EA was wrong to ride PS3 & Xbox 360, CEO says

by James Ransom-Wiley { Jul 27th 2007 at 11:25AM }

During yesterday's EA investor's meeting, fresh-faced CEO John Riccitiello lamented the company's unbalanced commitment to PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Riccitiello spoke candidly about fiscal 2007, which he described as "the toughest year in the company's history," reports Next-Gen. "One of the biggest challenges, of course, was that not a lot of people anticipated the success of Nintendo that they've shown with their wand controller and their Wii," observed Riccitiello, who admitted that by focusing on PS3 and Xbox, EA was on the "wrong horse". The pledge to Nintendo was a late bid.

As of March, EA had the largest third-party market share on Wii, but profits were still stunted by relatively few titles and not a single original IP. Riccitiello did reaffirm a company-wide initiative to cease using Wii as a shovelware graveyard and to focus on new IPs; the same applies for all platforms supported by the company. With new franchises like Army of Two, Crysis, Playground, Rock Band -- oh, and "A Steven Spielberg Game: Blocks" -- EA hopes to get stagnant share prices bubbling upward again (shares were down yesterday). If only it was as simple as a wave of that magic wand...

Tags: ea, ElectronicArts, JohnRiccitiello

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

vidGuy @ Jul 27th 2007 11:29AM

It amuses me to no end that developers put so much stock into the $600 console. Sure, PS2 has the largest install base of the lastgen consoles, but who in their right mind thought that a significant portion of the 100 million PS2 owners, many of whom bought the PS2 at less than $200, would go drop $600 out of the gate for the new system?

Anyone who took a serious look at the industry and the nextgen consoles could have determined that a company would do much better financially to develop games for the 360 and Wii and port them to the PS3, at least until the PS3 gets enough of an install base to make focusing on it worth it.

I'm liking EA sports games on the Wii - Tiger Woods and Madden are great to own. I just hope they nail online play, I'm kind of disappointed that they aren't going with the friend code system, as having an EA-specific gamer tag just makes more names to keep track of.

Jake @ Jul 27th 2007 11:48AM

Yeah, but the PS3 is still keeping up with where PS2 sales were at this time in its life. You can't base the success of consoles on the first year. The problem is not so much that the PS3 costs $500, but that it won't cost $200 after two or three years.

Also, the Wii is selling to a lot of people that didn't buy a system last generation. That expands the market without shrinking the share that Sony and MS have to fight over. The Wii's unprecedented early success does not doom the competitors. I personally feel the experience that the Wii offers is much different than the PS3 and 360. I don't even compare them anymore. The Wii is not going to make me not want to play games like Oblivion, Mass Effect, Gears, MGS3, FFXIII, Bioshock, etc. and just want minigames and two hardcore games a year.

I really think all three consoles will be successful. Sony won't dominate the way they did last gen and they need to get more of that artificial hype and belief that their games look way more better. MSFT has to get their hardware straightened out quick. Other than that, things look good.

The PS3 and 360 share a space that was occupied by 3 consoles last gen while the Wii is making its own space out in the wide blue ocean. The 360 is to gaming what the PS2 was last gen and the PS3 is what the xbox was last gen. The key difference, of course, is that Sony has a much larger fanbase.

Oh, on topic. EA can't totally blame its faults on not publishing more for the Wii. They didn't make that many great games. Dumping more turds on the Wii instead of the PS360 wouldn't have made much difference.

ZaBlanc @ Jul 27th 2007 1:43PM

> The Wii is not going to make me not want to play games like Oblivion, Mass Effect, Gears, MGS3, FFXIII, Bioshock, etc. and just want minigames and two hardcore games a year.

I can't let you get away with that comment.

Zelda: TP, Super Paper Mario, Madden 07, RE4? What about in the next few weeks when we'll see Strikers Charged and Madden 08 with online play?

What about Wii Fit and 16-player Mario Kart? Super Smash Bros. Brawl and Metroid Prime 3? Super Mario Galaxy...

I have 13 games for the Wii and would not classify my collection as a bunch of minigames. One of them, WarioWare, is mini-games -- and one of the most fun games around for parties. It should not be lumped in with Raving Rabbids or Mario Party 8...both excellent as well, but yes, minigames.

I'll take Zelda TP or Super paper Mario over any of those games, except maybe FF XIII, anyday...it's just too bad no one will be able to afford to play FF XIII if it's a PS3 exclusive (which I doubt).

As for thinking the PS3 is matching, or may match PS2, you can't be serious. :-)

ShawnMcCool @ Jul 27th 2007 2:39PM

"It amuses me to no end that developers put so much stock into the $600 console."

What? What stock? I have a ps3 (which I purchased as a cheap bluray player with promise of being a strong console --which I believe is correct--) but uh... there's no games.. there's few games even on the horizon.. Seriously... Every single game available via the Ps3 store is a clone of geometry wars.. There's no gaming available except for Ninja Gaiden Sigma(sweet game) and Resistance (seriously over rated ).

PSN: ummfada @ Jul 27th 2007 7:34PM

but "porting" will not build the install base, they should develop each the best for each console maybe include more things on the 50gb blu-ray disc more xbox live features on the xbox version and motion control on the wii (wii hellmet lol) honestly arguing over game systems is stupid... lets grow up please?

Farseer @ Jul 27th 2007 11:30AM

That picture is priceless!

PSN: ummfada @ Jul 27th 2007 7:37PM

ASS BACKWARDS
To do something totally wrong or stupid, whether intentionally or not. Something that is the opposite of itself. To be stupid or slow.

Tony @ Jul 27th 2007 11:31AM

Doesn't sound like he means "wrong to ride" on PS3 and 360 as much as wrong to barely pay any attention to the Wii at all... although, honestly, some of their ports are handled better than those by a good deal of other companies.

Shalex @ Jul 27th 2007 12:23PM

That statement makes no sense. EA has a huge Wii showing, and the best 3rd party presence on the console.... And Probably some of the best 3rd party Wii games. Activision got where they are with lazy business tactics, and milking their biggest franchise. If anything, EA needed more of a PS2 focus.

Activision is the worst of all the publishers, and people need to understand that. You blame Microsoft for the Guitar Hero 2 tracks being overpriced, that's ALL activision. If you don't agree, look at the 80's expansion for PS2. Most PS2 games come at $40 nowadays, but this PoS is $50 bucks, and it's basically the same damn game with new songs. Now expanded gameplay, no new interface... and it's the cost of a NEW GAME... a new high end game.

hvnlysoldr @ Jul 27th 2007 11:42AM

That's Sony right there.

ill trooper @ Jul 27th 2007 11:53AM

Millions of people are wanting more games for their Wii. So get on it, EA, if you feel you need to.

And really, the Madden and the Tiger Woods games for the Wii are well-received and have unique control schemes from their 360 and PS3 counterparts. So they have shown the Wii more respect than some other companies.

Quann @ Jul 27th 2007 12:03PM

I believe there is a broad difference for each of the systems, but because of it's price point and it's pick up and play gameplay the Wii has sold the most units. Personally, I would like to see Rock Band head over to the Wii,I would buy it over GHIII easily.

Curmeo @ Jul 27th 2007 12:05PM

EA and Wii have one thing in common: mediocrity.

Pussy @ Jul 27th 2007 12:15PM

I think you got it wrong. Its EA and the 360.

REUYL @ Jul 27th 2007 2:23PM

Maybe so, but that "mediocre" console practically prints money.

blueman @ Jul 27th 2007 12:12PM

EA and My Ass have one thing in common they both cant stop turning out shit!

BPM @ Jul 27th 2007 12:31PM

I do believe you meant "churning out."

oldest gamer @ Jul 27th 2007 12:13PM

Backing PS3? Releasing inferior products on the PS3 while the inferior 360 gets better attention? EA developers must be like MS developers, clueless on the benefits of the CBE in the PS3. How much is Microsoft greasing these guys up anyway? Time for Sony to parachute in their team to set these coders straight. On the Wii, doesn't it use the GameCube SDK with enhancements? Shouldn't take any established company too long to get up to speed on the hardware. EA just needs mor imagination.

GodisaMyth @ Jul 27th 2007 12:19PM

Yes, you are already seeing the difference in a PS3 only game vs. 360 lead platform ports.

If 3rd parties want the best games on both the 360 and the PS3...they need 2 make the PS3 the lead platform and then port down to the 360.

We will see soon enough with the New N4S from EA with the PS3 being the lead platform...and with Sega and their Rally game.

All you need 2 do is look at MGS4 and Killzone among others to see that the PS3 is a beast.

razer @ Jul 27th 2007 12:57PM

Inferior 360 my arse. The PS3 has been hyped up to be some kind of wonder box but the thing has bottlenecks. Just look at the Heavenly Sword demo.. Jaggies, framerate problems, etc. If it's such the superior machine than these problems should be non-existant. Don't spew your lies here that the 360 has somehow crippled the PS3 that's absurd! pfft fanboys..

Evan @ Jul 27th 2007 12:57PM

The performance difference between the PS3 and 360 is less than the difference between the PS2 and Xbox!

According to Sony's specs, the PS2 was THREE TIMES more powerful than the original Xbox (6 GIGAFLOPs on the PS2 verses 2 GIGAFLOPs on the Xbox). But the Emotion Engine's convoluted design nullified the PS2's power advantage over the Xbox, and PS2 games actually looked worst even though the PS2 was theoritically more "powerful".

According to Sony's specs, the PS3 is only about 1.5 times more powerful than the 360, and the cell's design is even more convoluted than the Emotion Engine. If developers couldn't make PS2 games look better than Xbox games with 3 times the "power", I seriously doubt they'll be able to make PS3 games look better than 360 with even less of a power advantage!

The1 @ Jul 27th 2007 12:14PM

Here is the issue, ONLY Nintendo games seem to sell on the Wii. How does that help any third party developer?

hvnlysoldr @ Jul 27th 2007 12:46PM

Rayman Raving Rabbids and Red Steel sold a million each.

Skippy @ Jul 27th 2007 2:00PM

And Resident Evil 4 is doing quite well, especially considering it's a port of an older game.

ouj @ Jul 27th 2007 2:52PM

"Rayman Raving Rabbids and Red Steel sold a million each."

Both were high profile launch titles (tells a lot about the launch, really), so it's not a big wonder that they sold well. Red Steel was also hyped no end before the launch.

I'm quite sure that for the most part sales of third party games for Wii have been very disappointing - notable exceptions being Dragon Quest in Japan and RE:4 in US/Europe. RE:4 sold only about 50 thousand copies in Japan.

By the way, what games are you waiting most eagerly? Let me guess: new Mario, new Metroid, maybe Smash Bros, maybe Mario Kart. Yeah, Nintendo consoles are for Nintendo games.

Still, the risk is quite small since Wii versions can be made relatively easily from the "PS2 base". In fact, you'll be hard pressed to find *any* games which will be released on Xbox 360, PS3, Wii but NOT PS2.

samfish @ Jul 27th 2007 3:13PM

"By the way, what games are you waiting most eagerly? Let me guess: new Mario, new Metroid, maybe Smash Bros, maybe Mario Kart. Yeah, Nintendo consoles are for Nintendo games."

I'm waiting for all of those, except Metroid.
I'm also, more than any of those, waiting for NiGHTS.
Not to mention Zack & Wiki and Dewey's Adventure.

Mr Khan @ Jul 27th 2007 6:18PM

and No More Heroes, lets not forget that

That game needs a "buy this game" campaign, more so than Zack and Wiki

GodisaMyth @ Jul 27th 2007 12:14PM

Excellent post Jake.
vidGuy.....not so good. It is NOT $600 anymore...it is $500.

I have been saying all along that the Wii should not even be considered along with the 360 and PS3.

It needs to be either...grouped with the PS2 or by itself.

vidGuy @ Jul 27th 2007 12:22PM

Did I say it was? I said it was $600 at launch, when the developers were choosing sides.

I agree, excellent post Jake.

WiNG @ Jul 27th 2007 12:21PM

shoulda bet on the Dreamcast.

OnimushaSoki @ Jul 27th 2007 12:34PM

LoL Farseer's right. Nice picture to represent the article, LoL. Anyway... I think EA really did give the Wii game releases a half-ass outing:

SSX BLUR was graphically decent, but the controls and load time was sub-par, considering the content was pretty simplified and options limited compared to other arcade-style snowboarding games.

MADDEN 07 had pretty nice controls of which myself and three friends were able to pick up after a single quarter without reading the severely lacking instruction manual*. However, the graphics were godawful, player models didn't look this creepy since the bug-eyed ones in Madden2001 on PS2.

TIGER WOODS is personally, the best of the three sports games - which isn't saying much. Though controls and gameplay still need sensitivity tweaking, graphically it was just a degree or three lower than SSX in clarity. Even with EA's supposedly infamous "rubberband difficulty"(i.e., the Player gets a huge lead on the CPU opponent, the game is "adjusted" to let the CPU catch up with "snarky", hard to replicate moves); beating Tiger is an irksome shred tougher when the WiiRemote slices every other shot.

I haven't had a chance to check out NFS:CARBON or even HARRY POTTER(admittedly, I'm not a HP fan. At all. So the likelyhood of me renting/buying is nill); but if it's anything like the above three, it's mediocrity... which is sad, because with the Wii's start-up popularity and all. I'm told GODFATHER isn't bad, but has awkward controls, but I'd still like to try that out of EA's remaining Wii titles out now. Granted after typing all this, in hindsight, there's obvious room for improvement after this first year of testing the Wii waters(LoL, sorry).

I might be among the few gamers out there that doesn't mind having three consoles out there going nuts for our hard earned/obtained money. Last time competition was this fierce, we had some of the best(16-bit)games of all time. :D

*BTW, Is it just me or is EA really attempting to slim the instruction booklets down to a single page? If they're going to add more features, functions, and gameplay tips each year to their titles; narrowing the guide doesn't help in the least.

Jack of No Trades @ Jul 27th 2007 12:39PM

It just goes to show you that just because a game has motion controls it doesn't make it a good game. Same goes for graphics. It takes balance. Like Mario Galaxy on Wii or Mass Effect on 360.

OnimushaSoki @ Jul 27th 2007 12:50PM

Jack of No Trades--- That's why I had to laugh at the whole "innovation"("zazz", LoL)buzzword use tossed around. I'd like to think I'm controlling some of these Wii/PS3 motion sensored games properly(No broken TVs or serious injuries here); but responsibility also falls on the developer to tweak the controls well enough. That's what killed THE BIGS for me on the Wii. Batting and pitching is obviously easy, but fielding is a pain in the ass.

As much as I praise competition among the consoles & companies because of the usually improved effort for greatness; it does drain the hell out of the pocket pretty deep owning all 3 consoles... and figuring out which version of a game is best out of the three.

BenjaminBreeg @ Jul 27th 2007 12:45PM

Pleeeeeeease let that mean they're bringing Rock Band to the Wii. I want that game so badly, but with my first semester of college this fall, plus buying a new car and everything, I really cant afford to buy a 360 or PS3 anytime soon.

Grey @ Jul 27th 2007 12:51PM

@ J Trades

Yeah, but developers aren't taking the time to tweak the motion controls.(They just rush games out) There lazy and they only care about visuals. The motion controls work.

(Zelda - Hourglass - DS, great stylus controls, works perfect, because they took the time to tweak it.) I know its not the Wii, but its kind of the same thing.

Word of the street. @ Jul 27th 2007 1:15PM

Perhaps I suppose,Well if you can develop games with greater facility in the wii without putting as much effort as in the xbox 360 or ps3 and sell more of course but aren't the wii best seller Nintendo games only?,Of course there is Rayman and Red steel but I havent seen a single EA Wii game in the top 10 in a while.

h0mi @ Jul 27th 2007 1:22PM

"Yeah, but the PS3 is still keeping up with where PS2 sales were at this time in its life."

This hasn't been the case in the US for nearly 20 weeks now. At this stage in its life, the ps2 sold 2x the number of ps3s sold.

hvnlysoldr @ Jul 27th 2007 2:35PM

Old gray mare ain't what she used to be.
Ain't what she used to be.
Ain't what she used to be.

RHP @ Jul 27th 2007 3:16PM

PS3 software sales face a hurdle in having to cater to an audience capable of investing in an such an expensive system.

I think anyone developing a Wii game faces a hurdle in having to compete with Nintendo and something that completely utilizes Wii. Very few third parties are had large selling Wii titles.

DoomPlague @ Jul 27th 2007 3:23PM

EA is just doing what a few of third-parties seem to be doing by reassessing their Wii strategy, or lack of thereof. Even Ubisoft, I believe, seemed to apologize for the quality of its early Wii games, despite being the system's biggest third-party supporter. It's a shame we didn't see the growing support at E3 but it probably will be awhile before we see the result, as so many were late to the Wii-wagon.

The Wii should be appealing to any publisher, with its cheap development costs and growing user base but I think a lot of them just do not get the system and its owners. They know how to market to males in their teens and twenties which should be easy to anyone that's been in the business this long. The Wii, though, appears to be selling to a wider, mainstream audience.

I feel third-parties are over-thinking their Wii strategies and fail to realize that not only are a lot of Wii owners actually avid gamers but that the new gamers might enjoy the same types of games. Of course, they're probably all content selling to cheap, shallow games to those who don't know better.

What's odd is that EA has one popular franchise that appeals to the same wide, mainstream audience that the Wii seems to be. Yet for the Wii they turn it into what looks like a kids game that won't have nearly the same appeal. It's baffling.

Shockgamer @ Jul 27th 2007 4:53PM

If EA wants to put more games on the Wii, let em. I'll still likely buy games from them that I think have value, but those games aren't going to be cartoony, dumbed down minigame collections and party games. EA's been more about the business than the games for a while, so it's not surprising.

If gaming were movies, it'd be an industry ruled by summer blockbusters, horror movies and action movies. Now it's being forced aside by kids movies, teen movies and romantic comedies.

Zsavior @ Jul 27th 2007 8:29PM

Everytime EA opens their mouth their words are mortifying, remember their remarks about, supporting the PSP over the DS. Explaining how they were surprised people wanted "fun" games, and that the PSP was not fun yet they were making the games for PSP.

Now this revelation that they just backed the Xbox 360 and the Ps3 for backing sake. The question that is still not answered is will they actually create for the WII. Oh many companies are making games, but they aren't creating anything. The same thing happened to sega, the 3rd party developers blamed the systems fan base but the truth is, these developers send poorly made games, and expect them to be bought just cause the console is popular and they haven't given them much of a choice.

Basically 3rd parties like EA are saying "If you are popular we just swarm mediocre games your way" That isn't creating games that is just flooding a system. Maybe if EA actually tried making new and interesting games people would find reasons to pick up the systems. Imagine the game company looks at a machine made to play their games, gives them poorly made games and says the machine didn't do enough to sell itself.

Bad movies don't blame movie screens for poor turn out. Crappy cars don't blame cracked roads for poor sales. So why are software producers blaming Consoles for not selling hardware when they aren't making good software. Don't get me wrong the PS3 price played a huge roll, but what is the excuse for the 360, or the PSP, and any other system EA supports.

Gamers are tired of being treated like cash cows and EA doesn't know how to cater to a group they never had to before. EA's lack of revenue has less to do with Console poor sales rather than their poor business practice in making poorly put together games. Software sells systems, and they are in charge of making software, putting out crap and then looking at the consumer isn't going to move anything bout time this backlash happened.

John @ Jul 27th 2007 9:36PM

Whoa.

Jake called it.

Mad props.

John @ Jul 27th 2007 9:52PM

Evan's comment, Evan's... "perspective" is just that, a perspective, an... "interpretation."

The ps2 runs at 297 MHZ. The xbox runs (or did run... they don't make them anymore, um, snap) at 768 MHZ. More than twice the speed of the ps2.

Yet because of the ps2's weird extra two co-processors (which generally had to be programmed in assembly language, and sync'd to the main processor, does any of this sound familiar?), and the flexibility of it's emotion unit (for instance-- the ps2 had no built-in anti-alias chip like xbox or cube (had to say it was a good day), but one of the "co-processors" (predecessors to Cell) could be configured to do that, as you saw in games like Ratchet and Clank, but not in games like Midnight Club 3, where that power was used for other things (MC3 looks AMAZING upscaled and smoothed on a PS3, btw).

Because of the high configurability of the engine of the ps2, developers were able to pull off stunts, after a learning curve, that weren't even possible on xbox, which was a computer with a graphics card.

Consider this other strange phenomenon of the ps2:

A 128-bit-wide data path, something no other console or even home computer had, at the time. You run a 300 MHZ computer against a well-coded PS2 and that computer will get shredded.

Developers later learned that they could dump stuff down this path, and the ps2 would eat it up.

An example of this is the game by Rockstar, Midnight Club 3 DUB edition... you play this game, on a 297 mhz ps2 and tell me you're not impressed. Every single pixel is being updated, the whole screen, 30 frames per second, with very clever framerate management. Even reviewers said the only difference with this and xbox was the textures, and even that was barely discernible.

Yet the xbox runs at more than twice the speed of the ps2.

That's future-proofing.

It reminds me of the brilliant Commodore 64, best 8-bit computer in history, but that's a whole other 'blog'...

Chainblast @ Jul 27th 2007 10:50PM

There is a $50 difference between the core 360 SKU and the Wii. I don't think price has as much of an affect as some seem to think. It basically comes down to one thing, development cost. In other words, for EA, why spend more money developing a sub-par product when you can spend less?

Is anyone else sickened by the bandwagon jumping to "non-gamer gaming"? Does EA even have a good game available for the PS3 or 360? Yeah, the more I think about it the more it seems like this is a move to reduce losses by reducing cost of development on non-grade A games. Something EA is known for.