4 ms·

Some places in EA are amazing places to work at. Others have challenges. They aren't the only game company that has seen studios do sub-standard work after bei

by junkilo 14y ago

Some places in EA are amazing places to work at. Others have challenges. They aren't the only game company that has seen studios do sub-standard work after being acquired.

pifflesnort 14y ago
You're seriously blaming this on Maxis? I think the respective records of EA and a pre-EA Maxis ought to provide ample evidence of the likely culprit here.
- junkilo 14y ago
  I was speaking more broadly. This isn't the first time EA has seriously blown a launch due to infrastructure issues I realize. EA's main infrastructure server team runs things like a pre-dotbomb forture 5. I'm slow to throw blame since EA's acquisitions chose to join EA. Technical Directors at Maxis are just as much to blame as well as product/project managers that fail to squeeze load testing into the busy schedule. I do (sadly) agree that studios seem to lose their magic to us gamers once they join EA. Why?
  - pifflesnort 14y ago
    > I do (sadly) agree that studios seem to lose their magic to us gamers once they join EA. Why? I'll give you one guess.
  - InvisibleCities 14y ago
    >since EA's acquisitions chose to join EA. Not quite correct. Maxis' shareholders decided to join EA; I doubt the average programmer, or even the average project manager or tech lead had any say in the process whatsoever.
    - junkilo 14y ago
      true. however if (coders ran the world); we would
- badloginagain 14y ago
  Are you forgetting Spore? It was Will's baby, and it sucked.
  - ricree 14y ago
    Sucked might be taking it a little far. Though it didn't work well as a game, the editors they created were really, really good. A very nice combination of user friendly and just powerful enough for creativity. One of my biggest disappointments with the games industry is that those editors never really made their way into the industry at large. One of my greatest hopes after Spore launched was that some company would license those editors and actually build a good game around them. A Dungeon-Keeperesque game with fully editable creatures and dungeon design was a particular dream. Sadly, it never really caught on, and Spore looks to be a mostly dead end.
  - interpol_p 14y ago
    I thought it did well commercially, though.
    - justindz 14y ago
      "In its first three weeks on sale, the game sold 2 million copies, according to Electronic Arts." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_(2008_video_game) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_(2008_video_game) Unfortunately, the citation link is dead on the article. I don't know if this answers your question about commercial success. Maybe someone knows more about this data point in context of the industry.

by junkilo 14y ago

Some places in EA are amazing places to work at. Others have challenges. They aren't the only game company that has seen studios do sub-standard work after being acquired.

pifflesnort 14y ago

You're seriously blaming this on Maxis? I think the respective records of EA and a pre-EA Maxis ought to provide ample evidence of the likely culprit here.

junkilo 14y ago
I was speaking more broadly. This isn't the first time EA has seriously blown a launch due to infrastructure issues I realize. EA's main infrastructure server team runs things like a pre-dotbomb forture 5. I'm slow to throw blame since EA's acquisitions chose to join EA. Technical Directors at Maxis are just as much to blame as well as product/project managers that fail to squeeze load testing into the busy schedule. I do (sadly) agree that studios seem to lose their magic to us gamers once they join EA. Why?
- pifflesnort 14y ago
  > I do (sadly) agree that studios seem to lose their magic to us gamers once they join EA. Why? I'll give you one guess.
- InvisibleCities 14y ago
  >since EA's acquisitions chose to join EA. Not quite correct. Maxis' shareholders decided to join EA; I doubt the average programmer, or even the average project manager or tech lead had any say in the process whatsoever.
  - junkilo 14y ago
    true. however if (coders ran the world); we would
badloginagain 14y ago
Are you forgetting Spore? It was Will's baby, and it sucked.
- ricree 14y ago
  Sucked might be taking it a little far. Though it didn't work well as a game, the editors they created were really, really good. A very nice combination of user friendly and just powerful enough for creativity. One of my biggest disappointments with the games industry is that those editors never really made their way into the industry at large. One of my greatest hopes after Spore launched was that some company would license those editors and actually build a good game around them. A Dungeon-Keeperesque game with fully editable creatures and dungeon design was a particular dream. Sadly, it never really caught on, and Spore looks to be a mostly dead end.
- interpol_p 14y ago
  I thought it did well commercially, though.
  - justindz 14y ago
    "In its first three weeks on sale, the game sold 2 million copies, according to Electronic Arts." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_(2008_video_game) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spore_(2008_video_game) Unfortunately, the citation link is dead on the article. I don't know if this answers your question about commercial success. Maybe someone knows more about this data point in context of the industry.