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Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

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Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#51

Post by soup10 »

kevingadd wrote: post #31
soup10 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

every video game is a financial gamble, it's not his money so who cares if they try to make a battle royale and it flops

We've had a considerable number of layoffs impact the video game industry over the past few years ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022%E2%80%932025_video_game_i... ) and executive incompetence is a big factor in it. Deciding to set a "success" target of 100 million players and then spending upwards of $400 million USD developing one title is a recipe for studio closures and/or layoffs when it inevitably "fails" becau…

i'd rather see studios take creative and financial risks personally, not saying I care about yet another battle royale game, but in principle it should be about good games that are innovative and push boundaries, not milking a sequel from an established ip for the sake of stable employment.

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#52

Post by AlexandrB »

bdcravens wrote: post #19

I used to spend way too much time, and money, playing the mobile game Tap Sports Baseball. A fairly simple take on a baseball simulator, but with an insanely set of team/club competitiveness and upgrade mechanics. After EA bought the company that owned it, it literally lasted a year before they decided to end it, as its tens of millions of dollars in revenue each year apparently didn't meet their goals.

EA has a well-earned reputation as the grim reaper of the industry.

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#53

Post by danaris »

delusional wrote: post #26
joegibbs wrote: post #20

I think the thing a lot of people don't realise when trying to make the next runaway hit game is that most of the games they're trying to emulate weren't produced with that intent, and didn't get their popularity with a running start as some massive AAA behemoth. Fortnite itself was originally a base-building PVE zombie game that Epic cranked out a battle royale mode for in a couple of months after seeing that PUBG (…

> I think the thing a lot of people don't realise when trying to make the next runaway hit game Okay sure, let's say that. I don't think it's true. I think anyone who has ever made anything creative, which is most people, know that chasing success just make your creative work bad. That doesn't matter though. Surely the executives at EA should know better. Like it's literally their job to know better. They head an ent…

> Surely the executives at EA should know better.

This...

> Like it's literally their job to know better.

...does not follow from this.

And executives get where they are, at least in significant part, because they are good at telling boards what they want to hear. They are also, generally speaking, in the same class as the board members, and together they are very willing to blame failures on those darn workers just doing a bad job at stuff.

"What is going on" is that the executive class in America has been progressively getting more and more divorced from the reality of actual production, and treating their opinions and expertise as if they are somehow definitive on everything related to their domain is very dangerous.

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#54

Post by swat535 »

joegibbs wrote: post #20

I think the thing a lot of people don't realise when trying to make the next runaway hit game is that most of the games they're trying to emulate weren't produced with that intent, and didn't get their popularity with a running start as some massive AAA behemoth. Fortnite itself was originally a base-building PVE zombie game that Epic cranked out a battle royale mode for in a couple of months after seeing that PUBG (…

I don’t think it’s about the size off the project but the crestivity, cohesion, gameplay and good storytelling.

There are plenty of counter examples like Witcher 3, Desth Starnding, Resident Evil Village and Cyberpunk (regardless of its rocky launch)

The issue with EA and Ubisoft nowadays is that they are not run by game designers but by MBAs and HR departments. There is very little room to disagree with the mandates and if the game must have x,y,z then you need to find a way to cram it regardless.

When you kill the creativity and don’t take bold risks, you kill innovation and ultimately suck the soul out of the game.

Games are a form of art after all.

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#55

Post by AlexandrB »

soup10 wrote: post #51
kevingadd wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've had a considerable number of layoffs impact the video game industry over the past few years ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022%E2%80%932025_video_game_i... ) and executive incompetence is a big factor in it. Deciding to set a "success" target of 100 million players and then spending upwards of $400 million USD developing one title is a recipe for studio closures and/or layoffs when it inevitably "fails" becau…

i'd rather see studios take creative and financial risks personally, not saying I care about yet another battle royale game, but in principle it should be about good games that are innovative and push boundaries, not milking a sequel from an established ip for the sake of stable employment.

Creative risks and financial risks are almost diametrically opposed. It's a lot harder to take a creative risk when a lot of money is on the line. It's also harder aligning a large team to execute on a novel vision.

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#56

Post by dcow »

danaris wrote: post #53
delusional wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the thing a lot of people don't realise when trying to make the next runaway hit game Okay sure, let's say that. I don't think it's true. I think anyone who has ever made anything creative, which is most people, know that chasing success just make your creative work bad. That doesn't matter though. Surely the executives at EA should know better. Like it's literally their job to know better. They head an ent…

> Surely the executives at EA should know better. This... > Like it's literally their job to know better. ...does not follow from this. And executives get where they are, at least in significant part, because they are good at telling boards what they want to hear. They are also, generally speaking, in the same class as the board members, and together they are very willing to blame failures on those darn workers just…

It’s not limited to games either. How many TV shows and movies in the last 10 years have shit the bed because instead of taking a good proven story from society and adapting it for screen, they decided that people actually want to hear a different story and had their “writers” hack up good art and turn it into gloopy strings of virtuous platitudes?

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#57

Post by ethbr1 »

swat535 wrote: post #54
joegibbs wrote: post #20

I think the thing a lot of people don't realise when trying to make the next runaway hit game is that most of the games they're trying to emulate weren't produced with that intent, and didn't get their popularity with a running start as some massive AAA behemoth. Fortnite itself was originally a base-building PVE zombie game that Epic cranked out a battle royale mode for in a couple of months after seeing that PUBG (…

I don’t think it’s about the size off the project but the crestivity, cohesion, gameplay and good storytelling. There are plenty of counter examples like Witcher 3, Desth Starnding, Resident Evil Village and Cyberpunk (regardless of its rocky launch) The issue with EA and Ubisoft nowadays is that they are not run by game designers but by MBAs and HR departments. There is very little room to disagree with the mandates…

'Creative decisions made by people who don't even like the output' was a good phrasing I recently heard.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j9Qm6_lEdcQ&t=656s

It's incredibly difficult to pick good creative things if you don't have the same spark their actual consumers do.

Sure, maybe someone is experienced, but they'll always be looking at it through a completely different lens than consumers. Eventually that creates a blind spot and understandings diverge disastrously.

Ex: the infamous Diablo mobile game announcement

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#58

Post by soup10 »

AlexandrB wrote: post #55
soup10 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i'd rather see studios take creative and financial risks personally, not saying I care about yet another battle royale game, but in principle it should be about good games that are innovative and push boundaries, not milking a sequel from an established ip for the sake of stable employment.

Creative risks and financial risks are almost diametrically opposed. It's a lot harder to take a creative risk when a lot of money is on the line. It's also harder aligning a large team to execute on a novel vision.

>It's a lot harder to take a creative risk when a lot of money is on the line. It's also harder aligning a large team to execute on a novel vision.

well indie games are their own separate thing and large studios will never have the creative freedom and the ability to align a small team to a novel vision that they do. However studios with deeper pockets and larger teams can still innovate and push the boundaries of what gaming can be so long as the executive team isn't a bunch of spineless losers.

Re: Electronic Arts Leadership Are Out of Their Goddamned Minds

#60

Post by bluefirebrand »

ekianjo wrote: post #35
bluefirebrand wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a huge part of the problem in the North American game industry is that the execs and MBAs you mention still seem to have a mentality that games are for gross dorky losers It's really weird how much the game industry seems to despise their audience

> It's really weird how much the game industry seems to despise their audience its an endemic behavior when you recruit MBAs that are not growing from within the company. not limited to gaming at all.

I agree that it's a bigger problem than just the game industry. I just didn't want to be accused of over-generalizing
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