MWEB GameZone writer, Delyth Angharad, takes a look at the cost of making money to game quality. She focuses on Electronic Arts and Activision as the two worst culprits in the video games industry.
Today Electronic Arts CEO Andrew Wilson provided a look into his ideas for the use of generative AI in the company's development processes.
EA is still a shady shitty company even with or without the help of Skynet. All they will use AI for is new ways to milk loot boxes and come up with the same sports title with a different year on the label. They are one company I truly do hate with a passion. They single handedly ruined some great franchise with their death touch. ME, Dead Space, Alice Returns, Dante's Inferno.
EA layoffs followed by 'Generative AI to Drive Monetization'
I knew it. Wonder what AI salary looks like? Nothing.
And take away creativity, and people's jobs as we've been seeing. Got it.
No thanks. I want my games created by people, not AI.
EA doesn't want to lose their title of worst gaming company ever, always trying their best to remain the champs!
What's sad is that they have so much potential to be a decent publisher.
SSX Tricky / SSX 3
Def Jam Vendetta / Fight for New York
NBA Street
NFL Steet
Mirror's Edge
Bad Company
Burnout 3 / 4 / 5
Remember when EA used to be awesome? It's all over with now. Unpolished, if not out-right broken games these days. Endless monetization and gambling in their sports games, and let's not forget wasting hours of your life trying to unlock characters or equipment using "surprise boxes!"
Gareth, Justin, and JoeyZ look at Layoff news for EA and Sony and reasons behind the downturn in the industry and more.
EA CEO Andrew Wilson writes: "In this time of change, we expect these decisions to impact approximately 5 percent of our workforce. I understand this will create uncertainty and be challenging for many who have worked with such dedication and passion and have made important contributions to our company. While not every team will be impacted, this is the hardest part of these changes, and we have deeply considered every option to try and limit impacts to our teams. Our primary goal is to provide team members with opportunities to find new roles and paths to transition onto other projects. Where that’s not possible, we will support and work with each colleague with the utmost attention, care, and respect. Communicating these impacts has already begun and will be largely completed by early next quarter."
All the big ones doing the same stuff. Terrible. I just hope that all these people are able to get a new job as soon as possible, God know that it is horrible to be left jobless when you have your kids or your parents depending on your financial help
The point I feel is problematic about all of this is that focusing on Owned Ip means more sequels, remasters and more of what was selling last year.
Great read and I agree with Del. Over the past few years we've seen a steady decline in game quality, it's all become so generic and mass friendly - money focused. Companies that used to make games that you wanted to play over and over don't anymore.
I also think that this is the reason why we have seen so many famous names in the Industry leave triple A to form Indie Studios. Unless the big studios wisen up I also predict that Indie will be where it's at.
Nicely put together article, but at the end of the day, the thing that will sway these guys is who is putting down money for the product.
CCP Games went through something like this with their Incarna expansion for EVE Online - it sucked, people stopped subbing , management paid attention, heads rolled, the company changed its direction, they are in a better place now overall. It can happen, but the scale is larger with EA and Actiblizz, so numerically, something drastic has to happen.
Hardcore gamers would blame casual gamers for the "money-driven" decline in quality.
EA did publish Mass Effect. I think that it comes down to how much crap a developer is willing to take. Some companies crumble quicker than a stale cookie, others are stronger :)