Peter Moore has taken to his blog to allay fears that EA are only focused on making online and F2P games, saying that they are still focused on making offline single-player experiences.
Moore said in his post:
“Today, most games are ‘online’ in some way, shape or form. Many games connect in online multiplayer modes; others include online services which allow for periodic content updates, sharing stats or achievements or connecting with friends; and others are games downloaded through digital delivery methods like Origin or the App Store. The reality is, the internet and social connectivity touches every one of our titles today – and has for several years.
“What that does NOT mean is that every game we ship will require an online connection. Many, if not most, of our games include single-player, offline modes that you can play entirely without an internet connection, if you so choose. We know that’s something many of our players want, and we will continue to deliver it.”
This is promising news, not everybody will like an always online MMO style experience like many games are doing now. Some people still want epic single-player campaigns that they can play by themselves without having to worry about matchmaking or their internet connection. Peter Moore then commented on EA’s F2P plans, as a growing number of people are worried that every game will soon become buried in micro-transactions:
“I also see confusion about our plans for free-to-play games. Many of our most popular franchises for PCs and mobile – including Battlefield, Need for Speed, FIFA, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Plants vs. Zombies and now Madden NFL, to name a few – already offer free-to-play experiences. Command & Conquer is another exciting new free-to-play game coming online later this year.
However, NOT ALL of EA’s games will offer a free-to-play mode. We will continue to explore new free-to-play experiences for our franchises when we believe there is gamer interest and a cool new game we can build. But of course we will continue to deliver award-winning core gaming experiences on ALL of these franchises.”
Free-to-Play games can deliver great value but sometimes people just want to pay $60 and be done with it, without being hassled by $3 here and there just to progress in the game. I think that when F2P games finally hit the consoles in a big way then people will be more accepting of them. For now though they can just seem annoying and needy.
Let me know in the comments what you think about Peter Moore’s comments, I think it was nice of him to write up a blog post to try and explain the companies stance.
