Sadly, I have little faith that EA will be as effective as Sega. EA tends to code for the LCD, rather than tweak the game for each platform as Sega did. EA will probably do a decent job but will hardly be innovative or trend setting.
The EArth is next picture has circulated other gaming forums for months now, and still makes me chuckle. Some other funny ones are stuff involving Larry Probst, CEO or sumthin of EA Gameshttp://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2.../EAphantom.jpg and this quotation: Larry Probst: We have won again. That is good! But what is best in life?
Mongol Warrior: The open steppe, fleet horse, falcon on your wrist, wind in your hair!
Mongol General: Wrong! Darien, what is best in life?
Darien: To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of the women!
I wonder if people realize that EA will probably try to charge for online use now that they'll be the only ones with a NFL license. They did want to do that before, but Sega already had set precedent with free updates. That barrier isn't going to be there anymore.
Well as speculated it was announced today that Take-Two has signed an exclusive third party deal with the MLB to run from 2006-2012. Also it was announced that Visual Concepts (longtime SEGA sports branch) was purchased by Take-Two for 24 million dollars. Looks like the sports gaming world is getting out of hand just as I feared. But at least it's one blow to EA's ego and also nice that they left room for 1st party games still. You can read about the MLB deal here. And about the VC deal here.
Now word is EA has signed NCAA football to an exclusive contract. If this is true I will be insanely angry. I want my VC football, it's the one thing I'm good at. If they take this from me there will be hell to pay.
This will be pretty amazing if true. But it sounds more like rumour monger stuff. I also recall reading that UbiSoft has suggested hostile takeover attempts when EA picked up 20% of their stock (or something like that).