Did you read the thread linked to? Last post, maybe you missed it: In addition, the articles note that EA had approached the other major sports organizations about exclusivity as well. Not sure why some refuse to see this; they stand to benefit the most because they have the most money; they pushed it in the past, they continue to push, and they got their wish.
Still...and NFL, NBA, or baseball game is not a NECESSITY. If they don't work to improve the game, less people will buy it, they lose money. Now that Madden has the ESPN license, they can incorporate some of the extra presentation stuff like this years ESPN game had.
But their incentive to do so is lessened, and there is no price competition. This is basic microeconomics. Less competition = bad for consumers. There is no possible way you can spin exclusivity deals as good for the consumer in this instance; not sure why anybody wants to try.
Um...refuse to see what? That quote says nothing we haven't already been talking about. We all know they'd been pushing for it. Not sure what you're trying to say? Yes, EA has been pushing for exclusivity. NFL didn't do it. Then they did. That's what changed.
Yes. So I shouldn't blame EA for starting this why? Because the NFL went along with it? Yes, they finished it, EA started it. They participated willingly, but EA is obviously the prime instigator here; that is not hard to see from any angle given market power and documented past history. So I shouldn't blame EA for starting this why?
They'd be r****ded to mess with GTA. One of those games alone brings in more money than the last couple of animated movies they put out. If they buy Take 2, it's for the money. Disney didn't put their name on Miramax movies when they owned it. They also didn't mess with it until F 9-11 came out.
Sam, Because the NFL did it. Now, if you want to blame both EA, and the NFL, and we can throw in Gatorade and Nike and Coke and whoever else has made our pro leagues into batches of exclusive contracts, that's a little more reasonable. EA is just following the model with these leagues. EA had been pushing. We all know that. But they didn't get what they wanted, so it really didn't matter. I mean - seriously - do you honestly believe that no other game company hasn't tried this? And then something changed, and the NFL decided to let it happen. All EA's pushing doesn't mean jack if the NFL doesn't make that decision. It didn't mean anything in the previous years of pushing. In fact... If, as many reports seem to believe, it was the recent price war between Sega and EA that helped the NFL to change it's mind. You could actually blame Take Two for making a 20 dollar football game and budget pricing the NFL brand name into the NFL's decision to give an exclusive deal. If you were so inclined.
A lousy analog. Would a sports drink consumer not drink Gatorade because it is not the official drink of the NBA? No; do you go to the grocery store and say "well, I would pick up a sixer of 7-up, but since LeBron endorses sprite, and 7-up only featured a generic basketball player, I will buy Sprite? Doubtful; other preferences will come into play Now, when you buy software, and you're looking for a pro basketball sim, do you say "Hey, I'll take the one with the Houston Buckets, so I can play with Stacy O'Brady, rather than the NBA and NBPA licensed version"? Doubtful. In this instance, an exclusive "endorsement" ; (which isn't even exclusive in this instance, the NBA and all players don't endorse 1 drink and one only; Yao does Gatorade, LeBron does Sprite, etc -- they endorse various shoes, drinks, products) is a completely different animal from an exclusive IP license from the NBA and the NBPA They wanted exclusivity, they got it. Come again? Ever in the history of video games? Of course not. But I highly doubt that cash strapped Sega rolled up to the NFL last year and asked to get an exclusive license. IF you have proof otherwise..... But anyway, what does it matter? Does it make this any less bad for the consumer? No. So what? They stil instigated it. Which reports believe this? Anyway, I will blame them from competing on an equal basis as their competitors? As a consumer, the answer is no. Look, EA has significant market power; they frequently exercise it to the detriment of competition, like they did here, as many firms do. This necessarily hurts the consumer. A rational consumer will not prefer this outcome, which is what I am expressing. Pretty simple and uncontroversial I think.
You're reaching a bit there, Sam. It's an exclusive deal where one product can use the brand name, player, etc. What the deal is doesn't really change. It's nothing new, and I'm only surprised that it took this long. Exclusive movie rights, rights to make a video game based on a movie, rights to make sports uniforms, televion broadcast rights, even rights to name a stadium after your company. Because the product is different doesn't change the fact that it's still an exclusive license. You know what that quote referenced. They may have sought it, but if the NFL didn't allow it they could want till blue in the face. It wouldn't matter. If you're still confused on that point, I don't know how else I can help you. It was stated in the past thread...you know, the thread you were referring to earlier? It's even linked. Funny, too, that you don't need proof that EA used some sort of 'strongarming' or shady business practices to secure/force the license, but you need suddenly need proof to believe that another company, including Take Two/Sega (TAKE TWO, by the way, as mentioned is the publisher of GRAND THEFT AUTO...they might not be as 'cash strapped' as you might think, eh?), would try and get an exclusive license... ...particularly since they are trying right now with the MLB. I agree that I don't necessarily like the exclusivity stuff, and EA is getting much too big, but in this instance to simply say that EA has 'started' all this is inaccurate, imo.
But the nature of the product drastically changes the impact of that license; does Gatorade use Michael Jordan's IP when it formulates it's product? I would hope not. You are confusing a straight up endorsement deal with a licensing agreement. And you are confusing markets too; Stadium naming rights? I can't think of a less apt comparison. You should be surprised it took this long; in the long run it is harmful to both buyers and sellers. And if you don't understand that EA pushed for exclusivity, and they eventually got it, I can't help you. I was referring to the period prior to Take two's involvement when it was just plain old Sega, since you were idly speculating about hypothetical past instances in which you claim other companies started this thing with regard to sports games. EDIT: should add that Sega had no relationship w/Take 2 until May of last year. Of course, I wouldn't be surprised if they put all their eggs in one basket and pay a huge premium to one league (while abandoning the other sports) just to stay afloat. They better hope MLB doesn't put it up for auction, lol. Well, they didn't invent the term or the concept, but they pushed for it in this arena repeatedly, got their wish, now everybody else is following. Not sure what more evidence of causation that you need; this is enough in a court of law.
Well, if they have shown signs of letting controversial material go, then I guess it may be more likely that they would do this deal. I still would wonder how things would work out if they got sued because someone shot their cat after playing GTA. I would imagine their children entertainment would suffer once parents learned that they helped finance a game that corrupts the youth. Of course, I wonder if TT even wants to get bought (as Rokkit mentioned, they are doing OK financially with GTA), and if they do, it would be for a pretty high price tag. I wonder if Disney could find a better time to buy them if this sports deal impacts their game sales. It may also be beneficial to wait until GTA:SA starts to slow down in sales. Could probably backfire though. IMO, if Disney were wanting to buy a developer/publisher, they should probably go after others instead of TT, especially if TT poses any issues that I mentioned earlier. For example, they could either merge or buyout Square-Enix, which is still a profitable company without the baggage. In fact, they are probably pretty close to each other as is. IIRC, the Kingdom Hearts idea got started when someone from each company were in the same building in Japan (I think both companies had an office in the same building). There are also other companies they could probably buy as well that would be easier to swallow, so to speak, that TT. As for the EA/NFL issue, I don't like what both of them did. I kind of wish it bites them both in the butt somehow (perhaps the NFL making less money with this deal than licensing out to multiple people, and maybe EA being stuck with ESPN while the NFL picks someone else in 5 years). I just know this is probably going to suck a little bit for us. I don't want any $60-$70 sports games that could have been better with a little competition, although, admittedly, I don't know how I will be able to tell if it could have been better considering they will have next-gen power to work with. I also hope this "buying out" thing doesn't become a trend and we end up with a just a few huge companies running the business, each unwilling to be creative in order to remain competitive, causing some type of video game market crash.
Wow...you really think this is an unusual thing for the pro sports leagues? The point is the NFL (and all sports leagues) w**** themselves out like there's no tomorrow. Once the videogame market became as big as it now is, it was only a matter of time. Ah, Sam. You've made it clear in the past you don't like EA, whereas I really don't care about them either way but just see it as inaccurate to blame them for everything, so we're just going in circles here. You can try and blame EA solely all you want (the fact that you only offhandedly look toward the League itself is mindboggling), try and perceive an exclusive license deal differently however it suits your needs, and believe that no other video game company has tried or would have tried to do the same thing; I think all those beliefs are false and only exist to help justify your dislike of EA. (Believe me, there are plenty of reasons to not like EA...using the weakest of them isn't necessary.) In reality we're not that far apart in what we're talking about. I, too, don't like the lack of competition. I just believe the writing was on the wall for this a long, long time ago...and EA is just in the position to do something about it And, from a profit and business standpoint, they pretty much did what any other company who had their resources would do. In fact...hmm, 'blame them for everything'....I think I can understand how to make this clearer for you. EA is Steve Francis, you are...hmm, let's see...who's your biggest rival/you accuse of bashing Francis for everything? GATER? That'll do...you're GATER. Maybe now you'll understand how I feel trying to get this point across to you.
Looks like this is now official: I thought that one comment was interesting. As shown by the NFL announcement, it seems as though several people don't like the idea of a sports game with no competition. Although I guess their could be some competition in this deal since the MLB games from 989/Sony can still be released, but I don't think they can compete quite like EA could. Like I said with EA, I don't see how TT could provide creative features, great improvements in gameplay, and acceptable price tags in their games without a little competition. If they can, great, but I think baseball fans would have been better off had their been no license (just like all the other sports fans and their games). Funny thing is that I probably preferred the EA baseball game this past year instead of the TT/Sega baseball game, so I may not have minded EA getting this one (from a gameplay perspective anyways). I just hope that the NBA doesn't budge, or, at worst, gives their license to TT. Don't really care about the NHL license, to be honest. BTW, one interesting idea I read is that maybe Take Two could somehow incorporate sports into a GTA or GTA-esque game. This is probably out the window now if they can get some more licenses, not to mention it would probably not happen anyways, but it would be a pretty cool game. Maybe you could grow up in the "hood" and be part of some gang, but you have to pick between them or your pro career, which can give you a college education, not to mention millions of dollars. Maybe you can be like a Cowboy and get arrested for drugs (ouch! Jab at myself). Maybe you can even go with two sports, like a Deion or a Bo or whoever. Of course, this sounds like it would probably be lacking several elements of a real GTA game, although Take Two could make a sports game darker if they won't have the leagues on their back. Of course, the production costs and development time of that game would probably be huge, along with the price tag, but it would be an interesting way to combat any scenario where they are shut out from the leagues.
Yeah, sort of, although probably on a much smaller scale. In fact, I think the last sentence or two that I wrote was "inspired" from some comments I read from Midway about the game and how they didn't have to worry about the NFL anymore. I'm not sure how far they'll go into off-the-field activities, but if they can get some interesting gameplay in that department, maybe they can show that you don't need the NFL/ESPN license to make a good football game. It will be interesting to see what they do, but I'll probably keep my expectations rather low.
I have big hopes for Midway; if anyone can create something meaningful out of the new 'non-NFL' landscape, I think it's Midway. I used to love the (old) Blitz. Funny that that Blitz died last year because of complaints the NFL was getting that it was too 'violent'. Now they won't have to worry about that. Don't play MLB games, but I keep hearing the EA game was better, so that's unfortunate. Of all the first parties, Sony/989 are the only ones that could probably do something meaningful with it...and that's only if 989 gets its act together.
If they fix the lefty bug glitch, makes the ps2 sims alot faster, and have as kickass of a soundtrack as last year, I will never leave my house.
The old Blitz games were pretty cool, although maybe a bit too arcadey for my tastes. I wouldn't mind an update though, especially if they can capitalize on the situation they are in. I just hope they don't think that alone will sell games. I don't want to see any advertising about how they did things the NFL wouldn't normally let them do and that it is the only game that shows what pro football is like, but in reality, the game itself is really mediocre, at best. I guess we'll have to wait and see...with fingers crossed. I played a lot of MVP Baseball 2004 and loved it. Didn't really get a chance to play the ESPN version, but I heard the EA one was a little better, so I didn't really bother. I was pretty satisfied with the game. I didn't play the 989 baseball game either, but I saw an episode of X Play where they praised the game. Basically, it sounded like 989 really put together a pretty good game, but they did it at a time where the MVP/ESPN games were great. Maybe they are on the right track, but I still doubt they can put up the competition that EA and Sega/TT have been putting up with each other. Plus, I saw a video of the NBA Shootout game for the PSP and it looked pretty bad, IMO. Of course, I'm assuming 989 did that game. Hope I'm not dissing them for a game they didn't make. As for anyone else competing, I can only think of the All-Star Baseball and High Heat Baseball games. I'm trying to rememeber info on those games, but I'm mostly drawing a blank. I want to say Acclaim had ASB, but I'm not sure. If so, I doubt they would be able to make a good baseball game anytime soon, unless someone buys off the devs. I think somebody bought the rights to HHB, but I can't remember who. I think 3DO made it, but I think they had some problems and either went under or sold off the studio. I seem to remember liking that game, so maybe they can revive that series, if one of the big 3 (Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony) were the ones that got it. I'm too lazy to look it up. BTW, Take Two just bought off Visual Concepts and their subsidiaries (IIRC, the developer Kush, who make the NHL and MLB games) from Sega for $24 million. For comparison, TT bought the Microsoft sports studios for around $18 million IIRC, so it seems like a good deal, although it may not matter if they can't get any game to sell except the baseball one. So now I don't have to put Sega/TT anymore. A strange thought that has just entered my mind about the baseball issue is how the 1st party thing is worded. I've read rumors that Capcom is having some financial problems due to bad sales (which seemed accurate given the December sales), which would be perfect for EA to gobble up. If they could finish off Ubisoft and get DICE, they could go ahead and maybe release their own console in a few years if they wanted to. Would that mean they could then use the MLB license, or would they still have to wait until the 7 years is up? Let's just hope that doesn't happen since it is already hard enough having to keep up with the 3 consoles, plus the handheld gaming which may pick up some steam with the DS, PSP, and maybe the next Game Boy if rumors are true. Link
