Man, I've been a hardcore Madden guy since 1997, but I was really really impressed with the steps ESPN NFL took this year. In fact, I was downright expecting to be switching over to ESPN next year (I insist on owning only one sim NFL game). This totally sucks. But while this hurts, it's not the end of the world for me. If EA did this with the NBA, however, I would become a rampaging murderer. I've spent a huge, huge amount of my free time on that game, both with friends and without. To have to go back to Live would be absolutely abysmal.
I misspoke earlier, it was NFL2k1 that I was referring to, not NFL2k. It remains one of the most, if not the most critically well received game of its kind. It was a quantum leap forward, and better than anything Maden put out that year. http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/914206.asp?q=NFL 2k Competition has motivated EA in the past, and they were starting to lose ground this year sales wise, to ESPN http://www.ferrago.com/portal/cluster/51913 So they had to stop the bleeding.
wdf man. Madden like any other EA game is mediocre at best...hopefully EA doesn't do that with the NBA....
Actually no, that's okay: it was 2k1 I was thinking of anyway. Like I said, this year was the first time in a while that it had really serious competion. And while it took a dent in sales - the numbers, I believe, were still vastly in Madden's favor. Had ESPN been allowed to stick around things would have got much more interesting. I don't think they necessarily stopped the bleeding as much as took the opposition down before it got to that point. ESPN was going in the right direction.
ESPN still sucks more. That's what they get for having freaking annoying ass popups all over their website. HA!
I'm going to ignore the "it's the same game as 5 years ago" bs that every bring up anytime anyone mentions Madden. Fact is, Sega (well, Take Two) tried to beat Madden, and in the process, slashed the price to appeal to regular people who don't really care about one game or the other. This ate in a bit to Madden's sales, not tremendously, but it may have put a small dent in it. ESPN tried to undercut the big boy and now it's been beaten at it's own game. And about Mutant League Football, it's EA's baby. They created it...they could probably use NFL Street's engine and make a Mutant League Football for PS2/Xbox/GC.
Uh, no. ESPN/Sega/VC's game was making football games, and it was cutting prices due to market forces. If it made an inferior product, or did a bad job marketing, and then stopped making football games due to taking heavy losses - then it would have been beaten at its "own game" EA just leveraged their huge cash reserves to close off the market to other entrants. That's not being beaten at its own game. In fact that's the exact opposite.
EA recently bought the rights to the 'Splinter Cell' series and have decided to change the main character's name to J. Madden ~ I thought that was strange...
I don't know enough about the financial side of things here, but I'm pretty pissed at the NFL as well ... not just EA. I don't know if ESPN's $20 price really took a dent out of Madden or not, but I have to think the NFL didn't like the price coming down (again, I don't know if it affected them directly or not). In the end, consumers get screwed. Price went down on a game that arguably is the same quality or better, and they lock them out.
I don't know the details of the licensing deals and what kind of royalty setups they have, so I can't say whether or not the NFL was hurt any by the lower price point. Anyway, this kind of exclusive dealing arrangement that makes consumers lose out is nothing new with the NFL. The absurd Direct Ticket exclusivity arrangement with DirectTV - which something like 60% or more of the country can't even get under any circumstances is of the same ilk. Why make a fantastic product if you're not going to allow most of the market to see it? Makes no sense. The NBA, CFB, and the rest did the smart thing by allowing their season pass to be available on direct tv and cable. Why can't the NFL? Likewise, the arcane TV broadcast rules (can't ever oppose the home team in the home market, the double header rule, the 72 hour sellout rule) are also seeemingly designed to minimize fan interest in its product. Sometimes I wonder what the F those guys are doing out there. The only reason they are still riding high is by default, IMO, because the other major sports keep shooting themselves in the foot.
What most of you all are missing is this out of the article: Do you expect EA to idly sit by while their biggest franchise is lost due to SEGA/ESPN taking over the exclusive rights to the NFL? They did what they had to do, given what the NFL wanted to do, to keep their franchise going. The rest from other companies is just sour grapes -- it's the NFL everyone should be irritated at, not EA Sports.
Sega had about as much chance of winning that auction as you have of beating Bill Gates on eBay. Regardless of who's more to blame, the bottom line is that we lose.
Agreed. Free market competition is better for the consumer. And having EA with the sole rights to the NFL gives them ZERO incentive in improve it in any meaningful way. I never really liked Madden vs. NCAA football (too damn hard to run the football and I just like college better), but I really don't like it now.
Well, I thought it was weird how all the NFL stuff on ESPN was sponsored by EA sports. And then they had Madden simulations to see who would win the game...I was confused since ESPN also had a football game...guess ESPN had to make its money back someway...
http://sports.ign.com/articles/572/572886p1.html Interesting Midway is making a non-NFL game called Blitzlaymakers and looks beautiful so far The scarier news: I will be REALLY pissed if EA takes my ESPN 2k series away...
That does bring up a good point, though: if the leagues are simply going to put their names/licenses up for auction, EA pretty much had no choice. NFL in particular is their cash cow. They are going to go into such an auction with no hesitation. Not saying they wouldn't have done this if it had been their choice anyway, and of course few others probably had a chance of winning. You wonder, though, if the league knew that already. EA is, like any business, out to make money. If this auction came up like the article says, their decision was already made. And SEGA is no different...had they the resources, do you think they would have turned awaY?
I am highly skeptical that, given their past history, EA is not explicitly or implicitly behind these so-called exclusivity "auctions".
They lobbied for it, sure...but are you going to 'conspiracy theory' way and saying that EA drove up in their unmarked black vans, met in the back alley with the NFL officials, and got the deal done? Maybe they 'took care of' some of their competitors, too. Sorry, just poking a little fun at ya...I'm amazed at some of the ire folks have for video game companies. It's quite interesting to me. But I think the NFL simply went they way they are used to going...with exclusive licenses. And as is the case most often in life, the big dog with the most money had it won... From the article:
Madden 94 for the SNES was the best anyways. You don't need any new ones. On a serious note...last year was the first year ever that video games grossed more revenue than the motion picture industry. The video game market is growing by huge percentages every year and EA is by FAR the leader. I looked at their financials a couple of weeks back and I believe they have been seeing growth of around 20-25% every year for the last few years if I'm not mistaken. Someone can look it up if they want, but I know its HUGE. This will only make them a bigger player in the industry. As far as exclusive contracts, I believe it is completely legal. I'm not sure there is any room for an antitrust. It might create a worse product...but it might also be time to buy some EA stock if it isn't already too high.
