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Has EA improved in your eyes?

Depends on the game.

I think season pass bullshit has resulted in a lot of their games feeling incomplete without it. Like every bioware game since Mass Effect 1 has giant holes and plot teases in them for the DLC to go. Its insulting and has turned me off them.
 

prudislav

Member
It's more like konami has fallen so low that makes EA and UBI look better in comparison.
pretty much this

.. with the expection of the semi-indie Unravel ... their games are all godly marketed and presended but they kinda lack soul and lately i was always hugely disappointed by them (DA:I, NFS2015, ME:C beta,...)
 

Caffeine

Member
I dont think they are evil but around 2008 i feel was their glory period where they seeked new ip's to bring to the market mirrors edge/deadspace. recently its just bee continuations and they kinda havent reapproached deadspace or amalur reckoning. I think they should continue to approach new ip's because the sports market is stagnant. It's kinda great for them releasing star wars related titles again I just wish they would make quality products with that ip instead of flooding the market with as many games as they can.
 

bounchfx

Member
Ungrateful, the game has content...

Uh, what? It has nothing to do with being grateful or not, nor did I say the game didn't have content. I said it lacked a lot of content when compared to its previous iteration, not to mention a lot of other games. It's not a matter of opinion.

Good for you if you felt it was a good value, but that only proves the point I made in my previous post of people getting used to less and then, for some reason, defending the company that made it.
 
To be honest, the whole of last year whatever shady shit EA have or might have done got overshadowed by everything Konami did.

At the very least it means they didn't royally fucked up...
 
In my eyes? No. The last game I bought from them was Dead Space as I didn't care for the sequels.

In terms of market practices and standing? Well what do the sales look like, I assume they continued leading with their franchise mentality and willing audiences.
 

Abounder

Banned
The games are good enough but not the community support - Battlefront on PC is a ghost town because of no server list/etc
 

eloxx

Member
Yep.

They have great games in the pipeline.

SW Battlefront was amazing (no i didnt lack content)
More Star Wars games coming which im excited for.

And this year a new Battlefield in WW1 *.*

Exactly my thoughts. Had a really great time with Battlefront. Also more Star Wars is always a plus. In additional this will be the first year of real Call of Duty fatigue for me. So Battlefield it is.
 

Shaanyboi

Banned
-Battlefront was barebones.

-We have yet to see what they're doing with Mass Effect

-PvZ:GW2 was pretty damn good

-we got a Mirror's Edge sequel


Outside of this stuff, I don't care about current EA. PvZ and ME2 win them some favor for the last 8 or so months, but I can't say I care about much else they've put out for a while.

EA between 2007 and 2011 was absolutely amazing.
They did not only push out Dragon Age 1, Mass Effect 1/2 and Dead Space 1 and 2 but also rather niche games such as Dante's Inferno, Red Alert 3, Mirror's Edge, Brütal Legends or Shadows of the Damned (yes, EA funded and published a Japanese niche game by Suda51 last gen, not kidding), all of them unusual and either innovative and/or great games. People seem to forget those games all the time. Thing is that after Dead Space 2 and Battlefield 3 (2012 onward) EA totally jumped off a cliff when it came to the mainstreamification of every title, a AAA-only policy, the total disregard for customers, 'money comes first' and broken releases.

The new Mirror's Edge and Battlefield 1 (thumbs up to them for actually greenlighting that) seem to be a good sign, though I won't hold my breath or think that their golden age of early last gen will return.
Just to clarify, Mass Effect 1 was Microsoft. EA bought Bioware not long after its release. And there are a lot of fans of the first one who take issue with some of the direction changes between 1 and 2. Besides the better combat, the sequel was markedly more simplistic and smaller scale. Whether that's attributed to Bioware or EA, I couldn't tell you. But the EA brand gets the stink-eye for that association from some. I like ME2, but I know alot of people that don't.
 

Draxyle

Neo Member
Honestly, I'm not even sure. They went from terrible to just plain boring. But that's mostly because of some of their shady practices -- their actual games still haven't been interesting for years.

That's kinda my stance too. They've been playing everything so safe and predictable to the point that I just don't care about them anymore (though Battlefield 1 seems like it'll be an interesting spin on the genre, but I'm not a Battlefield person).
 
I will be forever thankful to EA for making Battleforge. Sadly the market and the business model, in addition to EA's server shutdown policies, couldn't keep it alive.
 

Mooreberg

Member
Nope. The only games I own from this gen are BF4 and Titanfall. I'll get Mirror's Edge at some point, but the release timing after all the games in May is flat out terrible. That is a pretty low number for such a major publisher. I own more WB games on the current hardware.
 

Steel

Banned
Just to clarify, Mass Effect 1 was Microsoft. EA bought Bioware not long after its release. And there are a lot of fans of the first one who take issue with some of the direction changes between 1 and 2. Besides the better combat, the sequel was markedly more simplistic and smaller scale. Whether that's attributed to Bioware or EA, I couldn't tell you. But the EA brand gets the stink-eye for that association from some. I like ME2, but I know alot of people that don't.

Dragon's Age Origins was also bioware pre-EA.
 

scitek

Member
As far as the PC goes, they haven't improved really so much as worse players have entered the ring. Warner Bros. hit a new low with their bullshit, and Microsoft is making Origin look amazing with their Windows 10 Store shenanigans.
 

fritolay

Member
I give them kudos for supporting/allowing support of Battlefield 4. The kept improving the game, when other publishers may have called a it a day after 1 year, they kept updating 2 1/2 years.

Yes the launch sucked, and yes the R&D in this game and Frostbite will pay for not just future Dice games, but all EA games using the Frostbite engine.

The CTP allowed gamers to work closer with developers, on PC and XB1. XB1 this was something newer to consoles they had to get MS and details worked out.
 
I'm glad they are making Mirrors Edge 2 and not turning it into a multiplayer FPS.

I need to see what Andromeda looks like, ME3 was really disappointing to me and the ending had nothing to do with it.

The Henning and Stig Star Wars games could be good but they are far away and Battlefront was not nearly as good as advertised.

But for the most part i dont really care about the company either way, I never get mad at them because im not invested in them at all.
 

dtm808

Member
Almost 5 years of not buying any EA games now. Thankfully most of the games they have put out are broken, incomplete, or riddled with season passes, cut-out DLC, and pointless micro transactions. Maybe one day they will get better.
 
Almost 5 years of not buying any EA games now. Thankfully most of the games they have put out are broken, incomplete, or riddled with season passes, cut-out DLC, and pointless micro transactions. Maybe one day they will get better.

I hadnt bought one since ME3, then some of my friends asked me to buy Battlefront so i did (digitally....)......even they stopped playing it after like 4 days and went back to Destiny. I wont be making that mistake again.
 

Ennosuke

Member
It is like a rollercoaster with EA. In 2008/2009 they had some great games with Mirrors Edge, Deadspace or Mass Effect. Even Fifa was good and better than PES. But in the last years their games became less impressive or creative. Even their game output is not that big anymore or am I making this up?

DragonAge Inquisition is a strange and bland game. Fifa and NFS are a mess. Battlefront and Battlefield could habe been better.

But they seems less evil now. These days I am more annoyed by Ubisoft.
 

BobLoblaw

Banned
I'll always dislike EA just because of how they killed the NFL 2K franchise, but they haven't been as blatantly dickish as they've been over the last 10 years.
 
D

Deleted member 59090

Unconfirmed Member
I'd say they're at an all-time low with Mirror's Edge 2 being the only redeeming factor.
 
Not really, or maybe I've become less interested in their output. Seems like they still have a focus on IPs that are released on a yearly basis and (at least the multiplayer games) are only intended to last for that year.
 

Toxi

Banned
EA's been okay from what I can tell since the SimCity fiasco. When the worst thing you can say about them is "Star Wars Battlefront was bare-bones", that's a decent place to be. Certainly they've been treating consumers better than Warner or Ubisoft.
 

Mr. X

Member
Aren't they still plagued with hackers getting into Origin and Fifa accounts buying stuff?

Haven't bought a EA title since nba Street vol 3.
 

draetenth

Member
TBH, they are a non-entity to me (I suppose that is an improvement over hatred/dislike/contempt?). They don't make genres I care about like sports games and in genres I do like (RPGs), I don't care about their offerings (I don't care for Bioware style RPGs though I thought Mass Effect 1 + 2 were okay). They pretty much killed the games of theirs I did like (Dungeon Keeper, Sim City, Dead Space) because they changed them in an attempt to get more money and when that failed, figured that people didn't like the series any more instead of figuring out that maybe people just didn't like the way those series were revived.
 

Euron

Member
Yes and No. They certainly aren't even the worst company in gaming anymore by a large margin (let alone worst company in general) and have been making strides over the years to improve.

But I wouldn't put things like Battlefield 1 on the list of great improvements just yet. The PR may be good but in the past, developers have released disappointing games despite amazing settings and fantastic PR (Assassin's Creed 3). It could very well suffer similar problems as Battlefront.
 
EA has not improved at all really. The first video I ever made for youtube was a vlog about how fucked up Dungeon Keeper was and to this day I haven't seen much improvement from that mindset. Though that said, they were never the worst company in America (maybe worst gaming company though).

They don't get the spotlight as much as they used to with all these other companies fucking up so much now (ubi, WB, Microsoft, Nintendo, ect) but they don't at all deserve a pass, in fact far from it. People can praise EA Access and I think we can all agree they are branching out more then they used to with games like Unravel but in the end they are still closing down studios, they still launched Star Wars with damn well near no content and had the nerve to sell a 50$ season pass for the bloody thing and you know BF1 will have that same shit as will every other Star Wars game that comes out in the future and I'm sure they'll try to make ME4's season pass 50$ as well because EA. They still have microtransactions in all of their games as well which ruins some of them (Dead Space 3) and that doesn't look to be changing at all.

I think people give them far to much credit for things like EA Access, its a good deal sure but the reason it exists isn't because they were thinking about how to give US a good deal they did it because it curves used game sales, is free positive viral marketing, and because they'll make more off of that $5 a month or 25$ a year then they would otherwise. I'm not saying its a bad thing at all but I really think the praise it often gets is largely misplaced they did because it made perfect business sense not because they wanted to give us a good deal and try to win us over.

So yeah, EA is still the same and I do not trust them at all and I just wonder how long it'll be until they close down Bioware or DiCE like all the rest.
 

Consumer

Member
Improved? They abruptly shut down online features in NFS The Run in January, rendering the platinum unobtainable. They deserve every bit of hate they get.
 
Releasing NFS with an always online connection for no reason. Cutting out the campaign from Battlefront to release it in time for the movie. No they still suck, they only seem better because Ubisoft has taken their spot as the worst.
 

jetsetrez

Member
They're a business. They make some fine mass market games, they funded my favorite new franchise of last gen (Mass Effect), and fund the occasional interesting creative title.

They are still one of the industry's greatest destroyers of history and talent, though. If EA had bought iD rather than Bethesda and Blizzard rather than Activision, you could make a very compelling argument that EA has single-handedly dismantled almost all of the titans of the golden age of PC game development. Bullfrog, Origin, Westwood, Maxis, and some would argue they're working on Bioware. Not to mention later PC and console studios they've consumed, like Pandemic, Criterion, and Mythic.
 

Duxxy3

Member
Dead Space is no more. Need for speed has turned to shit. There's no new Bad Company game.

I think that they are trying, but the games don't appeal all that much to me.
 

Aostia

El Capitan Todd
I likes them at the time of dead space and mirror edge

Nothing outside those years (2006/9?) interested me from them
 

MaxLevel

Neo Member
Out of the big 3 third party publishers, EA is by far my favorite.

I love Mass Effect, like Dragon Age and enjoy playing Need for Speed and Battlefield. I am also looking forward to future Star Wars games and have hopes for a new Bioware game or the Ghost Games Racer. No other publisher has more games or game franchises relevant to my interests.

I also understand they are a company and have to earn money. I don't care if their games have DLC or an ingame shop unless it becomes too annoying and impossible to ignore.

They seemingly have stopped criticised business practices like turning beloved franchises into pay2win mobile or browser games and locking console multiplayer behind online passes, you can say they have improved, but I admit that stuff did not bother me to begin with.

I believe what they lack the most is a critically highly regarded creative gem in their portfolio. They have no game like a Last of Us, Uncharted, Dark Souls, Bioshock, Elder Scrolls, GTA or Metal Gear Solid.
 
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