who like the genre, but EA tried to make it product for masses with huge budget. People who dont like horror survival games wont go for DS3, because they know its past and horror survival roots and the core fans of horror survival wont touch DS3, because it became an action shooter. So EA just shot itself in foot.

johnny_ultimate

You have to remember Dead Space was at best a very modest sales success if not an outright disappointment (especially since it was released in that particularly crazy release window of Holiday 2008), so it's actually quite against the odds that it even got a sequel in the first place. Chalk that one down to the EA's shift in focus away from endless shovelware sequels.

But I can only re-stress that games more than any other medium are consumed by franchises and sequels (Hollywood aside). This makes sense in one way - technological advances mean its very possible to improve on core mechanics. Mass Effect at least was designed as a multi-part game, and Mirror's Edge could certainly benefit from iteration. But gamers, developers and publishers need to be more tolerant of once-offs or franchises being put to rest. Gaming would not necessarily be a less rich medium without Dead Space sequels - the first is a more than pleasant standalone title. Diminishing returns can be applied to sequels and franchises like Uncharted (3), Resident Evil, Devil May Cry, Final Fantasy etc... Again, many games justify at least a couple of sequels or even find perfection after a couple of outings, but the more beloved a franchise is the harder it becomes to meaningfully iterate and innovate while at the same time pleasing a split fanbase that may have wildly divergent expectations (a trap Mass Effect cannot possibly escape, as illustrated by this thread). Even developers starting a new franchise with similar gameplay and settings can be a meaningful step in the right direction by sidestepping expectations.

Of course commercial realities make the above ponderings somewhat vague and utopian, but I think that's why we should value the originals and once-offs more than we do rather than demanding an endless parade of sequels only to be disappointed that they aren't similar enough or are far too similar to what came before. A Catch-22 for us as well developers / publishers. EA are in unenviable position though - trying to promote unknown properties is a huge challenge on the scale EA work on. On the plus side, at least they do tend to (or have in the past) invest and support smaller developers - Double Fine, Oddworld Inhabitants, Katamari, the Deathspank guys etc...

BizzyC

IMO we're nearing the end of the "AAA" title fad.

The budgets being poured into some of these games is ridiculous, and when you try to make several within the space of a few years you're not going to have much innovation and creativity.
They turned it into a cash-cow business that isn't sustainable.

I think we're headed back into a sphere of lower budgets, longer development times and more enjoyable games.

ShadowHearth

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

You have to remember Dead Space was at best a very modest sales success if not an outright disappointment (especially since it was released in that particularly crazy release window of Holiday 2008), so it's actually quite against the odds that it even got a sequel in the first place. Chalk that one down to the EA's shift in focus away from endless shovelware sequels.

But I can only re-stress that games more than any other medium are consumed by franchises and sequels (Hollywood aside). This makes sense in one way - technological advances mean its very possible to improve on core mechanics. Mass Effect at least was designed as a multi-part game, and Mirror's Edge could certainly benefit from iteration. But gamers, developers and publishers need to be more tolerant of once-offs or franchises being put to rest. Gaming would not necessarily be a less rich medium without Dead Space sequels - the first is a more than pleasant standalone title. Diminishing returns can be applied to sequels and franchises like Uncharted (3), Resident Evil, Devil May Cry, Final Fantasy etc... Again, many games justify at least a couple of sequels or even find perfection after a couple of outings, but the more beloved a franchise is the harder it becomes to meaningfully iterate and innovate while at the same time pleasing a split fanbase that may have wildly divergent expectations (a trap Mass Effect cannot possibly escape, as illustrated by this thread). Even developers starting a new franchise with similar gameplay and settings can be a meaningful step in the right direction by sidestepping expectations.

Of course commercial realities make the above ponderings somewhat vague and utopian, but I think that's why we should value the originals and once-offs more than we do rather than demanding an endless parade of sequels only to be disappointed that they aren't similar enough or are far too similar to what came before. A Catch-22 for us as well developers / publishers. EA are in unenviable position though - trying to promote unknown properties is a huge challenge on the scale EA work on. On the plus side, at least they do tend to (or have in the past) invest and support smaller developers - Double Fine, Oddworld Inhabitants, Katamari, the Deathspank guys etc...

Wasn't Dead Space 1 well received? EA did not expected to sell a lot of it at all and it did better then they though. reason of making dead space 2? I cant give links, but i am pretty sure that was the case.
I cant really blame the franchise for what way EA wanted it to go. As gizmo said, it did not needed to be high budget game. I would add to this: it needed to stay Horror survival and hit the market for genre that barely gets any games anymore. By the looks of it, there is still Love for horror survival games, even if developers dont want to see it.

gizmo

ShadowHearth wrote: »

Wasn't Dead Space 1 well received? EA did not expected to sell a lot of it at all and it did better then they though. reason of making dead space 2? I cant give links, but i am pretty sure that was the case.
I cant really blame the franchise for what way EA wanted it to go. As gizmo said, it did not needed to be high budget game. I would add to this: it needed to stay Horror survival and hit the market for genre that barely gets any games anymore. By the looks of it, there is still Love for horror survival games, even if developers dont want to see it.

As I said above...

Let me put it a different way, three and four months respectively after release, Mirrors Edge and Dead Space had broken one million sales. By late 2010 [Note: around 18 months later) , they had just broken over 2 million sales. Currently, Battlefield 3 Premium has 2.9m subscribers.

Now, think of the rate at which games drop in price these days and how long it took to hit those sales. EA wouldn't have exactly been rolling in it based on those sales figures but the raw sales numbers were probably enough to justify a sequel upon which they hoped to build on the success of the first one but this time at launch.

I can never the hate for ME3 - sure, the ending was a bit of a mishap, but I enjoyed the rest of the game and the previous ones enough that, for me, it really wasn't that much of an issue. ME1 had great RPG elements, ME2 had great action elements, with ME3 having a mixture of both, but with the best story elements.

ShadowHearth

gizmo wrote: »

As I said above...



Now, think of the rate at which games drop in price these days and how long it took to hit those sales. EA wouldn't have exactly been rolling in it based on those sales figures but the raw sales numbers were probably enough to justify a sequel upon which they hoped to build on the success of the first one but this time at launch.

I doubt DS3 ( and surely DS1 ), had BF3 budget. Surely no one expected dead space 1, 2 or 3 sell as good as BF3?!

gizmo

ShadowHearth wrote: »

I doubt DS3 ( and surely DS1 ), had BF3 budget. Surely no one expected dead space 1, 2 or 3 sell as good as BF3?!

Oh no, I just highlighted the subscriber numbers of BF3 Premium in reply to Captain Chaos as to why EA would have no problem having DICE concentrate on it rather than a Mirror's Edge sequel.

They were, however, setting 5 million sales of DS3 as the requirement for the franchise to survive. While that figure isn't something I think they could achieve, they'd still need around 1-2 million sales for even a reasonably modest console game budget to be met. That brings us back to the need for reasonable expectations for a mid-tier game though.

Gamasutra have just tweeted this though:

Rumors about poor Dead Space 3 sales and an unannounced Dead Space 4 being cancelled are "patently false," EA tells us.

So I suspect what I said about the story being confused due to the Visceral Montreal closure to be true.

Adyx

Deleted User wrote: »

I can never the hate for ME3 - sure, the ending was a bit of a mishap, but I enjoyed the rest of the game and the previous ones enough that, for me, it really wasn't that much of an issue. ME1 had great RPG elements, ME2 had great action elements, with ME3 having a mixture of both, but with the best story elements.

Would definitely agree with this. There's no doubt (for me) that ME1 had by far the best story but had really poor combat and an awful inventory as well as looking quite bland in places. ME2 had vastly improved combat but no real story (recruit this guy then recruit her and when you've recruited half the galaxy then we'll give you a bit of a story).

ME3 kind of gives the best of both worlds but unfortunately with a rubbish ending.

As for EA themselves, I've noticed that more and more I've lost interest in their products. Just looking on Origin now: Dead Space 3, Battlefield 3, Far Cry 3, Crysis 3, The Sims 3. Nothing there I would pay full price for and it's not just because they're "sequels". As much as I enjoyed ME3 ( a lot) I think I'd probably feel the same about that if I hadn't put so much time into building my characters in 1 & 2. It's just all so... meh. But then my interest in multiplayer ended with BF2142 and I really didn't like Far Cry or Crysis.

Now if they brought out a (good) System Shock 3, then I might be interested. But I don't know if they have the rights to it anymore or is it some insurance company?

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

far cry 3 wasn't 'meh' in any way, shape or form

Azza

EA and Visceral Games have both come out and denied the reports on the canning of Dead Space 4 or the closure of Visceral Games.

ShadowHearth if your interested in going through Dead Space 3 on co-op I'll play it with you since my partner abondon me half way through. (Guild Wars 2 got him).

However I can only play on weekends currently.

ShadowHearth

Azza wrote: »

EA and Visceral Games have both come out and denied the reports on the canning of dead space 3 or the closure of Visceral Games.

ShadowHearth if your interested in going through Dead Space 3 on co-op I'll play it with you since my partner abondon me half way through. (Guild Wars 2 got him).

However I can only play on weekends currently.

Cheers for offer. As much as I hate where did the franchise got ( RE franchise all over again ) I will still be getting it, but only on sale.
After such disappointment it's is not on my priority list. I will be getting HOS and bioshock first and only then I'll be hunting down DS3.

Fnz

From December 2008.

Pushtrak

I've read through the thread before responding. I see the Dead Space 4/Visceral stuff I posted was baseless. Apologies for that.

gizmo wrote: »

They were, however, setting 5 million sales of DS3 as the requirement for the franchise to survive. While that figure isn't something I think they could achieve, they'd still need around 1-2 million sales for even a reasonably modest console game budget to be met. That brings us back to the need for reasonable expectations for a mid-tier game though.

I think 5 million is quite a hurdle in general. Personal preference will come in to it, of course, but take a look at this. I gave up on Fable after the first game, so if it only had the one game, I wouldn't have really had an issue, so 3 not meeting the 5 million mark isn't an issue. Resident Evil 5 was a let down, and haven't bought a Resi game since. Might make an exception for Revelations. Final Fantasy 13, I didn't buy as I had heard lots of off putting things about it.

(I'm not really selling the case of under 5 million needing more games in the franchises am I?)

Skyrim is one that if the 5 million metric was followed would be the last TES game. Assassin's Creed would be over a long time. Metal Gear Solid 3 would have been the last game. Meh, I'm sure reading a list of games is as boring to read as to type, I'm sure the point is made.

Pixelbastardo

Yeah, ea say they need to make dead space more action and multiplayer focused to appeal to more people to bring in more sales...
well that worked out well for them... maybe they didnt put in enough micro transactions ..

Edit,
and EA have said after the ps4 reveal, they want to have parity between ms and sony, and arent favoring either... although its still weird how they showed nothing at all. e3 will tell all.

Adyx

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar wrote: »

far cry 3 wasn't 'meh' in any way, shape or form

It doesn't matter. My point is I haven't bought it and don't plan to. As far as I'm concerned, there is little or nothing in EA's lineup that makes me want to spend my money with them.

Pushtrak

Pixelbastardo wrote: »

and EA have said after the ps4 reveal, they want to have parity between ms and sony, and arent favoring either... although its still weird how they showed nothing at all. e3 will tell all.

Well, that's interesting. I never saw that. If this is the case, we'll know before E3. If they want to have parity with both, it means by the same token as not being at the Sony one, they'll not be at the MS one which is going to happen before E3.

Article confirming maintaining balance.
Rumoured next xbox reveal.

Pushtrak

VideoGamer.com has doubled down on what they had said, and are rejecting what EA has said.

http://www.videogamer.com/news/dead_space_4_videogamer_com_statement.html

There is more at the article, but here's some of it...

The information was provided to us by a trusted source: an individual whose identity we agreed to protect, but whose background and statements gave us valid reason to trust their claims. We contacted Electronic Arts UK PR at 12:31 GMT on Monday, March 4, to ask whether they could confirm or deny that Dead Space 4 had been cancelled, or provide any further comment on the future of the series. This is standard industry practice.

In response, EA's UK representative asked us whether we would be willing to hold the story until the following day, Tuesday, March 5, to provide the publisher with more time to get a response from its US team.

After initially declining EA’s request, we later decided that waiting for an official response from the publisher would be the best course of action. At 16:34 GMT we informed EA UK that we would be holding the story overnight - as per their initial request - in the hope of receiving an official response.

On Tuesday morning, having informed the US team of our request, EA UK informed VideoGamer.com that it does not comment on rumour and speculation. The story was published at 10:36 GMT to include this response, 22 hours after our initial correspondence with the publisher.

Pushtrak

I started this thread when, as I saw it, a number of bad things were happening in news related to EA. It seems fair that I'd bring up news to the contrary position when it is warranted. Well, that and I prefer posting in this to making a new thread for this news... Enough of that. EA give up on online pass. They say its due to consumer reaction not being as they'd have liked, so they're not going to use that approach any more. That's great news. Though, the cynic in me is wondering what's next here.

Falthyron

Pushtrak wrote: »

I started this thread when, as I saw it, a number of bad things were happening in news related to EA. It seems fair that I'd bring up news to the contrary position when it is warranted. Well, that and I prefer posting in this to making a new thread for this news... Enough of that. EA give up on online pass. They say its due to consumer reaction not being as they'd have liked, so they're not going to use that approach any more. That's great news. Though, the cynic in me is wondering what's next here.

Zero-Cool

Yeah, I actually didn't have a problem with the online pass, clever way to reduce 2nd hand games and get the devs more money. I know they are trying to shake the 'worst company in the world' cloud but they have to have something shnakey up their shleeve

hooradiation

ShadowHearth wrote: »

Thanks to this attitude Franchises die and Developer studios close down. Next time the one who pays should ask piper if it is a good idea to play Funeral March on the Wedding day.

What on earth do you even imagine you are talking about?

CastorTroy

Pushtrak wrote: »

I started this thread when, as I saw it, a number of bad things were happening in news related to EA. It seems fair that I'd bring up news to the contrary position when it is warranted. Well, that and I prefer posting in this to making a new thread for this news... Enough of that. EA give up on online pass. They say its due to consumer reaction not being as they'd have liked, so they're not going to use that approach any more. That's great news. Though, the cynic in me is wondering what's next here.

What were they expecting? People to come out and say "Oh wow, this online pass is a great idea. At last we can play without as many of those lower class used game purchasers interrupting our games"?

gizmo

CastorTroy wrote: »

What were they expecting? People to come out and say "Oh wow, this online pass is a great idea. At last we can play without as many of those lower class used game purchasers interrupting our games"?

When he says customer reaction he more than likely means customer adoption.

Either way, nice to see a positive move being taken by EA after the last couple of months of fairly miserable news.

Zero-Cool

Actually this looks like the rumours might be true that the next Xbox won't play 2nd hand games at all meaning there is no need for this pass. This might be a way of softening the blow before the backlash they will receive (if they implement it) at their reveal.

Don't EA have some big deal with the next Xbox?

Burning Eclipse

Why are people talking about Far Cry 3 like EA had anything to do with it?