WEBVTT - The Electronic Arts Story: Part Two 0:00:03.960 --> 0:00:07.280 Get in touch with technology with text from how Stuff 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:14.200 Looks Dot coming every Hey there, everyone, and welcome to 0:00:14.280 --> 0:00:17.440 tech Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland and I'm Lauren and we 0:00:17.480 --> 0:00:20.600 want to get into the second part on our look 0:00:20.720 --> 0:00:23.880 at e A Electronic Arts. Now, as I recall, we 0:00:24.040 --> 0:00:28.160 left off in nineteen in our last episode, that is correct, 0:00:28.360 --> 0:00:32.479 and Trip Hawkins the third had just departed the company 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:35.120 that he had founded to go and work on three 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:38.960 D O a and ultimately failed game console that was 0:00:39.159 --> 0:00:42.040 perhaps ahead of its time. He later described the decision 0:00:42.080 --> 0:00:45.720 as as having two children, one a teenager and one 0:00:45.760 --> 0:00:49.880 an infant needing open heart surgery. That yeah, that's the 0:00:49.920 --> 0:00:55.280 thing that he said, so subtle, Mr Hawkins, Um, well, 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:57.760 and you know it was again the three D. Oh. 0:00:57.840 --> 0:00:59.400 I think the problem was again it was ahead of 0:00:59.400 --> 0:01:01.920 its time. It was it was a very expensive console, 0:01:02.080 --> 0:01:05.920 and ultimately people could argue that that the lack of 0:01:05.959 --> 0:01:10.000 compelling games also really hurt it in those early days. Ably, 0:01:10.080 --> 0:01:13.360 But it debuted like four D N dollars, which at 0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:17.399 the time, yeah, well, I mean you know, yeah, yeah, well, 0:01:17.440 --> 0:01:19.920 I mean you look at it in today's dollars, it 0:01:19.959 --> 0:01:22.880 would be a bunch more right, right, right, yes, but 0:01:22.959 --> 0:01:26.440 a console today coming out of four not unusual at all, 0:01:27.200 --> 0:01:30.600 although again inflation makes that different. But the point I'm 0:01:30.600 --> 0:01:33.000 trying to make is that it was the sort of 0:01:33.000 --> 0:01:34.920 console that we see today. It was the kind of 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:37.360 consulate was an entertainment center. Anyway, he had moved on 0:01:38.000 --> 0:01:40.480 nine two. Also, one thing I didn't mention at the 0:01:40.600 --> 0:01:42.800 end of the last podcast was that was the year 0:01:43.160 --> 0:01:47.360 e A purchased Origin Systems, and that's the game company 0:01:47.360 --> 0:01:49.680 that was founded by Richard Garriott, the guy who created 0:01:49.680 --> 0:01:52.800 the Ultimate series, and they also had an other series. 0:01:52.800 --> 0:01:57.280 They had Jame's Combat simulate simulators. They also had the 0:01:57.320 --> 0:02:01.160 Wing Commander series, and so that was a big move 0:02:01.240 --> 0:02:05.160 on their part. But then we move on into and 0:02:05.200 --> 0:02:09.000 that's when the three D O console actually hit the market. Uh. 0:02:09.040 --> 0:02:11.920 And then e A also released the first Need for 0:02:11.919 --> 0:02:15.600 Speed for the three D O. Because e A was 0:02:15.639 --> 0:02:19.120 actually a partner in that three D O console experiment, 0:02:19.200 --> 0:02:23.320 they were not the whole owners of that, which I 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:25.880 guess in retrospect, I'm sure the company thinks is a 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:29.400 good thing. But they were partners, so it wasn't like 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:35.520 Hawkins had severed all ties once he left e A. Uh. Now, again, 0:02:35.560 --> 0:02:39.120 We're not going to mention every single release that Electronics 0:02:39.240 --> 0:02:42.680 Arts had um Electronic Arts I should say had throughout 0:02:42.840 --> 0:02:46.919 their history. It would be ridiculous. And you'd also get 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:50.520 tired of hearing a say FIFA, uh like or fourtieth 0:02:50.600 --> 0:02:52.960 time we say FIFA. You just that word? First of all, 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:55.320 I didn't. If you're in the United States, you're probably thinking, 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:58.360 I don't know what that means. And even if you're not, 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:00.320 after you've heard it that many times, it's starts to 0:03:00.360 --> 0:03:02.520 lose all meeting and become something of a cone that 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:05.040 we were just saying over and over to achieve enlightenment. 0:03:05.680 --> 0:03:08.880 But so I don't have anything for for ninety four, Lauren, 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:10.720 do you? I don't want to skip over you if 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:12.720 you've got anything that was That was actually the year 0:03:12.720 --> 0:03:15.680 that Hawkins resigned as chairman of the board for e A. Okay, 0:03:15.720 --> 0:03:18.600 so now he had actually not just left as the CEO, 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:23.120 but also left the board of directors. Uh inve e 0:03:23.280 --> 0:03:27.400 A acquired a company called bull Frog, which was a 0:03:27.440 --> 0:03:30.120 game development studio in the United Kingdom, and they were 0:03:30.160 --> 0:03:32.320 known for a couple of different series, their theme park 0:03:32.520 --> 0:03:38.119 series and their series called Populus. Did you ever see Populous, Lauren, 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:40.760 I did not see Populous. I did play some of 0:03:40.760 --> 0:03:43.720 the theme parks. Okay, well, Populus was a game where 0:03:43.800 --> 0:03:46.320 it puts you in the role essentially as as like 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:49.400 a god, and it was your job to try and 0:03:49.600 --> 0:03:54.760 shape landscape so that people could film stuff and worship you. Right, yeah, 0:03:54.760 --> 0:03:58.080 this this is what Yeah, indeed, I was about to 0:03:58.600 --> 0:04:00.600 say that this is what I think back and White, 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:03.600 because that was the same studio later on Black and White. 0:04:03.640 --> 0:04:07.839 Definitely was was something that was inspired by the populist games. 0:04:07.840 --> 0:04:10.760 You could definitely tell that Populus was was not quite 0:04:10.840 --> 0:04:13.440 as sophisticated as that. And you know, there were, uh, 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:17.720 there were different ways of winning Populace. You had opponents 0:04:17.760 --> 0:04:20.600 that would also have their own worshippers, and you were 0:04:20.640 --> 0:04:24.159 trying to dominate the world. So if you wanted to 0:04:24.200 --> 0:04:26.880 go over to the your opponent's side when your opponent 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:29.599 wasn't looking, and start digging down until all of the 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:32.839 villages were submerged in water and all the little villagers drowned, 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:36.400 and it was both entertaining and horrifying at the same time. 0:04:37.480 --> 0:04:39.400 All of these series, by the way, we're serious that 0:04:39.480 --> 0:04:42.359 he had published and so um so the acquisition of 0:04:42.360 --> 0:04:44.920 bull Frog was kind of a good following steps since 0:04:44.960 --> 0:04:47.160 they had done pretty well. Right yeah, now now he 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:49.760 has decided that they want this as an actual part 0:04:49.760 --> 0:04:54.080 of their development team, not just a title that they published. 0:04:54.480 --> 0:04:57.599 Once bull Frog joined the A, they the division began 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:02.080 to develop the Dungeon Keepers series, which reached some acclaim 0:05:02.200 --> 0:05:05.120 I thought, I always thought it was a very entertaining series. 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:10.080 And that same year, in ninety the Sega Saturn platform launches, 0:05:10.279 --> 0:05:13.200 and so does a platform that would become one of 0:05:13.240 --> 0:05:17.720 the most disruptive platforms in video game console history because 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:22.039 at this point, Nintendo is pretty much the heavy hitter. 0:05:22.160 --> 0:05:25.840 I mean, Nintendo is owning video game consoles. Sega keeps 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:30.640 coming out with consoles that from a specs perspective might 0:05:30.760 --> 0:05:33.320 beat out whatever the Nintendo console is at that time. 0:05:33.360 --> 0:05:35.799 But but just but just that the games, the programming 0:05:35.800 --> 0:05:38.160 that was going on for Nintendo was incredible, right yeah, 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:41.159 the Nintendo had all the momentum, so Sega, while it 0:05:41.200 --> 0:05:43.479 had its fans, just didn't have nearly as many as 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:47.320 Nintendo did. Well. Was also when we saw Sony get 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:51.000 into the game with the PlayStation console, and that really 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.680 shook things up, you know, a CD based console that 0:05:54.880 --> 0:05:59.200 was had far more graphic ability than the Nintendo consoles 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:02.320 did uh, And that that gave e A a lot 0:06:02.400 --> 0:06:05.000 of opportunities as well to develop for yet another platform, 0:06:05.000 --> 0:06:07.200 because remember e A wants there to be as many 0:06:07.200 --> 0:06:10.440 platforms as possible, because it means that no single platform 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:14.960 has enough power to tell e A what to do. Um. 0:06:15.040 --> 0:06:17.680 And then e A also starts to port several three 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:21.160 d O titles to the Saga, Saturn, and Sony PlayStation 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:23.400 platforms in order to take advantage of the thirty two 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:26.440 bit processing power. So in this sense, they didn't have 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:30.360 to develop new titles. They just had to retool these 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:32.040 titles for the three D OH so that they would 0:06:32.040 --> 0:06:35.000 work on these other systems. Now, I say, just that's 0:06:35.000 --> 0:06:37.240 still a pretty big thing to have to do, but 0:06:37.320 --> 0:06:39.600 it does. It's different from having to build a game 0:06:39.680 --> 0:06:42.000 from the ground much. You don't have to go through 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:45.839 the whole conceptual phase at all. Uh, I don't have 0:06:45.880 --> 0:06:48.120 anything for ninety six, so we're gonna go right into 0:06:48.160 --> 0:06:51.720 ninety seven. Sounds good. So e A and n acquires 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:54.400 Maxis And this is this is a big one, folks, 0:06:54.400 --> 0:06:57.240 because this is the company that was responsible for sim City. 0:06:57.400 --> 0:07:00.400 The first sim City game came out in mind, so 0:07:00.640 --> 0:07:03.400 almost a decade earlier, right and uh and since then 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:06.320 will write who is who's the designer for Maxis had 0:07:06.360 --> 0:07:08.520 had been making all kinds of all kinds of related 0:07:08.640 --> 0:07:11.200 titles as sim Earth, Sam Aunt. Yeah. I was a 0:07:11.200 --> 0:07:13.720 big fantasy man. Yeah yeah. On the on the s 0:07:13.840 --> 0:07:16.560 N E S it was. It was great Aunt simulation. Man, 0:07:16.640 --> 0:07:20.080 I got it. Sounds so goofy and I had so 0:07:20.160 --> 0:07:22.240 much fun playing it. I'm not going to argue with 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:24.720 the goofy part, but hey, I like lots of goofy stuff, 0:07:24.760 --> 0:07:28.160 so I am not one to talk. And once e 0:07:28.280 --> 0:07:31.239 A acquires Maxis, that's when will Wright starts to work 0:07:31.280 --> 0:07:34.320 on a game that would become an important part of 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:36.880 e A's arsenal. In fact, you could argue it's the 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:39.640 most important game that e A ever came out with, 0:07:40.120 --> 0:07:44.440 and that is the SIMS. So will Wright starts to 0:07:44.520 --> 0:07:46.520 work on the SIMS back in ninety seven. It would 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:48.280 be a few years before that game would come out. 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:53.040 E A also gets into the online gaming market. They 0:07:53.160 --> 0:07:57.200 launch Ultima Online, which was one of the earliest, at 0:07:57.280 --> 0:08:00.760 least one of the earliest successful massively multi player online 0:08:00.840 --> 0:08:06.120 role playing games in the Western Hemisphere. So Ultimate Online 0:08:06.160 --> 0:08:10.720 goes live and starts to prove the model that online 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:13.440 gaming could be a thing. Keeping in mind this is 0:08:13.480 --> 0:08:18.000 before broadband penetration had really spread out throughout the United States. Uh, 0:08:18.040 --> 0:08:20.400 there were people who are playing this on dial ups. 0:08:20.760 --> 0:08:24.600 Oh my goodness. Uh. And so it was, you know, 0:08:24.760 --> 0:08:26.840 this was the earliest days of that, and it was 0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:30.080 before really in those days it came down to Ultimate 0:08:30.120 --> 0:08:33.079 Online or ever Quest. Those were the two big names, 0:08:33.080 --> 0:08:36.680 and it wouldn't be until the world of Warcraft that 0:08:36.679 --> 0:08:40.400 that dynamic gets really shaken up UM, and you had 0:08:40.400 --> 0:08:43.600 people who were hardcore fans of one and hated the 0:08:43.640 --> 0:08:48.720 other anyway. That same year, nine seven, bull Frog chief 0:08:49.040 --> 0:08:53.439 Peter Mullineaux leaves e A to start a new studio, 0:08:53.960 --> 0:08:56.400 and supposedly one of the reasons he left was that 0:08:56.440 --> 0:09:00.040 he felt that e A was getting two hands on 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:02.680 on in game development, that they were interfering too much 0:09:02.720 --> 0:09:06.120 in the actual development of games, and that he felt 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:10.280 that the pressure was to establish a game and then 0:09:10.320 --> 0:09:12.719 just churn out sequels, right right, And this is a 0:09:12.920 --> 0:09:17.000 UM is in direct opposition to ease original mode of operation, 0:09:17.040 --> 0:09:19.559 wherein they were they were treating game developers with extreme 0:09:19.559 --> 0:09:21.920 respect and kind of letting them do whatever they wanted 0:09:21.960 --> 0:09:25.920 on the principle that whatever they wanted would be awesome. Yeah. Yeah, 0:09:26.160 --> 0:09:28.120 But but since then had, as we discussed in our 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:31.040 previous episode, decided that um that, yeah, the that the 0:09:31.080 --> 0:09:33.480 real way to go is to create brands and and 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:37.280 really am push the brand, find a brand that resonates 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:38.720 with an audience, and then all you have to do 0:09:38.800 --> 0:09:42.079 is keep on creating uh sequels to that and that, 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:44.600 and people will buy it because you've established an audience 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:47.240 for it. This is not an unusual idea. We see 0:09:47.280 --> 0:09:49.480 it all across video games. I mean you could think 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:51.679 another media too, of course. Yeah, you can think of 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:56.360 dozens of franchises that exists only and you can look 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:59.080 at entries to various franchises where you think this really 0:09:59.080 --> 0:10:02.360 didn't live up to what the original was or what 0:10:02.559 --> 0:10:06.440 later entries were. This was clearly something where a company 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:09.679 was trying to cash in on a previously existing title. 0:10:10.240 --> 0:10:13.640 Um and in some cases it's it can be the 0:10:13.720 --> 0:10:17.160 death of a franchise or or even an entire company. 0:10:18.640 --> 0:10:24.079 Well then moving on, in n Electronic Arts moves its 0:10:24.080 --> 0:10:28.400 headquarters from San Mateo to Redwood City, and e A 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:33.199 also acquires yet another company, Westwood Studios, which was the 0:10:33.240 --> 0:10:36.240 company that developed the Command and Conqueror series, which are 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:40.959 real time strategy games. UM. I'm terrible at real time 0:10:41.000 --> 0:10:43.680 strategy games. I'm just I can't. I don't. I don't 0:10:43.679 --> 0:10:46.839 have a brain from either. I can't. I can't manage. Yeah, 0:10:47.280 --> 0:10:51.800 I cannot manage that many assets. I can't keep track 0:10:51.840 --> 0:10:55.400 of everything. Obviously, if I were going up against Kirk 0:10:55.400 --> 0:10:57.280 and Spock, they would be able to defeat me because 0:10:57.280 --> 0:11:04.000 I can't think three dimensionally. UM. Also, UM Electronic Arts 0:11:04.000 --> 0:11:07.600 formed a partnership with Square, being the Japanese game company 0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:10.920 that's that's most famous for for RPGs like say Final Fantasy. 0:11:11.000 --> 0:11:14.000 You might have heard of it. UM and UH, Square 0:11:14.080 --> 0:11:16.800 and and e A worked out the steal. They formed 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:19.080 a Square e A here in the States and e 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:21.960 A Square over in Japan. UH. The idea being to 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:25.480 transfer titles that were happening in each place to the 0:11:25.480 --> 0:11:27.320 other and and see see how they did. You know, 0:11:27.360 --> 0:11:29.320 try to try to bring stuff that wasn't being seen 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:32.440 in each country over to the other, as there were 0:11:32.920 --> 0:11:35.760 I think, especially in the Final Fantasy series, if I'm 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:38.960 not mistaken. There were a couple of entries in the 0:11:38.960 --> 0:11:42.240 Final Fantasy series that happened in Japan that at that 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:44.880 point had never been seen in the United States. Correct 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:47.640 and uh and and people were you know, urpgs had 0:11:47.679 --> 0:11:49.600 a little bit of a cult following over here. But 0:11:49.600 --> 0:11:52.320 but none of the really big cool titles were coming 0:11:52.360 --> 0:11:54.160 over and so and so. So I meant that you 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:57.719 had to have like a Japanese game console, and then 0:11:57.720 --> 0:12:00.840 you had to import the titles because of course, the 0:12:00.840 --> 0:12:04.840 the media for the Japanese consoles would not work on 0:12:04.960 --> 0:12:07.679 the United States. It literally would not play correct. I mean, 0:12:07.760 --> 0:12:09.240 you know, aside from the fact that you would have 0:12:09.280 --> 0:12:11.959 to learn Japanese in order to play them very effectively, 0:12:12.160 --> 0:12:14.160 which is a whole other issue. But um but yeah, 0:12:14.240 --> 0:12:17.079 so so each square e A and A Square each 0:12:17.080 --> 0:12:20.640 had a stake in the other um which which which 0:12:20.720 --> 0:12:23.000 is an interesting fun business model. And uh. In that 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:26.400 same year, they brought um Bashida Blade to Parasite Eve 0:12:27.000 --> 0:12:30.079 and Zeno Gears all to the American market for the PlayStation. 0:12:30.600 --> 0:12:34.679 Huh wow. So another big move on e A's part. 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:38.720 Also kind of interesting to see a an alliance in 0:12:38.760 --> 0:12:42.079 the video game world. Uh. Some people would call that, 0:12:42.600 --> 0:12:45.600 UH frightening, because you know, when you're talking about being 0:12:45.640 --> 0:12:47.600 such a big power player and you already have a 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:52.280 reputation for scooping up smaller companies and then to make 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:55.400 an alliance with another big company, just that starts to 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:57.959 make other people feel really nervous. Kind of nervous. Yeah. 0:12:58.240 --> 0:13:03.840 In seven years, after e A had acquired Origin Systems, 0:13:04.160 --> 0:13:07.240 Richard Garriott, who was the founder of Origin, leaves e A. 0:13:07.480 --> 0:13:10.640 He had finished work on Ultimate nine, which was the 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:15.480 final UH entry into the Ultimate series. Besides the online 0:13:15.520 --> 0:13:19.960 stuff and UH, he also seems to feel very similar 0:13:20.000 --> 0:13:22.439 to the way other people who departed e A felt 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:24.959 that that it was just it was not the most 0:13:25.040 --> 0:13:29.280 ideal creative environment, right. Apparently a bunch of his former 0:13:29.520 --> 0:13:32.400 team members, of former Ultimate team members felt very much 0:13:32.440 --> 0:13:35.120 the same way, because after e A canceled Ultimate Online 0:13:35.160 --> 0:13:37.640 to UM at the time, a bunch of a bunch 0:13:37.679 --> 0:13:40.040 of them jumped ship to go join Garriott at the 0:13:40.120 --> 0:13:44.560 new company that he had formed, Destination Games. UH. Garriott 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:47.480 would not see very much success here in the United 0:13:47.520 --> 0:13:51.960 States over the next several years, but recently interesting thing 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:53.840 is that he had a kick started campaign for a 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:58.040 new game that is inspired by his old Ultimate series 0:13:58.480 --> 0:14:02.120 and the kickstarter funded in like two days, it was, 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:04.800 and then went on to meet lots and lots of 0:14:04.840 --> 0:14:07.959 stretch goals. Anyway back to E A. H. Still in 0:14:08.920 --> 0:14:11.959 they published their first Medal of Honor game, which is 0:14:12.000 --> 0:14:15.320 again another one of those big franchises that UM that 0:14:15.320 --> 0:14:18.040 they're very well known for, and that debuted on the 0:14:18.080 --> 0:14:22.720 PlayStation platform. UH. And that same year, Sega debuts a 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:28.200 new video game console called the Dreamcastcast. I own a Dreamcast. 0:14:29.440 --> 0:14:31.720 I like it a lot. I actually got my Dreamcast 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:34.800 after the Dreamcast had already run its course and was 0:14:34.840 --> 0:14:38.440 no longer in production. UH. And I inherited a lot 0:14:38.440 --> 0:14:41.040 of games from a friend of mine who was not 0:14:41.120 --> 0:14:43.840 really playing them anymore. And you know, I think Dreamcast 0:14:43.880 --> 0:14:45.520 it's another one of those things where we've done an 0:14:45.520 --> 0:14:49.040 episode of about Sega. We did a full thing about 0:14:49.040 --> 0:14:54.600 Sega's uh successes, and it's it's notable failures and it's interesting. Again, 0:14:54.760 --> 0:14:58.479 the Dreamcast was one of those consoles that was phenomenal. 0:14:59.240 --> 0:15:02.080 It performed really well, particularly if you stacked it up 0:15:02.120 --> 0:15:05.000 against its competitors, but it just, you know, it just 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:08.560 never never, It never cut onto the to the extent 0:15:08.640 --> 0:15:11.560 that it needed to in order for viable platform. I 0:15:11.560 --> 0:15:13.400 think it was a little bit niche for for the 0:15:13.520 --> 0:15:17.480 for the mainstream American market real time especially um. Also 0:15:17.600 --> 0:15:19.600 that year was when Square e A put out the 0:15:19.640 --> 0:15:22.400 Final Fantasy Anthology, which brought some of those games that 0:15:22.440 --> 0:15:25.640 had not been published yet in America over here. So 0:15:26.520 --> 0:15:30.320 in in two thousand, that's when the SIMS debuts, and 0:15:30.360 --> 0:15:34.960 it is a huge success, and it really gave U 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:39.160 e A a access to a brand new audience, which 0:15:39.200 --> 0:15:42.400 we usually referred to as women. It turned out, it 0:15:42.440 --> 0:15:44.280 turned out that they didn't know at the time when 0:15:44.280 --> 0:15:46.800 they were producing the SIMS. They had no idea that 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.200 was going to resonate with a female audience. And in fact, 0:15:50.200 --> 0:15:52.200 when they were first building the SIMS, it was just 0:15:52.240 --> 0:15:57.240 going to be a a way of building homes. And 0:15:57.320 --> 0:16:00.760 then they created these little virtual characters to inhabit the 0:16:00.760 --> 0:16:03.520 homes and realized that it was way more interesting to 0:16:03.520 --> 0:16:05.720 see what the virtual characters were up to than to 0:16:05.840 --> 0:16:09.040 build out the houses. So that's when the SIMS focus 0:16:09.160 --> 0:16:12.720 shifted to these virtual people, and your job was to 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:15.480 give them as much of a life as you possibly could, 0:16:15.560 --> 0:16:19.960 which became increasingly difficult than the game where you're thinking, 0:16:20.080 --> 0:16:22.280 I don't have enough time. That's just like real life. 0:16:22.280 --> 0:16:24.520 I don't have enough hours to give this person a 0:16:24.600 --> 0:16:28.720 good job and a and a satisfying social life, still 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.480 have them go to the bathroom without having a terrible 0:16:31.520 --> 0:16:35.200 accident in the middle of the living room. But uh, Anyway, 0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:38.640 it was a huge performer, and they immediately started to 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:42.200 to develop expansion packs for the SIMS and also go 0:16:42.280 --> 0:16:45.520 into development for the sequels to the SIMS, because, I mean, 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:48.400 it was clear they had touched the nerve. And that's 0:16:48.480 --> 0:16:51.600 also the year in two thousand, that's when Sony launched 0:16:51.760 --> 0:16:56.760 the PlayStation two. Yeah. Um. Meanwhile, back on the PlayStation one, 0:16:56.840 --> 0:16:59.360 Square e A put out Crymo Cross that year, which 0:16:59.440 --> 0:17:02.480 is my the only RPG that I've ever played all 0:17:02.480 --> 0:17:05.080 the way through. I'm not really an RPG person. I 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:08.040 love that game with a burning and fiery passion. It is. 0:17:08.160 --> 0:17:10.600 It is the best. Um. But but I think that 0:17:10.640 --> 0:17:12.919 it's interesting that, uh. I mean, although it had been 0:17:12.920 --> 0:17:16.639 out already in Japan, I think it. You know, they 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:19.680 were like, no, that's PlayStation two, whatever, this one's fine 0:17:19.680 --> 0:17:23.119 on the PS. It'll still sell really well. And Sony 0:17:23.240 --> 0:17:27.080 was very good about supporting their old consoles even when 0:17:27.119 --> 0:17:30.840 they're introducing a new one. PlayStation two games were developed 0:17:30.840 --> 0:17:35.680 for the PlayStation two well after PlayStation three debuts, so um, 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:40.040 they have a very different strategy compared to say Microsoft. 0:17:40.480 --> 0:17:43.440 And speaking of Microsoft, in two thousand one, that's when 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:46.360 Microsoft launched the Xbox, So now we have even more 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:49.639 competition in the video game console world. At this point, 0:17:49.640 --> 0:17:53.600 e is just having kittens. Nintendo launched the game Cube, 0:17:53.960 --> 0:17:56.960 and EA starts developed games for all the three major 0:17:57.119 --> 0:18:01.800 console platforms, which of course does not include Sad Trombone. 0:18:02.240 --> 0:18:07.000 So Xbox, PlayStation two, and GameCube are all great platforms 0:18:07.040 --> 0:18:09.000 for e A to develop for. They just they see 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:15.200 there as endless opportunity. So uh. They then that same 0:18:15.280 --> 0:18:19.480 year closed the Bullfrog division of e A. Now this 0:18:19.640 --> 0:18:22.320 this kind of brings us to another thing that people 0:18:22.359 --> 0:18:24.439 have criticized e A for, not just the fact that 0:18:24.480 --> 0:18:26.679 they bought up companies, but that they would later go 0:18:26.720 --> 0:18:29.159 on to close them when they realized that they weren't 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:31.879 performing quite as well as they want to. Yeah, they 0:18:32.119 --> 0:18:34.679 just the things weren't working out, And a lot of 0:18:34.720 --> 0:18:36.760 the people who worked for these divisions came out and 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:38.640 said well, the reason things didn't work out is because 0:18:38.640 --> 0:18:42.840 they were so adamant on us producing a brand and 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:45.520 just concentrating on that brand as opposed to letting us 0:18:45.600 --> 0:18:48.440 develop do what we do, which is developed games. And 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:51.440 so you have this series of stories of all these 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:54.639 different divisions being or different companies rather being bought up 0:18:54.680 --> 0:18:57.960 and turned into divisions for e A later getting closed. 0:18:58.440 --> 0:19:01.920 Um that some would say that all e A was 0:19:01.960 --> 0:19:04.480 really doing was buying up competition and shutting it down. 0:19:05.160 --> 0:19:08.359 You know that that ultimately that's what turned out to 0:19:08.520 --> 0:19:10.840 be the case. Uh oh yeah. Whether or not it 0:19:10.880 --> 0:19:14.240 was intentional is absolutely you know. That's that's that's completely 0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:16.000 beside the point. It didn't matter if it was intentional 0:19:16.080 --> 0:19:19.399 or not. That was the effect, right, So, uh it was. 0:19:19.560 --> 0:19:21.960 It was kind of rough. And around that same time, 0:19:22.000 --> 0:19:25.119 e A starts to make licensing agreements to make games 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:28.600 based on films and other properties. Uh. These included big 0:19:28.720 --> 0:19:32.080 name properties like Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, The Godfather, 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:35.960 and James Bond. I think that that fits in really 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:38.280 well with their strategy of of latching onto brands and 0:19:38.320 --> 0:19:40.960 not necessarily producing the best games because a lot of 0:19:40.960 --> 0:19:44.280 those titles, especially in those early days were not not playable. 0:19:44.320 --> 0:19:46.280 I mean, and and that's that that goes back all 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:48.800 the way, you know, and any film title game is 0:19:48.880 --> 0:19:50.920 kind of spotty. There. There are a lot of times 0:19:50.920 --> 0:19:54.600 where I feel like like companies rely very heavily on 0:19:54.800 --> 0:19:59.640 the name of the franchise to sell copies, and so 0:19:59.720 --> 0:20:02.520 they're for the amount of time and effort you need 0:20:02.560 --> 0:20:06.520 to go in and build a very compelling game sometimes 0:20:06.920 --> 0:20:11.120 slips through the cracks, so um, you know, in that case, 0:20:11.200 --> 0:20:12.800 you end up getting these games that are based on 0:20:12.880 --> 0:20:16.000 these beloved franchises, but they failed to really live up 0:20:16.040 --> 0:20:20.359 to gamer expectations. This happens. I mean, you can spend 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:23.320 hours naming all the superhero games that just didn't live 0:20:23.400 --> 0:20:25.880 up to expectations. Not you know, there are a few 0:20:25.960 --> 0:20:29.560 that have been phenomenal, but they are way more that weren't. 0:20:29.840 --> 0:20:35.240 So it's not not a problem that only e A possesses. Certainly, 0:20:35.359 --> 0:20:38.000 certainly not. Also in two thousand and one, I should 0:20:38.000 --> 0:20:40.640 put in that um square A put out Final Fantasy ten, 0:20:41.240 --> 0:20:43.720 So that was that was one of those I remember 0:20:43.720 --> 0:20:46.320 seeing the previous for Final Fantasy ten when that was 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:48.879 coming out and thinking that that looked like a particularly 0:20:49.600 --> 0:20:54.800 beautiful game at that time. But things have changed. It 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:58.679 doesn't Things that were once the most gorgeous thing you 0:20:58.680 --> 0:21:02.359 could imagine have not necessarily aged. Well, do you have 0:21:02.400 --> 0:21:05.080 anything for two two? I do not excellent. Two thousand three, 0:21:05.520 --> 0:21:08.679 e A shuts down Westwood Studios and moves all the 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:12.760 remaining stuff to e A's Los Angeles studio. The Westwood 0:21:12.760 --> 0:21:15.320 was in Las Vegas, and so they shut that one down. 0:21:15.359 --> 0:21:18.280 So there's another example. They did not keep everybody. They 0:21:18.359 --> 0:21:21.040 laid off quite a few people, but the people who 0:21:21.080 --> 0:21:24.560 did remain were then moved to Los Angeles. UH. And 0:21:24.640 --> 0:21:31.920 then two thousand four, wait, Lauren, I didn't see your 0:21:32.040 --> 0:21:35.560 high sign. My bad. We have we have an intricate 0:21:35.560 --> 0:21:37.760 system of hand signals going on in the background here, 0:21:37.880 --> 0:21:41.959 I know. Two thousand three, UH Square decided UM their 0:21:42.080 --> 0:21:45.359 their relationship with EA had been slightly degraded, and also 0:21:45.400 --> 0:21:47.520 they had been UM flirting a little bit with with 0:21:47.680 --> 0:21:50.520 Enix Studios over in Japan and UH and so Square 0:21:50.560 --> 0:21:53.439 dissolved their relationship with e A, UM bought back all 0:21:53.480 --> 0:21:56.760 of their shares and formed Square Enix, which would continue 0:21:56.800 --> 0:22:00.160 to produce the rest of the series that people known 0:22:00.200 --> 0:22:04.240 for Excellent. Well excellent for them, not so great for 0:22:04.280 --> 0:22:07.120 e A. Necessarily. In two thousand four, e A went 0:22:07.119 --> 0:22:11.320 ahead and dissolved the Origin Systems division, so that was 0:22:11.400 --> 0:22:14.320 the ultimately the division that produced the Ultimate Games. That 0:22:14.359 --> 0:22:18.320 one was formally no more as of two thousand four. 0:22:18.960 --> 0:22:22.199 E A also acquired Criterion, which was that was the 0:22:22.320 --> 0:22:27.080 company that had developed the Burnout games. Anyone who's familiar 0:22:27.080 --> 0:22:30.960 with those the driving games that get really super crazy, Yeah, 0:22:31.640 --> 0:22:34.400 I really love those games. I'm not a big driving 0:22:34.600 --> 0:22:38.400 game kind of guy, but those particularly, they're very arcady. Yeah. Yeah, 0:22:38.400 --> 0:22:41.000 they're they're a little bit less focused on the physicalities 0:22:41.000 --> 0:22:43.280 of driving, and so if you're not a huge car 0:22:43.320 --> 0:22:46.119 buff the Burnout series, it's pretty fun. All the crashing 0:22:46.160 --> 0:22:48.840 parts other games don't let you do. Yeah, the crashing 0:22:48.880 --> 0:22:51.960 parts are pretty pretty spectacular and play a large part 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:54.880 in most of those games. Uh and then there. That 0:22:54.920 --> 0:22:57.719 was the same year that someone on live journal who 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:03.320 had the handle e A Spouse posted a rather uh 0:23:03.840 --> 0:23:08.119 critical post about e A, saying that they had some 0:23:08.760 --> 0:23:12.480 draconian practices as far as employment goes, that people were 0:23:12.920 --> 0:23:17.520 being forced to work super long hours six days out 0:23:17.520 --> 0:23:21.719 of the week, they weren't getting compensated for overtime. Um, 0:23:21.760 --> 0:23:27.919 there were a lot of pretty ugly accusations and eventually 0:23:28.280 --> 0:23:32.320 some uh, some spouses and some employees of e A 0:23:32.480 --> 0:23:35.160 got together and they filed a class action lawsuit, in fact, 0:23:35.200 --> 0:23:39.320 a few class action lawsuits against e A, and that 0:23:39.520 --> 0:23:42.439 ended up leading to massive changes in the A and 0:23:42.560 --> 0:23:45.000 in the industry in general, because other companies saw what 0:23:45.080 --> 0:23:47.600 was happening and they thought, we better fixed this before 0:23:47.640 --> 0:23:51.080 it happens to us. So uh. In two thousand and six, 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:54.679 e A settled a lawsuit that was brought against it 0:23:54.720 --> 0:23:58.159 by a bunch of graphic artists and awarded the graphic 0:23:58.240 --> 0:24:03.040 artists fifteen point six million dollars in unpaid overtime. And 0:24:03.080 --> 0:24:07.600 in two thousand seven, the court awarded plaintiffs of a 0:24:07.640 --> 0:24:12.320 class action lawsuit fourteen point nine million dollars and unpaid overtime. 0:24:12.400 --> 0:24:14.119 So this this is a different group. It's not the 0:24:14.160 --> 0:24:17.680 same one twice. So yeah, that was a big deal. 0:24:17.920 --> 0:24:21.560 And obviously e A did not want to court any 0:24:21.680 --> 0:24:24.919 more problems down the line, and so they started to 0:24:24.920 --> 0:24:29.280 really take a look for UH. And in two thousand five, 0:24:29.920 --> 0:24:34.320 e A purchased jam Debt Mobile. So two thousand five, 0:24:34.359 --> 0:24:37.440 this is before the iPhone comes out. EA makes its 0:24:37.480 --> 0:24:41.600 first move into the mobile gaming world, uh, for for phones, 0:24:42.000 --> 0:24:45.280 not not mobile devices like game Boy or whatever. You know. 0:24:45.359 --> 0:24:47.560 It had been developing games for platforms like that for 0:24:47.600 --> 0:24:49.960 a while, but this was the first time it started 0:24:49.960 --> 0:24:53.320 to really look into using um cell phones, not even 0:24:53.359 --> 0:24:57.119 smartphones yet as a potential gaming platform. And uh, and 0:24:57.760 --> 0:25:00.920 that was a smart move. I mean, we're seeing more 0:25:00.960 --> 0:25:04.520 and more that mobile devices are making a huge impact 0:25:04.560 --> 0:25:08.720 on the gaming industry. So that was a Whoever was 0:25:08.800 --> 0:25:11.680 the person who said we should do this was really 0:25:11.960 --> 0:25:14.360 they were really looking ahead. And that's also the year 0:25:14.359 --> 0:25:16.880 two thousand five would be the year when Microsoft launched 0:25:16.960 --> 0:25:21.560 the Xbox three sixty UM and so that that brings 0:25:21.600 --> 0:25:24.320 us about to the halfway points. So before we dive 0:25:24.359 --> 0:25:26.760 into the second half, I wanted to take a quick 0:25:26.800 --> 0:25:32.320 break and thank our sponsor. Alright, so let's see. I 0:25:32.359 --> 0:25:34.320 think according to my notes, we left off in two 0:25:34.359 --> 0:25:38.719 thousand five, So two thousand six, e A acquires Mythic Entertainment. 0:25:39.640 --> 0:25:43.159 Mythic Entertainment was responsible for the RPG, the m m 0:25:43.240 --> 0:25:47.200 O RPG Dark Age of Camelot that they viewed back 0:25:47.200 --> 0:25:50.960 in two thousand one, So now e A has decided 0:25:51.000 --> 0:25:53.760 to acquire another M M O RPG. They saw that 0:25:53.840 --> 0:25:58.720 as a way of of maintaining a steady stream of revenue. 0:25:58.760 --> 0:26:01.679 You've got all these people who are subscribing, So that 0:26:01.800 --> 0:26:04.359 was the strategy there, and that was the year the 0:26:04.359 --> 0:26:08.120 e A also acquired Digital Illusions CE better known as 0:26:08.240 --> 0:26:13.080 Dice and Dice is the company that made Battlefield nineteen two. 0:26:13.920 --> 0:26:16.679 So two thousand six is also the year that Sony 0:26:16.760 --> 0:26:20.360 launched the PlayStation three and and Nintendo launched the week exactly, 0:26:20.680 --> 0:26:23.040 both of them one year behind the Xbox three six, 0:26:23.200 --> 0:26:27.120 which had had a head start uh and uh, well 0:26:27.200 --> 0:26:30.000 not a full year, but several months behind anyway. But 0:26:31.200 --> 0:26:33.960 also what I thought was interesting was I found a 0:26:34.280 --> 0:26:38.720 statistic here from Bloomberg Business Week that said it was 0:26:39.200 --> 0:26:41.440 an article that was published in two thousand six, So 0:26:41.600 --> 0:26:43.360 that's why I put it here because we're talking about 0:26:43.359 --> 0:26:45.600 two thousand and six here. They said that from nine 0:26:46.680 --> 0:26:49.800 until present day, which at that time was two thousand six, 0:26:50.200 --> 0:26:53.880 e A averaged about one point two acquisitions per year. 0:26:54.000 --> 0:26:56.600 It was buying up more than a company per year 0:26:56.680 --> 0:26:58.960 if you average it out over those years, and that 0:26:59.160 --> 0:27:02.000 one third of the companies that had purchased in it 0:27:02.640 --> 0:27:08.000 eventually shut down. So that's again showing that that kind 0:27:08.000 --> 0:27:11.000 of trend that I talked about earlier, the criticism that 0:27:11.040 --> 0:27:13.639 the people have laid against it, saying, you're buying up 0:27:13.640 --> 0:27:19.080 these companies and when you are, uh, and you stripped 0:27:19.119 --> 0:27:22.560 the industry of the talent these people have, and then 0:27:22.840 --> 0:27:25.160 you end up closing it down when it doesn't meet 0:27:25.200 --> 0:27:28.200 whatever your performance measurements are. It's certainly not to say 0:27:28.200 --> 0:27:29.879 that those people didn't go on to do other things, 0:27:30.040 --> 0:27:34.240 but but yeah, yeah, but and it's not necessarily it's 0:27:34.240 --> 0:27:38.280 not necessarily the good business model for anyone in the industry, 0:27:38.119 --> 0:27:40.440 anyone else. And the big criticism would be those those 0:27:40.440 --> 0:27:43.359 guys and those men and women could have been developing 0:27:43.640 --> 0:27:47.400 games during that time that would have potentially changed the industry, 0:27:47.440 --> 0:27:50.600 but they couldn't because they were under contract or part 0:27:50.720 --> 0:27:53.840 part of this larger organization where they had nowhere else 0:27:53.880 --> 0:27:56.240 to go at that point. Um, yeah, I mean it's 0:27:57.440 --> 0:28:00.120 from from e A's perspective, it's doing all the smart 0:28:00.160 --> 0:28:03.399 business moves, so they're from a gamer's perspective or an 0:28:03.400 --> 0:28:05.840 industry analysts perspective, they might say this is not good 0:28:05.880 --> 0:28:07.680 for the industry or the gamer might say this isn't 0:28:07.680 --> 0:28:09.600 good for me because I'm not getting great games out 0:28:09.640 --> 0:28:12.120 of it. E A's point of view is that this 0:28:12.200 --> 0:28:16.480 is I'm making money, yeah, solidifying my position. Money. Yeah yeah. 0:28:16.520 --> 0:28:19.640 Money is thea when you were a business turns out? 0:28:21.560 --> 0:28:25.000 Yeah yeah. And I know this isn't financial stuff. So 0:28:25.119 --> 0:28:27.040 I didn't mean to blow your minds there about how 0:28:27.160 --> 0:28:31.520 money is. Okay. So two thousand seven, e A acquires BioWare. 0:28:32.560 --> 0:28:35.480 BioWare made some of my favorite games of all times. 0:28:35.480 --> 0:28:39.760 Still does uh Bolter's Gate. I love the Ball's Gate games, 0:28:39.920 --> 0:28:44.360 but the kicking for just this um there's a fantastic 0:28:44.400 --> 0:28:48.400 character who has a little hamster and he shouts out 0:28:48.480 --> 0:28:50.520 random things when you go into battle with him, and 0:28:50.680 --> 0:28:55.240 it's endlessly entertaining. They also made Planescape Torment. They made 0:28:55.280 --> 0:28:58.400 the Star Wars Nights the Old Republic games Cotour, which 0:28:58.720 --> 0:29:01.120 again I was a huge fan of the Cotour games. 0:29:01.120 --> 0:29:04.320 They made Mass Effect, which I've played a little bit of. 0:29:04.360 --> 0:29:06.160 I never played it all the way through, and that 0:29:06.360 --> 0:29:09.200 Frederick would probably hit me if he were in the 0:29:09.280 --> 0:29:11.600 room because it's actually his copy of the game that 0:29:11.680 --> 0:29:15.040 I have and I haven't returned it. Yet um that 0:29:15.160 --> 0:29:19.360 year they also acquired Pandemic Studios, which was the company 0:29:19.360 --> 0:29:22.560 that brought us Star Wars battle Front and also the 0:29:22.600 --> 0:29:25.680 game Destroy All Humans, as well as some other titles. 0:29:26.280 --> 0:29:30.120 And that was the year that that Probst steps down 0:29:30.440 --> 0:29:34.040 as CEO. He had been CEO since Hawkins had left 0:29:34.080 --> 0:29:38.080 the company. It was supposed to be more temporary than that, 0:29:38.240 --> 0:29:40.640 wasn't it. I think I believe so. But he he 0:29:40.880 --> 0:29:44.360 had led the company throughout those years, uh so from 0:29:45.720 --> 0:29:48.719 two thousand and seven, and he's still on the board, 0:29:48.880 --> 0:29:54.040 but he ends up stepping down and John Richie Tello Tello, 0:29:54.200 --> 0:29:57.640 I guess it should say Richie Tello becomes the new CEO, 0:29:58.560 --> 0:30:01.800 and he says the company's going to undergo a reorganization 0:30:01.840 --> 0:30:04.920 to address the problems they've had where they've been acquiring 0:30:05.040 --> 0:30:08.000 and trying to assimilate and then shutting down all these 0:30:08.040 --> 0:30:12.360 different companies that they've been going after over the years. So, 0:30:12.760 --> 0:30:14.960 I mean, this is this is an issue that all 0:30:15.040 --> 0:30:17.800 big companies have. If you acquire a company, there's always 0:30:17.800 --> 0:30:22.880 a culture shock era that follow it because unless the 0:30:22.920 --> 0:30:26.800 two companies are practically ideally well aligned, yeah, that's there's 0:30:26.840 --> 0:30:29.640 going to be culture shock so sometimes a company does 0:30:29.680 --> 0:30:33.959 this so quickly that they the there's never that period 0:30:34.000 --> 0:30:36.160 that you need to adjust and have things work out. 0:30:36.200 --> 0:30:39.479 So he was saying, let's take the time to really 0:30:39.520 --> 0:30:42.080 look at how our company is structured and make sure 0:30:42.120 --> 0:30:44.360 that it makes sense. That was his That was his 0:30:44.440 --> 0:30:48.840 statement from the the get go when he started right. 0:30:49.440 --> 0:30:52.320 Also unrelated to that, but in addition to the other 0:30:52.360 --> 0:30:54.400 games that they published that year, that was the year 0:30:54.440 --> 0:31:00.000 that they published harm Nix's Rock Band along with MTV Huge, huge, 0:31:00.040 --> 0:31:03.320 huge title. I mean, you know, Guitar Hero had been 0:31:03.480 --> 0:31:07.360 in the years before already kind of uh had revolutionized 0:31:07.840 --> 0:31:11.200 the idea of rhythm games on consoles, and Rock Band 0:31:11.720 --> 0:31:14.200 ended up taking that and dialing it up to eleven. 0:31:14.240 --> 0:31:17.280 As spinel Tap would love to say, and uh, I mean, 0:31:18.000 --> 0:31:21.680 I've had a blast playing Rock Band. Even though I adore, 0:31:21.760 --> 0:31:24.880 I adore the series. It's terrific. My musical talent is 0:31:24.880 --> 0:31:29.000 is pretty negligible, but I still, you know, any game 0:31:29.040 --> 0:31:30.920 that makes you feel like a rock star is pretty 0:31:31.000 --> 0:31:33.080 pretty cool. It is it is, And also karaoke in 0:31:33.120 --> 0:31:36.080 your own home is pretty cool. And also a little 0:31:36.240 --> 0:31:39.680 cheat boxes that allow you to hook up real electronic 0:31:39.760 --> 0:31:43.520 drum sets to the game and actually rock out. It's 0:31:43.760 --> 0:31:47.120 pretty neat, pretty neat. Yeah. So we then move on 0:31:47.720 --> 0:31:52.120 into two thousand eight where e A has a an 0:31:52.160 --> 0:31:57.760 attempt to acquire another big name, Take two Interactive, which 0:31:58.200 --> 0:32:01.760 you know gamers will wreck unize that it's it's pretty 0:32:01.760 --> 0:32:06.360 famous studio. So e A made a move to acquire 0:32:06.440 --> 0:32:10.400 take to Take two turned down the initial offer that 0:32:10.520 --> 0:32:15.160 e A made, and then uh, the negotiations kind of 0:32:15.200 --> 0:32:17.719 got a little quiet, but everyone kept an eye on 0:32:17.760 --> 0:32:20.120 this because they were really wondering if e A was 0:32:20.160 --> 0:32:23.240 in fact going to acquire yet another company, and some 0:32:23.280 --> 0:32:25.280 people were really worried about what the fate of Take 0:32:25.320 --> 0:32:27.440 two would be. Yeah. I think that part of the 0:32:27.480 --> 0:32:29.560 reason that it fell through was also that the the 0:32:29.600 --> 0:32:32.920 economic crisis that year, yeah hit them really hard. Yeah, 0:32:32.960 --> 0:32:38.680 So e A's attempt to acquire Take two fails, and 0:32:39.480 --> 0:32:44.160 that year the entire world entered into an economic crisis 0:32:44.200 --> 0:32:47.640 and it affected lots of industries, you know, real estate 0:32:47.720 --> 0:32:50.720 being the big famous one in the United States, banking 0:32:50.760 --> 0:32:54.160 as well, but it also hit companies like e A 0:32:54.920 --> 0:32:58.000 and UH. E A end up announcing that was going 0:32:58.080 --> 0:33:01.160 to cut more than a thousand positions across all of 0:33:01.160 --> 0:33:03.880 its divisions, which ended up being around ten to eleven 0:33:04.360 --> 0:33:07.720 of its workforce, and that the company lost over six 0:33:07.880 --> 0:33:11.320 hundred million dollars in the last quarter of two thousand 0:33:11.360 --> 0:33:15.040 eight due to accommodation of the economic crisis and just 0:33:15.120 --> 0:33:17.920 the fact that it's game releases had not performed very 0:33:17.960 --> 0:33:22.040 well in the market at all um and there their 0:33:22.120 --> 0:33:26.800 stock took a big tumble. So in August fifteen, of 0:33:26.800 --> 0:33:30.000 of two thousand eight, their stock was valued at forty 0:33:30.000 --> 0:33:33.360 eight dollars and twenty four cents per share. By December 0:33:33.440 --> 0:33:36.280 twenty six, of two thousand eight, it had fallen to 0:33:36.520 --> 0:33:40.239 twenty five dollars and thirty two cents per share. So, uh, 0:33:40.360 --> 0:33:45.800 not not quite losing half its value, just under at drop, 0:33:45.880 --> 0:33:49.600 but it's a whole bunch. Yeah, that's that's terrible, and 0:33:49.640 --> 0:33:53.320 it really what it signaled was that investors had lost 0:33:53.400 --> 0:33:56.000 a lot of confidence in the company. Now, keep in mind, 0:33:56.040 --> 0:33:59.000 the value of your company is based upon how many 0:33:59.080 --> 0:34:01.840 stocks are out there. If you're a publicly traded company, 0:34:01.880 --> 0:34:03.720 the value of your company in part at least is 0:34:03.760 --> 0:34:06.560 determined by how many stocks you have, and how how 0:34:06.560 --> 0:34:08.759 many stocks are out there in the market and what 0:34:08.960 --> 0:34:12.719 they're the actual value of each stock is. So you 0:34:12.800 --> 0:34:14.960 kind of multiply those two numbers together and you get 0:34:15.000 --> 0:34:17.759 a rough estimate of what the value of the company is. Well, 0:34:17.800 --> 0:34:20.520 when you lose your stock price, that means that your 0:34:20.560 --> 0:34:25.160 company is losing its value more or less oversimplifying, but 0:34:25.200 --> 0:34:28.520 that more or less is what it means. Well, two 0:34:28.800 --> 0:34:31.880 eight wasn't all bad. They did come out with a 0:34:31.960 --> 0:34:34.200 game that ended up getting a lot of critical acclaim 0:34:34.239 --> 0:34:38.040 and a lot of fans, which was Dead Space. I 0:34:38.080 --> 0:34:40.520 was never a big Dead Space player, but I know 0:34:40.600 --> 0:34:44.320 some people who can recite everything about that game, including 0:34:44.360 --> 0:34:46.399 all the little hidden stuff that you had to find 0:34:46.440 --> 0:34:50.319 to get the backstory. Also in the negative column that 0:34:50.360 --> 0:34:51.759 was two thousand eight was a year that they were 0:34:51.800 --> 0:34:55.280 hit with a class action lawsuit over the undisclosed edition 0:34:55.480 --> 0:34:59.000 of a secure ROM DRM software along with games like 0:34:59.040 --> 0:35:02.960 Spore for the Piece, E and M. And the lawsuit 0:35:03.040 --> 0:35:05.640 was about the fact that they had included this this 0:35:05.640 --> 0:35:09.880 this UH digital rights management software without telling anyone about it, 0:35:09.920 --> 0:35:12.160 that it was separate from the game software, and that 0:35:12.440 --> 0:35:15.360 it was basically impossible to uninstall even after you had 0:35:15.400 --> 0:35:18.040 uninstalled the video game. Ye so e A was falling 0:35:18.120 --> 0:35:21.759 under the same trap that Sony did, where, in an 0:35:21.760 --> 0:35:25.759 effort to try and keep its intellectual property safe, it 0:35:25.800 --> 0:35:29.799 had kind of over not kind of it overstepped. Yeah. Yeah, 0:35:29.880 --> 0:35:32.319 you know. The point was to prevent people from from 0:35:32.320 --> 0:35:34.520 installing it more than I think it was eight times, 0:35:35.239 --> 0:35:38.520 three times, six times. It all depends number of times, right, right, Well, 0:35:38.520 --> 0:35:40.120 it's one of those things where you know, someone who 0:35:40.200 --> 0:35:42.879 buys the game, their argument is I should be able 0:35:42.920 --> 0:35:45.240 to install this as many times as I want, because 0:35:45.760 --> 0:35:47.960 you know, if I buy a new computer, I want 0:35:47.960 --> 0:35:51.360 to be able to transfer the stuff I own onto 0:35:51.360 --> 0:35:54.080 that computer. It's not that I'm you know, installing it 0:35:54.120 --> 0:35:56.440 on all my friends machines. I just want to be 0:35:56.520 --> 0:35:59.400 able to play my game. And the other argument against 0:35:59.440 --> 0:36:01.440 that is that we don't want you to install this 0:36:01.520 --> 0:36:05.120 somehow your friends machines. Right uh. In In other DRM 0:36:05.160 --> 0:36:07.279 news that year, that was the year that UM the 0:36:07.360 --> 0:36:10.879 e A announced plans to require PC owners of things 0:36:10.880 --> 0:36:14.080 like Mass Effect and Sport to authenticate their copies every 0:36:14.160 --> 0:36:17.840 ten days, even if they were playing the game offline. Yeah. 0:36:18.120 --> 0:36:22.360 Um and this this is this becomes a common thread 0:36:22.600 --> 0:36:25.239 in e A as well. This idea of having either 0:36:25.400 --> 0:36:29.360 a persistent Internet connection or at least using the Internet 0:36:29.440 --> 0:36:31.880 every now and then to again verify that you have 0:36:32.800 --> 0:36:34.879 a legitimate copy of the game. So not only would 0:36:34.920 --> 0:36:37.759 you have to retain whatever the disc was, you would 0:36:37.800 --> 0:36:39.239 have to have that in your machine. You would have 0:36:39.280 --> 0:36:41.120 to then make a connection to the internet, and then 0:36:41.160 --> 0:36:43.520 the Internet would make sure that that, in fact was 0:36:43.600 --> 0:36:46.719 your registered copy so that you could play the game 0:36:46.760 --> 0:36:49.800 you wanted. Even if you were able to just move 0:36:50.000 --> 0:36:53.360 everything on the game into your computer and it's a 0:36:53.360 --> 0:36:55.840 single player game, you still had to do that. And 0:36:56.320 --> 0:36:58.719 a lot of players objected. Yeah, yeah, especially you know 0:36:58.760 --> 0:37:01.400 two thousand eight. You know, most people had had pretty 0:37:01.400 --> 0:37:04.560 good Internet connections at that point. It was getting better, 0:37:04.600 --> 0:37:06.960 but not everyone wanted to be connected to the Internet 0:37:06.960 --> 0:37:10.359 all the time. And you know, the people who bought 0:37:10.400 --> 0:37:13.400 the game pointed out that this was really a hassle 0:37:13.520 --> 0:37:16.279 for the legitimate game player, and people who were pirate 0:37:16.360 --> 0:37:19.600 into the game were breaking this encryption. They were using 0:37:19.760 --> 0:37:24.240 keys that would allow them to right so that they 0:37:24.239 --> 0:37:26.879 wouldn't they didn't have to offer a kid. They were 0:37:27.160 --> 0:37:31.320 playing pirated copies that they got for free that didn't 0:37:31.360 --> 0:37:34.160 have this drm in it. And so the players, the 0:37:34.280 --> 0:37:37.480 legitimate players who had bought the games say it said, look, 0:37:37.800 --> 0:37:40.960 you're only punishing us. You're not you're not stopping piracy, 0:37:41.000 --> 0:37:43.319 and you're making the game a miserable experience for the 0:37:43.320 --> 0:37:46.160 people who actually paid to play it. Yeah. This this 0:37:46.239 --> 0:37:50.320 never did go into effect, this particular bit of of 0:37:50.400 --> 0:37:53.080 d r M on the side. They relented pretty quickly 0:37:53.120 --> 0:37:56.279 after community feedback, which was highly highly negative as you 0:37:56.280 --> 0:37:59.160 can imagine. They however, did not learn their lesson from it, 0:37:59.200 --> 0:38:01.840 because they would they would incorporate it again in the future. 0:38:02.680 --> 0:38:06.720 H two thousand nine, e A acquires a play Fish, 0:38:06.760 --> 0:38:09.920 which was a developer of casual games. They had seen 0:38:10.000 --> 0:38:12.400 how Louis was doing and they thought let's get in 0:38:12.440 --> 0:38:15.160 on that as well. Um. They also went ahead and 0:38:15.200 --> 0:38:18.520 cut another fifteen hundred employees, which was about sevent of 0:38:18.560 --> 0:38:22.480 its workforce, and they shut down Pandemic Studios that year. 0:38:22.560 --> 0:38:25.600 So yet another example of them acquiring and then shutting 0:38:25.600 --> 0:38:29.320 down a company. Uh and next, I don't have anything 0:38:29.360 --> 0:38:33.680 for me neither, but inn In the summer they acquired 0:38:33.719 --> 0:38:39.399 PopCap Oh wow, yeah, another casual games developer, so lots 0:38:39.400 --> 0:38:42.480 of lots of mobile content all that. Yeah, who own 0:38:42.520 --> 0:38:45.240 like The Jeweled and stuff like that? Right, They also 0:38:45.400 --> 0:38:48.279 released Star Wars the Old Republic, which was a Star 0:38:48.280 --> 0:38:51.399 Wars based m m O RPG. Uh. Now, we had 0:38:51.440 --> 0:38:54.000 one person asked us if we could talk more about 0:38:54.120 --> 0:38:57.080 Star Wars the Old Republic and why did it move 0:38:57.239 --> 0:39:00.239 from a subscription based service too free to play with 0:39:00.280 --> 0:39:04.480 micro transactions, and and how you know, what's the story 0:39:04.520 --> 0:39:07.319 of its failure if you want to look at it 0:39:07.360 --> 0:39:10.520 in that way? All right? As so, I actually played 0:39:10.640 --> 0:39:13.160 Star Wars the Old Republic. I I subscribed. I was 0:39:13.200 --> 0:39:15.279 one of the subscribers. I was one of the people 0:39:15.320 --> 0:39:17.880 who got who rolled his eyes when I heard that 0:39:18.000 --> 0:39:20.200 was going to free to play because I had actually 0:39:20.400 --> 0:39:22.919 bought a I think it was like a twelve month 0:39:22.960 --> 0:39:28.760 subscription in advance. But so Star Wars the Old Republic 0:39:28.800 --> 0:39:32.279 takes place thousands of years before the events of the 0:39:32.320 --> 0:39:36.200 Star Wars movie series. Um. But it puts you in 0:39:36.480 --> 0:39:41.959 either a a Sith role or a Republic role, and 0:39:42.480 --> 0:39:44.719 you have different storylines that we play out based upon 0:39:44.760 --> 0:39:47.640 the type of character you were playing. I think part 0:39:47.680 --> 0:39:49.600 of the problem was that it, even though it was 0:39:49.640 --> 0:39:53.360 an m m O RPG, more frequently than not it 0:39:53.480 --> 0:39:56.080 felt to me like a single player game. It felt 0:39:56.120 --> 0:39:59.040 like another sequel to Cotur, which isn't a bad thing. 0:39:59.200 --> 0:40:01.560 The Coach board game were great. I very much enjoyed them, 0:40:02.040 --> 0:40:05.920 even though the second Cotur game obviously had an entire 0:40:05.960 --> 0:40:09.040 section that was left unfinished because you could see it 0:40:09.080 --> 0:40:11.200 on your map, but you couldn't get to it in 0:40:11.360 --> 0:40:15.160 uh in the actual game. Anyway, the Old Republic felt 0:40:15.160 --> 0:40:17.960 like another sequel to that. It didn't feel as much 0:40:18.120 --> 0:40:20.520 like an M M O RPG. You didn't have as 0:40:20.560 --> 0:40:23.680 many people partying up together and kind of interactions that 0:40:23.680 --> 0:40:27.920 you would normally expect from and not after the initial launched, 0:40:27.920 --> 0:40:30.160 Like there was a lot of interest in it very 0:40:30.160 --> 0:40:32.480 early on, but that kind of dropped off quickly. And 0:40:32.480 --> 0:40:34.640 part of the problem was that people were completing the 0:40:34.800 --> 0:40:38.600 storylines for the characters very very quickly, and once you 0:40:38.640 --> 0:40:41.600 did that, you didn't really have any incentive to keep playing. 0:40:42.160 --> 0:40:43.719 So it was just like if you had played a 0:40:43.760 --> 0:40:45.520 single player game all the way through and then you're thinking, 0:40:45.560 --> 0:40:47.080 all right, well, that was fun, but now I want 0:40:47.160 --> 0:40:50.120 to sell this game and get some money back, and 0:40:50.160 --> 0:40:52.200 then I'm going to buy another new game. That's kind 0:40:52.200 --> 0:40:56.440 of what people were thinking. Well, subscribers started to drop 0:40:56.480 --> 0:40:59.520 off from this game, and e A's response was that, well, 0:40:59.760 --> 0:41:02.280 you know, we could either pull the plug on it entirely, 0:41:03.040 --> 0:41:06.279 or we could try and switch our strategy and get 0:41:06.280 --> 0:41:10.080 more people interested in this game. But obviously the subscription 0:41:10.120 --> 0:41:12.239 models not really working. So what if we dropped the 0:41:12.280 --> 0:41:14.680 subscription and go to free to play and instead of 0:41:14.719 --> 0:41:19.200 making money through people subscribing, we make money by selling 0:41:19.280 --> 0:41:23.040 items in the game for real money, small amounts of 0:41:23.080 --> 0:41:28.120 money micro transactions, but um, and you could still play 0:41:28.120 --> 0:41:31.680 it for free without buying anything, but you wouldn't have 0:41:31.719 --> 0:41:33.840 access to the entire game. There'll be sections of the 0:41:33.840 --> 0:41:35.759 game you could not get to because you would have 0:41:35.880 --> 0:41:38.080 to purchase them in order to have access. And all 0:41:38.080 --> 0:41:42.400 of the micro transaction items were the super powerful cool 0:41:42.440 --> 0:41:45.000 things with rainbows and unicorns or whatever the you know 0:41:45.160 --> 0:41:49.400 Star Wars equivalent of rainbows and called lightsabers. So I 0:41:49.440 --> 0:41:52.839 realize you're not familiar with the venerable franchise known as 0:41:52.840 --> 0:41:55.800 Star Wars. Yeah no, never never seen any of those 0:41:55.880 --> 0:42:00.520 scruffy looking at um. So yeah, they that was the 0:42:00.560 --> 0:42:03.040 whole response there was to switch over to free to 0:42:03.080 --> 0:42:06.719 play and do micro transactions. Now, this is another thing 0:42:06.800 --> 0:42:09.239 that e a has received a lot of criticism for 0:42:09.440 --> 0:42:12.600 is the whole micro transaction approach. I can't say the 0:42:12.600 --> 0:42:18.799 word criticism either, obviously, but the micro transactions are that's 0:42:18.800 --> 0:42:20.920 another way to try and generate revenue, and if you 0:42:20.960 --> 0:42:23.520 make your game free to play, it may be the 0:42:23.560 --> 0:42:27.000 only way unless you incorporate lots of advertising, and either 0:42:27.080 --> 0:42:29.919 way most players kind of react in a negative way. Yeah, 0:42:30.000 --> 0:42:32.160 that has also been something that e A has gotten 0:42:32.200 --> 0:42:34.360 a lot of flak for, is the the inclusion of 0:42:34.840 --> 0:42:38.200 kind of kind of annoying out there advertising in the 0:42:38.200 --> 0:42:42.080 middle of their games. Right. Well, the disappointing performance of 0:42:42.120 --> 0:42:45.360 Star Wars may have also contributed to another dip in 0:42:45.440 --> 0:42:49.920 e AS stock prices in although, but before we move on, 0:42:50.040 --> 0:42:52.640 just thank you Chaz our listener from Twitter for for 0:42:52.680 --> 0:42:55.560 writing in about that. Yes, thank you very much, and 0:42:55.800 --> 0:42:57.799 we have a few more questions we will address at 0:42:57.840 --> 0:43:00.360 the end of this episode as well. Also in twenty eleven, 0:43:00.400 --> 0:43:03.960 something else big happened to e A. E A had 0:43:04.000 --> 0:43:08.080 the honor is the wrong word for it, had had 0:43:08.160 --> 0:43:14.880 the unfortunate um role as Lull's SEC final target. LULLS 0:43:14.920 --> 0:43:18.400 SEC being laugh out Loud Security was kind of a 0:43:18.400 --> 0:43:25.040 an offshoot of Anonymous. It was not necessarily related directly 0:43:25.120 --> 0:43:28.719 to anonymous, but it was a group of of hackers 0:43:28.760 --> 0:43:31.160 who decided that they were going to cause as much 0:43:31.200 --> 0:43:35.040 trouble as possible really for the main reason they wanted 0:43:35.080 --> 0:43:37.839 to do it was to show that they could. And Uh, boy, 0:43:37.840 --> 0:43:40.160 I bet they're regretting that decision right now because as 0:43:40.280 --> 0:43:43.239 the recording of this podcast, uh, four of them have 0:43:43.360 --> 0:43:47.080 been sentenced to between a year and two years in 0:43:47.320 --> 0:43:53.279 various uh jails or juvenile facilities. Well, so, yikes, I 0:43:53.280 --> 0:43:57.200 guess they weren't quite as anonymous as they thought. Uh. Anyway, 0:43:57.320 --> 0:44:01.080 they hit e A as their final target for disbanding, 0:44:01.719 --> 0:44:05.440 and uh they ended up releasing the log in information 0:44:05.560 --> 0:44:09.520 of thousands of people who were playing Battlefield Heroes. So 0:44:10.040 --> 0:44:12.120 uh that was a big black I. E A had 0:44:12.120 --> 0:44:14.560 to reset all that and send emails out to everybody saying, 0:44:14.600 --> 0:44:17.640 you know, it was compromised and you need to change 0:44:17.680 --> 0:44:20.919 passwords and all that kind of stuff. Uh. In twelve 0:44:21.520 --> 0:44:27.440 e he wins another awful uh distinguishing feature here they 0:44:27.480 --> 0:44:30.280 were called they they they were named the worst company 0:44:30.320 --> 0:44:32.960 in America by the Consumerist And this is a this 0:44:33.040 --> 0:44:35.480 is a thing that that the consumers does every year. 0:44:35.480 --> 0:44:37.319 They've been doing it for a while. They gave a 0:44:37.360 --> 0:44:42.080 Golden Poo award. Yes they do. It's a very distinguished 0:44:42.680 --> 0:44:44.560 Uh yeah. The way it works is that they set 0:44:44.560 --> 0:44:48.240 it up like a tournament bracket and they let people 0:44:48.360 --> 0:44:51.680 vote on which company they think should progress in the bracket. 0:44:52.160 --> 0:44:55.560 And that year e A took home the Golden Pooh. 0:44:55.760 --> 0:44:59.160 It's final opponent was the Bank of America. Now keep 0:44:59.200 --> 0:45:02.120 in mind this is all from reader votes, it's not. 0:45:02.239 --> 0:45:04.400 I mean, I think I think the consumers is the 0:45:04.440 --> 0:45:07.120 one that ultimately decides which ones are in the brackets, 0:45:07.120 --> 0:45:10.480 but the readers are the ones who determine which companies progress, right, 0:45:10.520 --> 0:45:12.520 And this is the Internet, and there are some gamers 0:45:12.560 --> 0:45:14.600 on the internet, so so I'm sure that that is 0:45:14.760 --> 0:45:17.279 part of why e A made it that far. But 0:45:17.280 --> 0:45:21.000 but also, I mean was when Occupy was happening, so 0:45:21.000 --> 0:45:23.440 so think I mean there were thousands of people on 0:45:23.520 --> 0:45:28.640 the streets protesting the actions of corporations like Bank of America, 0:45:28.960 --> 0:45:32.840 and e A still still beat them out. Yeah, by 0:45:33.040 --> 0:45:36.279 I think it was like close to to you know, 0:45:36.680 --> 0:45:39.480 twenty six or something like that. It's really like that, 0:45:39.640 --> 0:45:42.719 So it was it wasn't even close. It's a runaway 0:45:42.760 --> 0:45:45.880 but again, you know the platforms the Internet. Gamers like 0:45:45.960 --> 0:45:48.080 the Internet, so you know, keep that all in mind. 0:45:48.280 --> 0:45:50.600 It's kind of it was kind of skewed to e A, 0:45:50.600 --> 0:45:54.040 is what we're saying. Probably, So why did it win 0:45:54.160 --> 0:45:58.280 Worst Company? Well, some of the the suggestions were because 0:45:58.400 --> 0:46:00.320 it had stripped the video game in the story of 0:46:00.400 --> 0:46:04.200 talent through all those acquisitions and then shutting down competitions. 0:46:04.600 --> 0:46:08.080 Are shutting down competing studios, I should say. So they 0:46:08.239 --> 0:46:10.560 not only bought up competing studios but then shut them down, 0:46:10.600 --> 0:46:14.120 which then meant that that talent and those games would 0:46:14.320 --> 0:46:18.240 often become inaccessible. There would never be another one because 0:46:18.360 --> 0:46:21.040 e A would own the intellectual property, but not have 0:46:21.120 --> 0:46:24.400 anyone to actually develop the games anymore. At least the 0:46:24.440 --> 0:46:26.359 people who had developed it were gone, so it would 0:46:26.360 --> 0:46:29.399 be a completely different experience. Uh. Then there was also 0:46:29.560 --> 0:46:32.360 citing of the use of micro transactions, just like I said, 0:46:33.360 --> 0:46:36.480 especially for any games where you already had to buy 0:46:36.520 --> 0:46:38.919 a game and then on top of it, have micro 0:46:39.000 --> 0:46:41.760 transactions within the games that were not free to begin with. Yeah, 0:46:41.800 --> 0:46:44.120 so the idea of buying like a sixty dollar game 0:46:44.160 --> 0:46:46.359 and then having to spend more money within the game 0:46:46.400 --> 0:46:48.759 in order for it to be a satisfying experience. That 0:46:48.800 --> 0:46:50.880 did not sit well with a lot of people who 0:46:51.000 --> 0:46:53.759 voted in this Also, the one of the things they 0:46:53.840 --> 0:46:57.040 cited were the exclusivity deals that e A had made 0:46:57.040 --> 0:47:01.160 with organizations like the NFL. Now that big deal. Now 0:47:01.160 --> 0:47:03.160 for e A, it made perfect sense. That meant that 0:47:03.239 --> 0:47:06.359 they had tied up the NFL license that they were 0:47:06.360 --> 0:47:09.600 the only company that could put out an official NFL 0:47:09.719 --> 0:47:12.520 affiliated football game. And the same thing is true for 0:47:12.600 --> 0:47:16.160 other sports as well. They made exclusivity agreements with other 0:47:16.239 --> 0:47:21.239 sports agencies, but NFL is an easy example. So e 0:47:21.360 --> 0:47:26.200 A then shuts down competition because no other game company 0:47:26.280 --> 0:47:29.919 can make an official NFL licensed game. They can't use 0:47:30.040 --> 0:47:33.520 the actual team player names or anything. And although you know, 0:47:33.880 --> 0:47:37.080 another football strategy game could certainly be enjoyable, when you 0:47:37.080 --> 0:47:39.560 don't have that brand recognition behind it, it becomes a 0:47:39.600 --> 0:47:41.600 lot harder to market, right. I mean, why if if 0:47:41.640 --> 0:47:44.320 you're a fan of football and you want to play 0:47:44.480 --> 0:47:48.000 as your favorite football team with with the actual players 0:47:48.000 --> 0:47:50.760 who are on that team as your as your players, 0:47:51.120 --> 0:47:53.319 then you had to go with the A because no 0:47:53.360 --> 0:47:55.879 one else had the licensing agreement that would allow them 0:47:55.920 --> 0:47:58.759 to do that and so that you know, people said, like, 0:47:58.800 --> 0:48:01.960 you're essentially saying we're the only game in town. Yeah, 0:48:02.000 --> 0:48:06.000 you're you're further further shutting down the opportunities of other studios. Right, 0:48:06.040 --> 0:48:08.719 So that was another reason why they got a lot 0:48:08.719 --> 0:48:14.320 of votes. Uh So the tournaments came out pretty badly 0:48:14.520 --> 0:48:17.279 for e A. Uh, it showed that that had a 0:48:17.320 --> 0:48:20.560 real problem with public perception of the company. Um and 0:48:20.640 --> 0:48:24.839 e A tried to kind of uh respond to that, 0:48:24.960 --> 0:48:27.120 and and a lot of people thought that their response 0:48:27.200 --> 0:48:30.640 was lackluster. This would happen again, but we'll get to it. Yeah, 0:48:30.719 --> 0:48:33.439 I don't want to spoil it, but yeah. That year 0:48:33.560 --> 0:48:36.759 also was when e A released Mass Effect three, which 0:48:36.800 --> 0:48:39.400 may also have affected its standings as Worst Company in 0:48:39.440 --> 0:48:41.920 America because, as I recall, there were a lot of 0:48:41.960 --> 0:48:44.320 people who were not happy with the way that game ended. 0:48:44.560 --> 0:48:46.560 Yeah didn't they didn't they wasn't that the one that 0:48:46.600 --> 0:48:49.840 they released a different ending too that you could you 0:48:49.880 --> 0:48:52.799 could download. There were, as I recall, there were there 0:48:52.840 --> 0:48:54.560 may have been. I think there might have been, but 0:48:54.600 --> 0:48:56.799 I know there were at least three different endings that 0:48:56.880 --> 0:48:59.799 were already in the game. But some people argued that 0:48:59.840 --> 0:49:02.759 the three different endings were not distinct enough that you know, 0:49:02.960 --> 0:49:05.520 you would have small details that were different, but that 0:49:05.960 --> 0:49:08.080 in the grand scheme it felt like what you had 0:49:08.160 --> 0:49:11.640 done in the series of games. Yeah, it defeats the 0:49:11.760 --> 0:49:14.200 entire purpose of the Mass Effect series exactly. It felt 0:49:14.239 --> 0:49:17.280 like like, while while the whole game makes it feel 0:49:17.280 --> 0:49:20.680 like you're going to have this huge impact, ultimately, if 0:49:20.760 --> 0:49:24.319 the differences aren't that great, then it means that you know, 0:49:24.360 --> 0:49:26.399 what you did didn't really matter in the grand scheme 0:49:26.400 --> 0:49:28.360 of things, which from an existential point of view is 0:49:28.400 --> 0:49:32.319 kind of interesting. But from a gamer player, uh, you know, experience, 0:49:32.480 --> 0:49:34.879 maybe not so much fun. Right, It's not called nic 0:49:35.080 --> 0:49:38.160 the game so therefore so so people said that they 0:49:38.200 --> 0:49:41.120 felt that the game had what the end game in particular, 0:49:41.120 --> 0:49:43.160 had been rushed, and that it just wasn't a fitting 0:49:43.440 --> 0:49:48.480 capper to it. UH and Penny Arcades Ben Kuchera and 0:49:48.640 --> 0:49:52.400 I apologize if I'm miss uh mispronouncing his name. He 0:49:52.520 --> 0:49:55.760 criticized the company for concentrating on free to play games 0:49:55.760 --> 0:49:58.480 and micro transactions, and he also said that the company 0:49:58.520 --> 0:50:01.200 was failing to create compel in retail games. So you're 0:50:01.239 --> 0:50:04.040 saying that the games that you are selling for sixty 0:50:04.080 --> 0:50:07.440 dollars aren't really good good and the ones that are 0:50:07.440 --> 0:50:10.360 free to play with micro transactions are irritating. Right. So 0:50:11.239 --> 0:50:14.320 Penny Arcade, by the way, has nine hundred and twenty 0:50:14.320 --> 0:50:17.200 two comics that are tagged e A in their system, 0:50:17.320 --> 0:50:19.879 which as of the recording of this podcast, yes, as 0:50:19.880 --> 0:50:22.879 a well, yeah, as of as of Tuesday, I think 0:50:22.880 --> 0:50:26.000 actually Tuesday or Wednesday this week, so there there. There 0:50:26.080 --> 0:50:30.239 might have been more UH since then, but it just 0:50:30.320 --> 0:50:32.960 which just goes to show that the gaming community has 0:50:33.000 --> 0:50:34.880 had a lot to say and a lot of crisis 0:50:35.000 --> 0:50:38.319 criticism to lob against the company over the years. And 0:50:38.440 --> 0:50:43.360 UH and John Richard tell O stepped down as CEO 0:50:43.680 --> 0:50:46.040 and as a member of the board. UH. Here's a 0:50:46.080 --> 0:50:48.440 direct quote from one of the blog posts that was 0:50:48.480 --> 0:50:50.960 written that he wrote about this. He said, I am 0:50:51.000 --> 0:50:54.040 writing with some tough news. I have resigned my position 0:50:54.040 --> 0:50:56.520 as e A s CEO. I will be around for 0:50:56.560 --> 0:50:58.200 a couple of weeks and I hope to have it 0:50:58.600 --> 0:51:01.040 the chance to say goodbye to many of you. Larry 0:51:01.080 --> 0:51:03.719 Probest will be stepping in as executive chairman to help 0:51:03.800 --> 0:51:08.400 smooth the transition. UH. E A also continued to layoff 0:51:08.440 --> 0:51:12.240 employees in part as a streamlining effort at this time, 0:51:12.960 --> 0:51:15.120 and so Probest comes back in. You know, he had 0:51:15.120 --> 0:51:20.680 stepped down and now he was interim CEO. Uh and 0:51:20.880 --> 0:51:23.920 uh that's as of the recording of this podcast, that's 0:51:23.920 --> 0:51:27.080 still the case. They hadn't found a permanent replacement yet. Yeah, 0:51:27.120 --> 0:51:29.080 but they yeah, that was that was another ten percent 0:51:29.080 --> 0:51:32.160 of global staff that was laid off as of May 0:51:32.280 --> 0:51:35.640 of this year. So tough times over at e A. 0:51:36.080 --> 0:51:39.000 They also said that they planned to open a Dice 0:51:39.280 --> 0:51:43.600 l A office, uh, where they would be developing games, 0:51:43.640 --> 0:51:46.800 including Star Wars games because they made a deal with Disney, 0:51:46.840 --> 0:51:50.720 which of course acquired the rights to the Lucas Arts 0:51:50.880 --> 0:51:56.680 stuff earlier. And they won the Worst Company in America 0:51:56.760 --> 0:51:59.360 for the second year in a row. And most of 0:51:59.400 --> 0:52:01.879 the reasons is the first time that any company has 0:52:01.920 --> 0:52:04.080 ever done this, by the way, done a two for 0:52:04.680 --> 0:52:07.359 and they they the reasons are pretty much the same 0:52:07.360 --> 0:52:11.080 as twelve. But also there was another controversy that happened 0:52:11.719 --> 0:52:14.800 between those two times that ended up costing the company 0:52:14.840 --> 0:52:17.680 big time, which was the launch of sim City five, 0:52:17.800 --> 0:52:21.200 one of the most anticipated games in a long time. 0:52:21.239 --> 0:52:23.480 I mean, like there's certain titles that when you hear 0:52:23.480 --> 0:52:27.360 about them coming out, people old school gamers get really excited. 0:52:27.640 --> 0:52:30.239 Diablo three is a great example of a game that 0:52:30.320 --> 0:52:33.480 got a lot of people talking months before it came out. 0:52:33.520 --> 0:52:36.279 Sim City five is another one of those where people 0:52:36.320 --> 0:52:38.800 who are fans of the sim City franchise were really 0:52:38.840 --> 0:52:43.319 excited by this game. But the big issue was that 0:52:43.400 --> 0:52:45.640 sim City five was a game that requires you to 0:52:45.640 --> 0:52:47.719 have a persistent connection to the Internet in order to 0:52:47.760 --> 0:52:50.400 play it. Even if you're just playing single payer, single 0:52:50.400 --> 0:52:52.920 player offline, it's just you and your computer, but you 0:52:52.960 --> 0:52:55.719 still have to have a persistent Internet connection. And they 0:52:55.760 --> 0:52:58.879 had some server issues when the game launched, which meant 0:52:58.880 --> 0:53:01.160 that people couldn't play the game they had just bought. 0:53:01.200 --> 0:53:04.080 They had spent the money, the game was in their hands. 0:53:04.120 --> 0:53:06.520 They wanted to play a single player game, and they 0:53:06.600 --> 0:53:10.120 couldn't do it because the servers weren't working. Now, that 0:53:10.920 --> 0:53:13.520 tells you that this is a huge problem that that's 0:53:13.520 --> 0:53:17.160 another example of why the persistent Internet connection thing is 0:53:17.200 --> 0:53:21.040 an argument that people say makes for bad gaming experience, 0:53:21.040 --> 0:53:23.560 because when you have a technical issue on the the 0:53:23.600 --> 0:53:28.759 game providers end uh, then it's adding a completely unnecessary 0:53:28.760 --> 0:53:30.759 extra step that a lot of things can go wrong 0:53:30.800 --> 0:53:34.359 with right, And if it's an online game, then that's 0:53:34.400 --> 0:53:36.560 just the way that works, right. But but when it's 0:53:36.560 --> 0:53:39.040 a single player game, then people have a real hard 0:53:39.120 --> 0:53:43.080 time feeling. And uh, you know again, a lot of 0:53:43.120 --> 0:53:45.400 people say that the whole reason for this was just 0:53:45.480 --> 0:53:48.800 so that e A could have another kind of DRM 0:53:48.840 --> 0:53:52.600 there that you know, that's not e A has denied that. 0:53:52.680 --> 0:53:54.920 They said, that's not the reason, but that's the reason 0:53:55.000 --> 0:53:59.480 everyone says, says is a lot of people suggest that's 0:53:59.520 --> 0:54:02.080 the real Let me put it that way. Sure. They 0:54:02.120 --> 0:54:04.719 also made headlines in February and March when um, the 0:54:04.800 --> 0:54:08.240 CFO Blake Jorgensen announced that all future titles would involve 0:54:08.280 --> 0:54:11.919 micro transactions. Uh he back pedaled really hard a week later. 0:54:12.200 --> 0:54:14.040 Um yeah, let it. That did not get a great 0:54:14.080 --> 0:54:17.960 reaction now and again that's probably what contributed to it 0:54:18.000 --> 0:54:21.239 winning the Worst company in America again. Yeah. Despite all 0:54:21.280 --> 0:54:25.439 of this, their their stock has been rising dramatically over 0:54:25.440 --> 0:54:30.240 the course of of so far. Um and uh really 0:54:30.320 --> 0:54:34.200 really interestingly, as of as of this week, the a 0:54:34.200 --> 0:54:36.560 couple of the really high level people have been selling 0:54:36.600 --> 0:54:40.600 off a lot of their shares in their own company's stock, 0:54:40.719 --> 0:54:45.920 like fifties seven thousand of their shares. Wow, that is uh, 0:54:46.040 --> 0:54:48.960 I'm actually looking it up right now because it's actually 0:54:48.960 --> 0:54:50.600 a little lower than it was when I wrote it down. 0:54:50.640 --> 0:54:52.840 Because originally we were going to record this episode the 0:54:52.920 --> 0:54:55.320 day before. We're actually recording it right We're going to 0:54:55.400 --> 0:55:01.280 record it yesterday. But on May fifteenth, fifteenth, the stock 0:55:01.320 --> 0:55:03.759 price was at twenty two dollars and fifty cents when 0:55:03.760 --> 0:55:07.920 I looked at originally. Uh, right now on May sixteenth, 0:55:08.200 --> 0:55:11.719 at four forty four pm Eastern time, more information than 0:55:11.760 --> 0:55:14.400 you need to know, it's at two and two cents. 0:55:14.400 --> 0:55:17.640 So it's dropped almost fifty cents, right around fifty cents 0:55:18.239 --> 0:55:22.480 since I checked it yesterday. So it's still and it's 0:55:22.480 --> 0:55:27.120 obviously not at that pre August two eight high when 0:55:27.120 --> 0:55:29.719 it was in the high forties and lower fifties, but 0:55:29.719 --> 0:55:33.040 it's but it's dropped a great deal since then. Um, 0:55:32.320 --> 0:55:35.560 I think I think that that well as of as 0:55:35.600 --> 0:55:38.440 of wednesday, as of the May fifteenth, anyway, shares where 0:55:38.440 --> 0:55:42.799 your shares were up very nearly for the course. Yeah, 0:55:42.840 --> 0:55:47.600 so it's it's I think volatile is a safe wordy use, Yes, Yes, 0:55:47.880 --> 0:55:51.560 that that's there's a lot of very very important financial 0:55:51.600 --> 0:55:53.799 publications that are talking about e A right now, which 0:55:53.840 --> 0:55:55.880 I which I always find fascinating, and all of them 0:55:55.920 --> 0:55:58.719 are going like, be cautious, don't actually invest, we don't 0:55:58.760 --> 0:56:00.759 know about this thing. Yeah, there does seem to be 0:56:00.760 --> 0:56:06.360 a real problem with consumer confidence in an investor confidence 0:56:06.400 --> 0:56:08.520 in a e A. And again that can really affect that. 0:56:08.800 --> 0:56:12.000 You know, e A is a multibillion dollar industry company 0:56:12.120 --> 0:56:15.400 right now. It's you know, it's revenues can be over 0:56:15.480 --> 0:56:18.200 a billion dollars, can be over three billion dollars in 0:56:18.239 --> 0:56:20.960 a good year, and so when you're talking about that, 0:56:21.080 --> 0:56:24.200 it's kind of weird to think that it's it's value 0:56:24.239 --> 0:56:26.520 as a company is in question. That suggests that there's 0:56:26.560 --> 0:56:30.040 been some pretty serious missteps or that something's really funky 0:56:30.120 --> 0:56:32.319 with the industry in general, right right, Well, you know, 0:56:32.360 --> 0:56:34.480 it's I think it's just basically that thing where they're 0:56:34.520 --> 0:56:37.440 not really they're not really heating all of all of 0:56:37.480 --> 0:56:40.400 this this feedback that they're getting from from all of 0:56:40.440 --> 0:56:43.520 their their from their fans, and that's you know, like 0:56:43.600 --> 0:56:47.160 and they also just renew their license with with the 0:56:47.880 --> 0:56:51.800 Football Association with a FIFA, FIFA and the soccer soccer 0:56:52.160 --> 0:56:58.239 So yeah, sure, football whatever, go back to France. Um 0:56:58.320 --> 0:57:02.279 until two? Um so well, and and FIVA is one 0:57:02.280 --> 0:57:06.240 of those titles that consistently does really well for e A. Sure, 0:57:06.360 --> 0:57:08.600 And and you know again like it's it's understandable why 0:57:08.640 --> 0:57:13.200 would they would want that exclusivity? Now, we asked our 0:57:13.239 --> 0:57:15.560 listeners if they had any specific questions they would like 0:57:15.640 --> 0:57:19.280 us to address, and uh, we We've talked about some 0:57:19.320 --> 0:57:20.760 of them already, so I'm not going to go over 0:57:20.840 --> 0:57:23.160 all of them. But I've got two left that we 0:57:23.200 --> 0:57:26.959 can chat about really quickly. Peter from Facebook said, what 0:57:27.000 --> 0:57:29.840 was the most popular e A game? And if you 0:57:29.880 --> 0:57:33.680 go from the debut of e A till present day 0:57:33.680 --> 0:57:36.600 and you look at all the units sold, the SIMS 0:57:36.760 --> 0:57:39.440 comes out on top with a level eleven point twenty 0:57:39.480 --> 0:57:43.800 three million units sold globally according to VG charts. And 0:57:43.880 --> 0:57:47.280 second place would go to Need for Speed Underground. Now, 0:57:47.480 --> 0:57:50.680 UM that that doesn't surprise me because the SIMS is 0:57:50.680 --> 0:57:52.680 one of those games that had a very wide appeal. 0:57:52.760 --> 0:57:54.240 I mean I loved it when it came out. I 0:57:54.280 --> 0:57:56.920 thought this was such a cool, innovative game. Also, I 0:57:56.920 --> 0:57:59.720 thought it was funny to lock people out of the bathroom. 0:58:00.080 --> 0:58:03.600 Um yeah, I did. Some pretty cruel things. Good good, 0:58:03.640 --> 0:58:07.720 good thing to know about you, Jonathan, That's great. Uh. 0:58:07.720 --> 0:58:12.080 And then Ian he asked also on Facebook if I 0:58:12.080 --> 0:58:14.800 could give a rundown of some of the PR meltdowns 0:58:14.840 --> 0:58:18.000 the e A has had. I could, but that's a 0:58:18.040 --> 0:58:21.000 full episode. So I'm going to give you, Um, I'm 0:58:21.040 --> 0:58:25.520 gonna give you three examples of PR attempts that e 0:58:25.720 --> 0:58:29.920 A maybe did not handle very well. This isn't just 0:58:30.080 --> 0:58:33.560 like coming out and saying, uh, we didn't do this right, 0:58:33.560 --> 0:58:35.600 We're going to do better. This is this is this 0:58:35.680 --> 0:58:39.520 goes beyond this. This comes into marketing mistakes. Okay, three 0:58:39.600 --> 0:58:43.040 big marketing mistakes. Now, keep in mind that this might 0:58:43.080 --> 0:58:46.520 not be entirely e a's fault. They could have partnered 0:58:46.560 --> 0:58:49.360 with a marketing firm that came up with a terrible 0:58:49.400 --> 0:58:52.640 idea and just ran with it. Um. One of them 0:58:52.760 --> 0:58:56.720 was when e A was marketing the game Dante's Inferno, 0:58:58.320 --> 0:59:01.160 remember that, Yeah, which had all these different characters that 0:59:01.200 --> 0:59:06.320 were based off the Seven Deadly Sins. So the promotion 0:59:06.440 --> 0:59:10.080 for the Sin of Lust came around and right around 0:59:10.120 --> 0:59:13.560 the same time as Comic Con An e A had 0:59:13.840 --> 0:59:18.040 a booth at Comic Con where they had some young 0:59:18.240 --> 0:59:23.360 ladies dressed in costume models colloquially known as booth babes 0:59:23.960 --> 0:59:29.000 to promote their games, and they had their Sin to 0:59:29.120 --> 0:59:34.160 Win campaign, which was a contest that encouraged people to 0:59:34.480 --> 0:59:39.920 quote commit acts of lust unquote with costumed reps at 0:59:39.960 --> 0:59:43.520 e A's booth. Later on, the team clarified this as 0:59:43.560 --> 0:59:47.320 saying that they were just trying to tell people to 0:59:47.800 --> 0:59:51.920 take photos with these reps and then tweet and share 0:59:51.920 --> 0:59:56.080 them in various ways. But no, that doesn't sound like 0:59:56.160 --> 1:00:02.640 that thing. Yeah, I'm I I remember I had completely 1:00:02.640 --> 1:00:05.720 blocked that from my memory, but I remember exactly how 1:00:05.760 --> 1:00:08.760 offended I was by that because it was really offended. 1:00:08.800 --> 1:00:12.600 Actually yeah, yeah, not a great move. Okay, So here's 1:00:12.600 --> 1:00:15.520 another one. This one, This one really makes me scratch 1:00:15.600 --> 1:00:18.480 my head. So theyre for a promotional campaign for the 1:00:18.480 --> 1:00:23.080 game Mercenaries to e A converted a London gas station 1:00:23.840 --> 1:00:26.480 to make it look like a military depot, so it 1:00:26.600 --> 1:00:28.480 was like a depot that you would see in the 1:00:28.480 --> 1:00:30.600 game Mercenaries to which is kind of cool. I mean, 1:00:30.600 --> 1:00:35.400 we've seen promotions like that, like the Simpsons, Quickie mark 1:00:35.480 --> 1:00:38.920 type stuff. They had a bunch of a bunch of 1:00:39.120 --> 1:00:42.160 life size column dolls on London Underground for a while. 1:00:42.600 --> 1:00:46.480 That clever stuff. So what's the big deal about converting 1:00:46.480 --> 1:00:50.320 a gas station into a military depot. Well, they had 1:00:50.360 --> 1:00:54.320 this campaign where anyone stopping at the military depot slash 1:00:54.360 --> 1:00:58.880 gas station would get seventy dollars worth of gas for free. 1:01:00.080 --> 1:01:02.360 Keep in mind that the game doesn't cost that much, 1:01:02.920 --> 1:01:05.240 which meant that even if every single person who stopped 1:01:05.280 --> 1:01:08.280 at that gas station then went out and bought a 1:01:08.280 --> 1:01:12.520 copy of Mercenaries, to still at losing money. And they 1:01:13.040 --> 1:01:17.000 ended up screwing up traffic patterns so badly in London 1:01:17.040 --> 1:01:19.240 once people found out they could get free gas at 1:01:19.240 --> 1:01:24.320 this station that it caused a massive traffic snarl and 1:01:24.440 --> 1:01:28.880 even ended up with government censure of e A cost 1:01:28.960 --> 1:01:31.920 him about fifty to convert the gas station into a 1:01:31.920 --> 1:01:36.280 military depot. Seventy bucks of gas per person who stopped. Yeah, 1:01:36.640 --> 1:01:39.400 not the most effective use of your marketing dollars, you 1:01:39.800 --> 1:01:44.080 might argue. And here's the third one. So godfather to 1:01:44.720 --> 1:01:48.600 the game coming out and e A, like many companies, 1:01:48.800 --> 1:01:53.560 tries to court the gaming press by sending out publicity kits. 1:01:53.920 --> 1:01:57.720 They have various little gifts in them. Right horses head, No, 1:01:57.720 --> 1:02:02.080 no horses had no fish. Okay, no, knowly brass knuckles. 1:02:03.120 --> 1:02:06.439 They send out brass, actual brass knuckles, actual breast knuckles, which, 1:02:06.720 --> 1:02:11.400 by the way, not legal and also illegal to send 1:02:11.680 --> 1:02:15.160 by May. So then they had to send a message 1:02:15.200 --> 1:02:17.680 to everyone they had sent a package to saying could 1:02:17.680 --> 1:02:20.959 you please send back those breast knuckles and please don't 1:02:21.440 --> 1:02:26.320 sue us. Three examples of marketing failures on e A's part. Now, 1:02:26.840 --> 1:02:28.880 there are plenty of other examples of e A coming 1:02:28.880 --> 1:02:32.520 out and apologizing or not apologizing for something, like when 1:02:32.520 --> 1:02:35.680 they won the America's Worst Company the second time. There 1:02:35.680 --> 1:02:38.040 was a blog post that essentially said we can do better, 1:02:38.520 --> 1:02:40.520 but a lot of people viewed it as kind of 1:02:40.520 --> 1:02:45.640 a backhanded slap at gamers, and not not like so 1:02:45.720 --> 1:02:49.280 much as owning up to problems, but rather saying, uh, 1:02:49.800 --> 1:02:52.080 you know, people perceive it as this, so we can 1:02:52.160 --> 1:02:58.080 change their perception. So uh and I'm paraphrasing obviously, but 1:02:58.080 --> 1:03:00.440 but nonetheless it no, they've they've they've not always had 1:03:00.440 --> 1:03:02.600 the best attitude about that sort of thing, or at 1:03:02.680 --> 1:03:05.640 least that that seems to be the implication anyway, you know, 1:03:05.680 --> 1:03:08.120 because we're all reading this through our own lens and 1:03:08.160 --> 1:03:09.960 perhaps the way they intended it and the way that 1:03:10.000 --> 1:03:12.880 we're interpreting it are just wildly different. Oh. Absolutely, And 1:03:13.120 --> 1:03:17.360 you know, and it's an understanding, understandably upsetting situation to 1:03:17.440 --> 1:03:19.400 be in UM to to have to be the company's 1:03:19.440 --> 1:03:22.240 representative coming off of something like that. Yeah, there's there's 1:03:22.240 --> 1:03:24.600 ever you know, it's you know that that's the kind 1:03:24.600 --> 1:03:26.040 of thing that if if I had to write that, 1:03:26.120 --> 1:03:28.280 I would draft it like nine and a half times 1:03:28.280 --> 1:03:30.000 and get everyone in the office to read it and 1:03:30.000 --> 1:03:31.960 make sure there was absolutely no way that it could 1:03:32.000 --> 1:03:35.080 be perceived as being negative to the fans that I 1:03:35.080 --> 1:03:38.560 had piste off so much to begin with. Yeah, that's fair. Well, 1:03:38.600 --> 1:03:42.000 and that's our rundown of Electronic Arts, the history of 1:03:42.040 --> 1:03:44.920 the company and what they have managed in the industry, 1:03:44.920 --> 1:03:48.480 how they've been influential, both in good and bad ways. 1:03:49.360 --> 1:03:51.440 I thought it was a really interesting story. It's it's 1:03:51.480 --> 1:03:54.880 kind of fascinating. I'm curious to see where the company 1:03:54.880 --> 1:03:58.040 goes from here. I will be going to the Electronic 1:03:58.200 --> 1:04:02.440 Arts Keynote presentation at E three this year, so UM 1:04:02.480 --> 1:04:04.479 I will give a full report on what I saw 1:04:04.480 --> 1:04:07.200 when I come back. We're already we've already planned that episode. 1:04:07.240 --> 1:04:09.360 So when I come back the day I come back 1:04:09.360 --> 1:04:12.440 from E three, we'll be going into the studio and 1:04:12.560 --> 1:04:15.479 I will be sleep walking my way through talking about 1:04:15.520 --> 1:04:18.080 what I saw the three red Red Eye flight and 1:04:18.120 --> 1:04:21.439 then then podcasting. Yeah. I land at six am, come 1:04:21.480 --> 1:04:25.120 to the office, and I just rock star lifestyle. Yeah. 1:04:26.640 --> 1:04:29.320 Sure does feel good to be a gangster. So guys, 1:04:29.360 --> 1:04:32.920 if you have any suggestions for future episodes of text Stuff, 1:04:33.080 --> 1:04:37.120 I highly recommend you let us know because otherwise we won't. 1:04:37.720 --> 1:04:41.480 So write us our addresses tech stuff at Discovery dot 1:04:41.520 --> 1:04:43.560 com or get in touch with us on Facebook or Twitter. 1:04:43.840 --> 1:04:46.760 Our handle of both those locations is text Stuff H. S. 1:04:47.000 --> 1:04:48.800 W and Lauren and I will talk to you again 1:04:49.240 --> 1:04:58.760 really soon for more on this and thousands of other 1:04:58.840 --> 1:05:10.040 topics because it has to of works dot Com