Why EA are a good fit for BioWare.

[YesConsiderably]

With the recent release of Dragon Age II, i have noticed that many fans have laid the blame as much at the feet of EA as they have Mike Laidlaw and BioWare, making such statements as "EA don't care about BioWare's games, they just want the money".

To me, this is an absolutely ridiculous notion, and i will explain why.

Dig out your copy of Mass Effect 2, and you will notice that the EA logo is inside a circle with the ME swooshy thing. Now if you go and look at Dragon Age, it's inside a blood dragon. If you happen to own a Tiger Woods game, you'll see that it's inside a golf ball.

No other publisher puts as much effort into, or is as creative with, their logo on the game box. This really does send a strong message to me -- that EA really care about and respect the developers artistic vision.

The whole point of a logo is to create brand recognition, but EA purposely diminish theirs to make the cover of BioWare's games look better. No other company, in the history of anything, does this. The Mercedes star is the same on my clk cabriolet 500 sport, as it is on an A-class; the Pepsi logo is the same on all variety of the soft-drink.

What EA are doing is literally unprecedented in the business world, and it shows just how much the company respects BioWare's artistic visions.

If anyone is going to publish for BioWare, i'm glad it's Electronic Arts.

 

[TheKruzdawg]

Interesting. I hadn't noticed that before. Well played sir.

 

[Weaver]

So your argument is that EA doesn't try to milk consumers for money because they change their logo on game boxes?

Also, No. EA is not the only company to ever do this. Universal Studios changes their logo at the beginning of movies to fit the motif of the film. Apogee used to do it too, when they were still around.

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

A rushed game, with BW employees admitting things had to be cut to fit the deadline, begs to differ. Give me one good reason Dragon Age 2 only had a development time of a year and a half.
Edit: Really only 14 months. Even worse.

 

[Irridium]

This gave me a good laugh. Thanks for that.

 

[YesConsiderably]

So your argument is that EA doesn't try to milk consumers for money because they change their logo on game boxes?

Also, No. EA is not the only company to ever do this. Universal Studios changes their logo at the beginning of movies to fit the motif of the film. Apogee used to do it too, when they were still around.

Also, yes. The Universal Studios logo is the same on all printed media. Even companies like Activision, that plaster their ugly logo on game boxes without any regard for how it affects the aesthtic aura of a case, have it used in a graphic that fits a game's theme a little better in the opening titles.

On the case of Indiana Jones, the Universal Studios logo is the same as it is on all other films they have been involvedin.

 

[Appleshampoo]

I still prefer EA to Activision though.

If activision had Bioware, we'd be on Modern Dragon age 5 by now.

 

[CM156_v1legacy]

I still prefer EA to Activision though.

If activision had Bioware, we'd be on Modern Dragon age 5 by now.

Modern Guitar Dragon Age 5: Grey Warden Opps

The only thing that really botherd me personally about EA was their whole marketing thing for Dantie's Inferno. I just hated to see my favorite poem done an injustice

 

[Zhukov]

Is this an unusaully clever April fools thing?

 

[CrashBang]

Very interesting. I've always noticed that as well but never thought into it this much. I'm glad you did

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Cash in dev for cash in pub? If capcom was not already branded they(ea/bw) should change their name!

 

[More Fun To Compute]

2:17 pm in the UK. You can only do April fools in the morning.

 

[BENZOOKA]

I'm just waiting for the Tiger Woods' Dragon Tour. Dragon blood on a golf ball? Or they might even come up with something else extraordinarily clever! Absolutely brilliant.

 

[rockyoumonkeys]

So EA publishing Bioware:

Pro: cool EA logos.

Cons: tons of day-one DLC and add-ons to buy or codes to enter.

Evens out, I guess.

 

[MercurySteam]

Yeah just about half my game library is courtesy of EA. I love it how people pin DA2s 'failure' on EA whilst they've been the ones behind all Bioware's great games for the last few years.

Some people...

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

Yeah just about half my game library is courtesy of EA. I love it how people pin DA2s 'failure' on EA whilst they've been the ones behind all Bioware's great games for the last few years.

Some people...

DA:O's dev time: 5+ years
DA2's dev time: 14 months.
Both sides are at fault. And you can't tell me EA had nothing to do with DA2's release date.

 

[MercurySteam]

Yeah just about half my game library is courtesy of EA. I love it how people pin DA2s 'failure' on EA whilst they've been the ones behind all Bioware's great games for the last few years.

Some people...

DA:O's dev time: 5+ years
DA2's dev time: 14 months.
Both sides are at fault. And you can't tell me EA had nothing to do with DA2's release date.

Guess we'll never know. Whether you think DA2 is a good game or not is up to you.