Electronic Arts Head Says Games are Boring

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While Electronic Arts don't make or publish any games we cover, its boss John Ritticiello has an interesting thing to say, which is not really anything new anyway: basically, he claims that, as of now, games bore people to death with a flowing stream of sequels which are harder and harder to play. Sequels are something we in the roleplaying part of the gaming world know something about, as is game difficulty - although in our case the latter is falling rather than rising, as a trend. Here's a longer quote:

Electronic Arts Inc. became the world's biggest maker of videogames by relying on a formula now widespread in the industry: pumping out sequels of familiar game franchises, like Madden football, that consumers bought almost on cue. Now, its new chief executive says EA and other game makers must change their ways or risk losing audiences to more compelling forms of entertainment.

In his first in-depth comments since taking the job in April, John Riccitiello says he worries that the Redwood City, Calif., company and others in the industry make too many games that lack innovation. He says EA and others need both to push more aggressively beyond traditional audiences to court "casual" consumers and to experiment more with new sales approaches -- outside the norm of selling $50 to $60 discs with 40-hour games that he says few players ever finish.

"We're boring people to death and making games that are harder and harder to play," Mr. Riccitiello said in an interview.

It looks like the cRPG industry has discovered the cure for, "40-hour games that he says few players ever finish," but the problem is, players seem to be mourning the departure of those big, monumental projects from the past. More and more games are "compact", contain less meticulous art, complex and involving storyline, dialogue, whatever you name, than those longer ones that people actually do finish after some time, with a walkthrough if need be. As for difficulty level, while I've had some issues with how ridiculously overpowered certain enemies have been in the past games (and not really just the bosses, but also and sometimes more so, random encounters or resident critters), the problem isn't gone, either. There are scenes in the short games that force you to reload a good number of times before you can finally proceed. It's just that games are easier overall, but it's not really nicer this way, is it?

At any rate, speak your mind.

And read the reast at Wall Street Journal.

 

It's true I think, when's the last big CRPG project that has had an immersive storyline? Both Kotor seems the be it (games I enjoyed immensely). As for the bigger difficulty, I believe that a game should be enjoyable, what's the point in making almost unbeatable. I enjoy a challenge mind you, but not something that is so hard that it requires nothing less than pure luck or extravagant power play. Bring back the uniqueness of games, stop the sequels I say.

 

Yeah, I don't like it when reloading is sort of presumed. Doesn't mean I should be able to get away with running into battles unprepared, but I shouldn't really have to reload and use foreknowledge to prepare spells and buffs - there's no way you could do that in pen & paper or in real life, as you can't reload there. I loved both KotORs too, by the way.

 

Well said Tal. Though I do hate it when you steal the words out of my mouth
All I'll say is, let's hope this is more than just PR.

 

I don't believe EA would make such claims and still do nothing about it. Such a comment has got to have repercussions, in the sense that gamers (i.e customer) would most likely expect something out of it. It would cause havoc to EA's credibility methinks, but perhaps I'm just naive about this subject too.

 

The early EA sounds like a nearly ideal game company, while the modern incarnation is the complete opposite. Hopefully they'll go back to their roots as a company that actually cares about games as art and the people who make them.

But I'm not holding my breath. It's too risky to put together a big team with a big budget and all the latest thingies with an untested concept - so unless they're willing to make some small teams with a lower budget missing some of the latest thingies - I doubt we're going to see anything interesting. There isn't much in the way of an avant guade in the mainstream games industry - if EA wants to make one then that'd be pretty awesome.

 

Ofelix, you are forgetting that the majority of people that play EA games doesn't read gaming news. They got the largest amount of non-gamer gamers with their Madden, Fifa, Sims, and NHL brands.

 

They made Sims and they say gamers are geting tired of sequals?

I do hope they mean this. Computer games are geting a bit worn through by the endless repeats.

 

heh. Amusing, considering word in last(?) month's UK PC Gamer is that, um, EA thought Spore was too interesting and innovative and brought in some new team members to dumb it down and make it more commercial.

 

@Aikanaro: All game companies were started by people who cared about games and wanted to make games that they would love to play. Take EA, Interplay, id, Square... the list goes on forever. All those companies that we now think of as "evil corporations" were started by a handful of people who thought they could change the world of computers.

However, as upstart companies become major corporations things naturally change. And major corporations do not and never will revert to being "by gamers for gamers". But you can have massive corporations publishing (and even developing) great games: Sierra, SSI, LucasArts in the old days, even Interplay with games like Fallout, Baldur's Gate and Torment. I do agree with Tal that EA single-handedly created "sequilitis". No other company has a 20-year running series of 20 games, or what's essentially the same damn thing with minor interface changes and a new paint job every time.