Yet another blog from the SGC, this time discussing how EA may be leaving their old ways behind and entering a new era of *gasp* good games. These impressions come from Sarow’s own SGC blog. You can have one too, just by swinging by the forums. As always, we’ll be keeping a vigilant eye on the blogs for the cream of the crop, which will end up here. This article required no edits so well done Sarow! And now, let’s check out Sarow’s editorial about EA…

While EA has churned out endless copies of brilliant awful games over the past few years, they seem to be changing their ways. For the first time in many years I have actually found myself interested in several EA games at once. EA has always managed to produce a couple of good games every year (or rather buy the studios making these good games), but they finally they seem to be realising that it is quality that matter, not quantity. To prove this, look at the Medal of Honour series. EA has published 14 Medal of Honour games in the last 8 years. However since the very first one was published, the series has declined in Metacritic score to a low of 56 from the 91 they received for the original game. This is just one example of how the EA has ridden a cash cow series into the ground, while sucking out as much money as humanly possible.

So what’s changed in the last year or so? Has EA finally awoken to that mythical beast called quality assurance, or has John Riccitiello brought a fresh wind to the calm seas that were EA? While the latter will certainly have a played a part in their new behaviour, the formation of Activision Blizzard will definitely have rattled EA cage (trust me I’ve seen it, they keep testers there). Almost overnight they tumbled from their safe position as the world’s biggest games publisher and developer, to number two.

EA are obviously worried and have stepped up their marketing strategies on major new IPs. Big EA titles like Dead Space and Spore have both received unique marketing overhauls. The Spore Creature Creator was released almost two months ago and has turned a vague interest into an obsessive OMGWTFBBQSAUCE-fest over every Spore video released. With over 800,000 registered users on Sporepedia and 2.5 million creatures uploaded, Spore will certainly sell well. With Dead Space they introduced Ben Templesmith’s brilliant graphical skill to a rich and vibrant backstory, to produce the Dead Space animated comics. The comics provide the backstory for Dead Space showing us how Issac (the protagonist) ends up stuck in space with a load of necromorphs (think zombie mutants). These comics caught my interest like Bowser catches Peach (complete with manic laughter), and I have been an avid watcher ever since. For anyone who’s interested in survival horror games, third person shooters or gore, the links are below.

Animated Comic: Issue 1

Animated Comic Issue 2

Animated Comic: Issue 3

Animated Comic: Issue 4

It is also worth mentioning another new IP by EA: Mirror’s Edge which takes free running to the next level as you slide, jump and roll into dangerous world of an information courier. EA plans to release another mini-comic series to accompany Mirror’s Edge a la Dead Space and personally, I can’t wait.

So finally after many years EA seems to be changing. While they still churn out endless Madden and Fifa sequels they seem to have some new IP’s which actually look worth playing. But will this continue or will EA revert back to its usual ‘more games = more money’ strategy?

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