You are Electronic Arts' new CEO. What do you do?

[Stef]

So, it seems that Electronic Arts is in a weird spot right now.

Battlefield V is underperforming while FIFA sales are slowing down.

The Star Wars deal seems a mess in terms of management, with cancelled games and a disaster such as Battlefront II.

And now investors are getting alarmed.

So... let's say you are in charge at Electronic Arts. What would you do to exit this swamp?

My take:
- Publish some more low-budget games such as Unravel (they could perform well and could easily be multiplatform)
- Reboot Dead Space as a mid-budget game
- Announce a new Wing Commander game. Let's put this library of old IPs in good use.
- Announce a new proper Theme Park or Dungeon Keeper game. No microtransaction shit this time.
- About that: keep microtransactions at a distance
- Release a stand-alone Battlefield V Battle Royale mode.

 

[ILikeFeet]

keeping MTX at a distance would crater the company. like it or not, it's teh source of a lot of their revenue

 

[Chindogg]

Give Factor 5 permission to finish and publish their Switch port of Rogue Leader that they've had sitting around for almost a decade.

 

[Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule]

Make Battlefield BattleRoyale F2P and add maps from every entry on the franchise since BF3. Appeal to the BF3 'nostalgia' and see profit.

 

[Damn Silly]

Make Mirror's Edge games out the wazoo. I mean, it probably won't make them money, but it'd make me happy.

I'd bring Burnout back too while I'm at it.

 

[SergioFerrazJr]

.

 

[0VERBYTE]

I would bring back the Desert Strike games.

Commit to a Star Wars adventure game.

Do more sci fi games. Such as a Super Metroid like open space game. A space bounty hunter game so to speak where you do crime investigations and find criminals on the run throughout a galaxy.

And put more resources into single player games.

 

[Giolon]

Give Bioware whatever money EA has left to make KOTOR3.

 

[funky]

Skate 4

 

[Pennywise]

My take:
- Publish some more low-budget games such as Unravel (they could perform well and could easily be multiplatform)
- Reboot Dead Space as a mid-budget game
- Announce a new Wing Commander game. Let's put this library of old IPs in good use.
- Announce a new proper Theme Park or Dungeon Keeper game. No microtransaction shit this time.
- About that: keep microtransactions at a distance

Click to shrink...

So basically getting those investors even more alarmed?

 

[Andromeda]

They need to diversify. They can't do only MTX games.

 

[UltraMagnus]

Don't panic, there's still a lot of good things going for the company.

I'd OK a number of Star Wars projects ... Star Wars VR game (X-Wing/TIE Fighter) yes, Star Wars action game, yes. Star Wars game for Switch, yup.

Then I'd OK more original IP.

New Sim City for PS4/XB1/Switch.

I'd turn NBA Live into an arcadey franchise.

 

[Freddo]

Bring back creative software like Deluxe Paint and Deluxe Music.

Deluxe Paint was really the Photoshop of the 80s and early 90s and then they just dropped it, letting other graphic software take the lead.

 

[Mitsurugi]

Bring back all the great games from before, stop forcing MTX on every shit and gain people's trust back.

 

[Damaniel]

The main thing I'd want to do (scale back MTX extensively) would probably get me ousted as CEO.

 

[z1ggy]

They need an online game to milk without bullshit

 

[Deleted member 16136]

Sink the company.
Get 100 million bonus.

 

[Kill3r7]

Find a way to make all the GaaS games F2P. Alternatively, offer all games on a subscription service for $10/month. Folks can still buy them if they want.

 

[Zukkoyaki]

Make a point of reigning in budgets and sales projections would be my biggest priority (at least for non-sports games). Basically stop throwing literally thousands of devs onto a project simply to make the holiday season.

Getting away from the 10+ million copies sold in addition to microtransactions in order to be a success. It's absolutely absurd that a game like BFII can move 7 million units in a quarter and still be considered a bummer.

 

[deadasdisco]

Receive 30 million dollars in stock awards.

 

[Deleted member 1413]

You presumably have enough power to green light basically any game you want.
I'd probably do that for myself.

In order to actually make money, can't say they've been too off.
Mtx make them a ton with fifa.

Disney Star Wars deal is probably more expensive than it was worth.
Probably no going around that, tho

 

[Ethifury]

Make Mirror's Edge games out the wazoo. I mean, it probably won't make them money, but it'd make me happy.

I'd bring Burnout back too while I'm at it.

Click to shrink...

I'm make Mirror's Edge an AA title while rebooting Burnout in the veins of Revenge or Takedown with some open-world roam (drop-in/drop-our multiplayer like Forza Horizon)

Give Bioware whatever money EA has left to make KOTOR3.

Click to shrink...

I agree with this. But also reboot Dead Space and keep the scale of the game at AA until it becomes a hit again.

Skate 4

Click to shrink...

I agree with this and bring back Sims and scale it back but make it GaaS

Bring back all the great games from before, stop forcing MTX on every shit and gain people's trust back.

Click to shrink...

Same

 

[Mechaplum]

Create a new console called MUTbox.

 

[P A Z]

Only make sports games.

Anything else is not worth the risk.

 

[SBit]

Command & Conquer Tiberium Wars 2.

 

[Eros]

Skate motherfuckin 4

 

[skeezx]

either resign right away or embrace the dark side and keep business as usual. we're talking EA 2019 here so it's one way or the other

 

[Lausebub]

Finish a Star Wars game!!!!!!

How hard can that be.

 

[Ploid 6.0]

Get on autopilot and look forward to get my bonuses.

 

[dubc]

Not demand Frostbite for all EA games
KOTOR3
Figure out an NCAA license. If not, go full mutant league

 

[Tavernade]

Super The Force Awakens
Super The Last Jedi
Super The Phantom Menace
Super Attack of the Clones
Super Revenge of the Sith
Super Rouge One
Super Solo
Super Knights Of The Old Republic 3
Rogue Squadron 4
Battlefront 2 "The Good One" HD

 

[ASaiyan]

Ship a damn Star Wars game. Bring in DICE and Criterion on Respawn's game if they need help. Hire more liasons to deal with the Lucasfilm approval people. Just get an AAA Star Wars title out there that isn't Battlefront. Then collect the money.

And if all that works out, I have a radical plan for how we follow up: Make another one! Maybe even have two projects ongoing at the same time! And give them the capital and support they need to avoid zombieing on for years before being cancelled. Because, the most valuable media IP in the world should be much more than a vehicle to set money on fire!

Spoiler

Also I would greenlight another Mass Effect game.

 

[GMM]

Make FIFA mobile games with tons of micro transactions.

 

[egg]

Give Bioware whatever money EA has left to make KOTOR3.

Click to shrink...

The most we're getting is a spiritual successor to KOTOR. We're not getting sequels since the first two aren't canon and some things have been taken, changed and introduced into canon!
IM HERE FOR A NEW BIOWARE STAR WARS RPG THO!!

 

[Kaelan]

A couple things

- Do a new dead space AAA, and if needed get Microsoft to moneyhat it as a timed exclusive for scarlet

- give Dice 2-3 years and allow them to work on a proper Battlefield Bad Company 3 in modern day

- Reboot Burnout at a mid tier

- publish More indie titles etc

 

[batfax]

Time for Maxis to get some money and Star Wars to have a game actually release.

 

[Strafer]

Start development of Dead Space 4, 5 and 6.

 

[carlosrox]

PUT
GLEN SCHOFIELD
ON
DEAD
SPACE
4
FOR THE LOVE OF FUCK!!!!!

Remaster the entire awesome trilogy.

 

[ShinUltramanJ]

-Bring back Visceral to helm Kingdoms of Amalur 2.

-Port the complete Battlefield 3 to Switch

- Need for Speed team (whomever that is) does a Pod Racing game.

- Drop support for Battlefront 2 and move everyone to Battlefield V.

- I'm lukewarm on Titanfall. I'd probably put it on ice for several years. Respawn would work on a mech multiplayer game. Mechs vs Dragons. It'd be a new ip.

 

[ZanderEzekial]

Click to shrink...

This is the only right answer.

 

[Tavernade]

The most we're getting is a spiritual successor to KOTOR. We're not getting sequels since the first two aren't canon and some things have been taken, changed and introduced into canon!
IM HERE FOR A NEW BIOWARE STAR WARS RPG THO!!

Click to shrink...

I don't 'think' there's been much new canon that actively overide KOTOR so far. They could easily do a Shrodinger's Canon thing where they just don't say whether it's canon with the new stuff or not since they haven't touched the time period yet.

 

[0VERBYTE]

Desert Strike 2020!!!

 

[EmptyWarren]

Bring back Skate as a f2p game. All tricks available and all that, but cosmetics would be mtx on top of earned in-game currency. Game is open to play and there would be customization options up front, but you paying for extra wheels, deck designs, clothes, etc. Online only.

 

[dubc]

RalliSport Challenge 3, since they own DICE

 

[Alienous]

I'd try to generate some goodwill with a Skate 4.
Also start development on a RE7-like VR compatible Dead Space 4.
Try to get a Star Wars Overwatch-like game happening.
Unify the microtransactions as one shared EA currency - have a UPlay like loyalty thing. FIFA sales will carry the rest of the titles.
Battlefield Bad Company 3 (but rumours are they're doing that).
Try to reboot the cancelled Star Wars project as an uncomplicated, linear Uncharted clone (instead of open-world, or sabotage based as in Hennig's version).

 

[hank_tree]

Buy a new house.

 

[AcademicSaucer]

Star Wars Utimate Team, also move my money to a tax haven

 

[ASaiyan]

Not demand Frostbite for all EA games

Click to shrink...

These seems pretty crucial as well. It's all well and good to want to use your own engine. But if it doesn't work well with certain genres of games, maybe...build a new engine for those games? Or improve the engine so that it does? Seems like otherwise you'll just get more expensive projects failing because devs can't make things work when using the wrong tools for the job.

 

[Host Samurai]

Hire Grasshopper and let Suda do whatever he wants.

 

[tenderbrew]

Stop making AAA games duh.