If true AMEN that mega suck treat me as a prirate compagnie si feeling the squeze. Hope it falls thought the floor.

Hmm that link doesnt work.

Spore was the most disapointing game to me since MOO3, and Mr. Wright is "supposedly" suppose to be the king of strategy games (Spore was a coloring book).  Perhaps he is leaving to work on that new "Barbie Pet Rescue II" PC game. . .

That's odd. Is anyone else having that problem? I can try to link it again...

I got that, too. But it also seems like he was "encouraged" by EA to do it, as EA will no longer be funding (at least not completely) his games anymore. Because Spore aparently cost about $30-40 million to make, so EA is glad to not have to pay for that anymore.

It wasn't a layoff, but I don't think that the executives at EA are sad to see him go. Even if they still have a partial say in his new company.

EA's getting better.  I'm actually interested to see how this economic downturn treats them.  Either they will become SUPER strict or they will become a much better company than they are now.  (or the economic downturn actually will not effect them that much and the will stay mostly the same, but it looks like one of the other options)

Maxis makes more money than any other department except EA sports... which makes the most money.    Maxis is second, and while will wright IS maxis, the ignorant casual gamers that make up like 90% of the sims market base really don't care.  They likely don't even know who Will Wright is (my cousins sure don't. I wouldn't even be surprised if they couldn't even tell what part of EA makes the sims,)

 I'm sure they will just continue to pump out the sims marketing machine and make more and more money.

Oh yeah, EA Sports....yeah, forgive my blinders since I never have and never will play sports games.  I forgot about em.

Frankly I'm impressed that Spore was made at all, and that it worked as a game to the extent that it did. It hasn't had any lasting appeal for me, but it did have me grinning like an idiot on a few occasions.

I hope that, having made the technology and broken new ground, they will take it further.

As much as people love to bitch about EA, how many publishing labels actually make all that much money?  I don't like some of their operations but I'm all for success in American businesses right now, and EA (unlike several European publishers) hasn't been pissing me off.  They've gotten quite a few unique franchises pushed out that I'm really interested in since that new guy took over, and I'm impressed.

The only thing I give a great big 'meh' to is the Need for Speed franchise.  Just let it go already.

I'm sure I'll buy Spore once its got an expansion, it does interest me at the very least.  I've just got too much to play right now.

So Spore has sold 2 million, and cost $30-40 million.

I think typically devs see about $15 / unit on full-price items ($30 wholesale less publishing fees).  That means if every unit sold was at full-price then we're talking wholesale revenue of about $60 million ($30 * 2,000,000).  Split down the middle for EA and their RIO is $30 million.  Not too encouraging, probably only just covers their investment in development and marketing (if that).  The real winner is Maxis who probably only spent about $10 million on development of the product.  Thus they come out with a 200% ROI.

So this move is in EA's favour as investment is now 50-50 and ROI is now 50-50.

Of course the above figures come out a lot worse for EA in the red, and lessening Maxis's profits for non-full price sales.  I'd estimate probably 25% of sales would be < full price.

You should probably take note of the fact that a lot of the aversion against EA stems from the awful customer support and the lack of useful game manuals. And of course from it's statements about their customers rebelling against their DDRM schemes having to be all pirates.

As for their backpaddeling on DRM: I believe it when I see it... And even IF they do it's rather most likely just out of fear of more class action suits and resulting additional image loss than out of love and understanding for their customers.

I'm not a big fan, but I'd likely buy one of their games if they got off there butts and made something 'new'.   Like another Mutant legue Football.   (I know that would technically be old, not new.  A new more child friendly IP would be fine, since mutant legue football wouldn't get past ESRB in this day and age, I just can't use that as an example.  But at least it isn't another maddan)

most of my 'ea hate' stems from the mistreatment of their employees and the obviously rushed quality of their games.   They've been improving here though, realizing I guess that if you give a good development team extra time and money you will get something better than the strictly modeled game, and your good employees don't leave on a moments notice.

I thought EA haved moved the rights to SimCity etc from Maxis to Tilted Mill?

Even assuming those figures are accurate (which I highly doubt,) Spores full sales chart hasn't been played out yet because it's still 'in development.'  Look at how many expansions Sims 1 and 2 had.  Every time an expansion is released (unless there have been quite a few already, but even then most likely...) the base game sells more copies too.  Over the lifespan of Spore they'll sell a ton of random sh...stuff.  The investment was well worth it.

Pretty sure that was just SimCity Soceties... which was so awful they had to create a bundle pack witht he older Simcity 4 to sell it.