EA: "We blew it."

I'm a few days late with this, but it just came to my attention. IGN is reporting that during the 2008 Dice Summit, current Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello made a speech regarding the future of game development, and the mistakes of EAs past.

How does this relate to Wing Commander? Well, while discussing EAs new plan of organizing the various development teams under the massive EA umbrella, Riccitiello commented on the old business model, which found legendary development studios dissolving after being absorbed by EA.

From IGN:
"At EA we've had our share of failures with the acquisitions of developers. Westwood, Bullfrog, Origin Systems -- these places no longer exist today and are no longer creative forces in the industry," he said. "There was a fundamental belief that we could be one happy family. We had a top-down approach to development. We at EA blew it. I would say I blew it."

Riccitiello hopes to learn from EAs past mistakes with the absorption of development studios by keeping some form of independence throughout the various EA subsidiaries. EAs newest acquisitions, BioWare and Pandemic for example, will retain their identity as separate studios, much like SimCity and The Sims developer Maxis.

It may be too late for Origin, but perhaps their sacrifice has helped to shape the future of EA in a positive way.

IGN's Original Article

Sure, EA; give us (PU) some money and we'll show you creativity Very Happy

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PU (Privateer: Parallel Universe's Home)
WCpedia --The Wing Commander Encyclopedia

Careful, Monk, I hear they are known to swallow souls.

Every time my soul's been swallowed, it's been spat back out Very Happy

_________________
PU (Privateer: Parallel Universe's Home)
WCpedia --The Wing Commander Encyclopedia