6 ms·

How Electronic Arts changed the way it worked

26 points by Yhippa 11y ago

dlitz 11y ago
How is EA to work for nowadays? Long ago, I heard that they had a pretty awful burnout culture, since every year, there's a new crop of novices who want to make games for a living.
- acconrad 11y ago
  I wondered this too - none of the resolutions mentioned fostering a better company culture that involved properly valuing their employees, as I would imagine doing so would lead to better quality games.
  - SeanBoocock 11y ago
    I've worked at EA before, during, and after the transition discussed in the article. The culture at the company has improved during that time, but it wasn't starting from a poor place, especially relative to the perception of EA or the video gaming industry generally. Issues like poor work/life balance and "crunch" culture are openly talked about internally and there is a lot of momentum around improving it. That extends from the highest levels of leadership - evident in delaying games to let teams hit a higher quality bar without killing themselves in the process - to studio/team level managers who see overtime as a failure. Some EA studios are even recruiting on the basis of the very positive cultures they've created: http://careers.ea.com/our-locations/los-angeles-eala http://careers.ea.com/our-locations/los-angeles-eala. All of that is to say nothing about the many positives of working at EA: industry leading technology, storied franchises in a diverse array of genres, internal mobility both geographically and in role, and more. It can be hard to talk about "EA" as an entity because the individual development studios that make it up are quite different, but in general I've found it a positive place to work and one of the best places to have a longer term career in the video game industry.
chaostheory 11y ago
This article reads like a PR piece. The reality is that in order for EA to truly change, it needs to go private. Until it does, it will always be forced to make big sacrifices for short term profits to meet quarterly projections whereas companies like Valve don't have this weakness. They can act for the long term.
- dragontamer 11y ago
  Not necessarily. I think certain public companies like Costco or Target (which have been focusing on increasing wages and training opportunities) are doing very good long-term thinking. Furthermore, the valuation of Amazon proves that investors are patient (at least in some industries). Amazon's profits are absolutely awful, but the stock price continues to rise year-after-year.
  - chaostheory 11y ago
    Well retail is different from entertainment where good customer service isn't enough. If you don't produce hit after consecutive hit that makes analyst financial projections every quarter your stock plummets. EA actually tried to do right a few years back by taking a big gamble on two new IPs (Mirror's Edge and Dead Space) but sales weren't enough and they couldn't beat back pressure from the street. If it were privately held with the same results, it wouldn't have had that problem and it could have continued to focus on the long term (both new IPs were profitable, just not profitable enough for analysts on the street). The end result is that the EAs of the world hate risk and they just end up producing sequel after sequel, or buy up a smaller studio with proven hits. The industry landscape has changed as well. Free to play is a huge force now and app stores rule with cheaper distribution paired with cheaper prices for games. EA also no longer has a charismatic CEO like a Bezos to charm investors. They lost Trip Hawkins a long time ago.
    - dragontamer 11y ago
      Point. But I think it is important to note that "Shareholders" cannot be generalized. At best, you can argue that EA's (current) shareholders are short-sighted... but shareholders "in general" have different opinions and expectations from company to company. The huge variation on PE ratios should be proof of that. No one judges a company purely on last-quarter's profits.
dragontamer 11y ago
This was clearly a PR piece. EA has a long way to go before it claws its way out of the hole it dug itself into. They've killed Maxis for instance. I don't know a single gamer who "trusts" Origin (Good Ol' Games Galaxy already seems more successful already). But as the major Japanese companies implode from self-inflicted wounds... Konami's loss of Kojima (Metal Gear) and Koji Igarashi(Castlevania)... Konami's tilt towards mobile, Capcom's tilt to DLC, the loss of Keiji Inafune (Mega Man)... Square Enix's tilt to Mobile... EA has some room to rise up as the other companies make similar mistakes. At very least, EA's mistakes this year are not even close to the worst mistakes in the industry.
vacri 11y ago
It's amazing how loud gamers are. The economist points out that the other contender for worst company was Bank of America. Just as a comparison, if EA does the nasty, you lose a two-digit number of dollars, and a few hours of your life. If Bank of America does the nasty, you lose your home. I always thought that these 'worst company' awards were for worst to work at - in which case I understand EA getting the guernsey, as they live and breathe 'staff turnover'. But if it's consumer confidence, what the hell is a company that shills relatively low-priced entertainment doing in top spot? Their titles cost less than a room in a cheapish hotel for one night. Crazy. Bread and circuses, I guess?
umutisik 11y ago
i haven't played a lot of EA games in recent years, but I do play Fifa. The gameplay for FIFA 15 is one if the worst in the history of the franchise. The good players are like gods who make the defenders do silly things. It's clear that they put way too much effort into turning the game into Candy Crush with Fifa Ultimate Team and too little effort into making a good soccer game.
- Vaskivo 11y ago
  I don't understand you comment. Are you saying that good players are too good for average players to play against? (if this is good or bad it's another thing). And then you say it's simplified (Candy Crush). I'm really curious. I don't play sports games, and don't really understand what changes in their year-to-year iterations (besides the teams).

26 points by Yhippa 11y ago

dlitz 11y ago

How is EA to work for nowadays? Long ago, I heard that they had a pretty awful burnout culture, since every year, there's a new crop of novices who want to make games for a living.

acconrad 11y ago
I wondered this too - none of the resolutions mentioned fostering a better company culture that involved properly valuing their employees, as I would imagine doing so would lead to better quality games.
- SeanBoocock 11y ago
  I've worked at EA before, during, and after the transition discussed in the article. The culture at the company has improved during that time, but it wasn't starting from a poor place, especially relative to the perception of EA or the video gaming industry generally. Issues like poor work/life balance and "crunch" culture are openly talked about internally and there is a lot of momentum around improving it. That extends from the highest levels of leadership - evident in delaying games to let teams hit a higher quality bar without killing themselves in the process - to studio/team level managers who see overtime as a failure. Some EA studios are even recruiting on the basis of the very positive cultures they've created: http://careers.ea.com/our-locations/los-angeles-eala http://careers.ea.com/our-locations/los-angeles-eala. All of that is to say nothing about the many positives of working at EA: industry leading technology, storied franchises in a diverse array of genres, internal mobility both geographically and in role, and more. It can be hard to talk about "EA" as an entity because the individual development studios that make it up are quite different, but in general I've found it a positive place to work and one of the best places to have a longer term career in the video game industry.

chaostheory 11y ago

This article reads like a PR piece. The reality is that in order for EA to truly change, it needs to go private. Until it does, it will always be forced to make big sacrifices for short term profits to meet quarterly projections whereas companies like Valve don't have this weakness. They can act for the long term.

dragontamer 11y ago
Not necessarily. I think certain public companies like Costco or Target (which have been focusing on increasing wages and training opportunities) are doing very good long-term thinking. Furthermore, the valuation of Amazon proves that investors are patient (at least in some industries). Amazon's profits are absolutely awful, but the stock price continues to rise year-after-year.
- chaostheory 11y ago
  Well retail is different from entertainment where good customer service isn't enough. If you don't produce hit after consecutive hit that makes analyst financial projections every quarter your stock plummets. EA actually tried to do right a few years back by taking a big gamble on two new IPs (Mirror's Edge and Dead Space) but sales weren't enough and they couldn't beat back pressure from the street. If it were privately held with the same results, it wouldn't have had that problem and it could have continued to focus on the long term (both new IPs were profitable, just not profitable enough for analysts on the street). The end result is that the EAs of the world hate risk and they just end up producing sequel after sequel, or buy up a smaller studio with proven hits. The industry landscape has changed as well. Free to play is a huge force now and app stores rule with cheaper distribution paired with cheaper prices for games. EA also no longer has a charismatic CEO like a Bezos to charm investors. They lost Trip Hawkins a long time ago.
  - dragontamer 11y ago
    Point. But I think it is important to note that "Shareholders" cannot be generalized. At best, you can argue that EA's (current) shareholders are short-sighted... but shareholders "in general" have different opinions and expectations from company to company. The huge variation on PE ratios should be proof of that. No one judges a company purely on last-quarter's profits.

dragontamer 11y ago

This was clearly a PR piece. EA has a long way to go before it claws its way out of the hole it dug itself into. They've killed Maxis for instance. I don't know a single gamer who "trusts" Origin (Good Ol' Games Galaxy already seems more successful already). But as the major Japanese companies implode from self-inflicted wounds... Konami's loss of Kojima (Metal Gear) and Koji Igarashi(Castlevania)... Konami's tilt towards mobile, Capcom's tilt to DLC, the loss of Keiji Inafune (Mega Man)... Square Enix's tilt to Mobile... EA has some room to rise up as the other companies make similar mistakes. At very least, EA's mistakes this year are not even close to the worst mistakes in the industry.

vacri 11y ago

It's amazing how loud gamers are. The economist points out that the other contender for worst company was Bank of America. Just as a comparison, if EA does the nasty, you lose a two-digit number of dollars, and a few hours of your life. If Bank of America does the nasty, you lose your home. I always thought that these 'worst company' awards were for worst to work at - in which case I understand EA getting the guernsey, as they live and breathe 'staff turnover'. But if it's consumer confidence, what the hell is a company that shills relatively low-priced entertainment doing in top spot? Their titles cost less than a room in a cheapish hotel for one night. Crazy. Bread and circuses, I guess?

umutisik 11y ago

i haven't played a lot of EA games in recent years, but I do play Fifa. The gameplay for FIFA 15 is one if the worst in the history of the franchise. The good players are like gods who make the defenders do silly things. It's clear that they put way too much effort into turning the game into Candy Crush with Fifa Ultimate Team and too little effort into making a good soccer game.

Vaskivo 11y ago
I don't understand you comment. Are you saying that good players are too good for average players to play against? (if this is good or bad it's another thing). And then you say it's simplified (Candy Crush). I'm really curious. I don't play sports games, and don't really understand what changes in their year-to-year iterations (besides the teams).