The Escapist: The Conquest of Origin

[Tannhauser]

For anyone who hasn't read The Escapist, you should try it (I assume the people reading this forum have interest in the subject).

In any case, this issue focuses on Electronic Arts, a company that needs not be explained. While there are a number of good articles, The Conquest of Origin is perhaps the most interesting. A detailed history of the events between Origin and EA, it is an article well worth reading (the entire issue is really).

The article is quite long, so I won't quote it here. However, here are two interesting sections, if you want a glimpse.

Origin was a publisher, which meant manufacturing boxes and stocking them in the retail channel. In that primeval pre-Myst era, computer games shipped not on CD-ROMs but on 3.5-inch, 1.44-megabyte high-density floppy disks. Origin games, in particular, required lots of disks - often eight to ten disks that cost about 70 cents apiece. Cost of goods became such an issue that while Strike Commander was in development, the team jokingly suggested shipping the game pre-installed on its own 20MB hard drive. (Strike shipped on eight floppies in 1993, but CD-ROMs finally became commonplace in time for a later expanded edition.) Wing Commander was a huge, unanticipated success, and the high cost of manufacturing it consumed all the company's ready cash and more.

The forces that propelled Electronic Arts to success and gave it the funds to purchase Origin - the incessant marketing, the quest for blockbusters, even the ferocious executive infighting - also made it difficult to exploit Origin effectively. EA could have preserved Origin as a small design house gestating new ideas. Rather than alienating staffers and discarding the valuable Ultima and Wing Commander brands, EA could have kept Origin alive in body and spirit, just as it could have preserved the other studios it bought: Westwood and Bullfrog and Maxis and...

But though this was technically possible, it was not imaginable. Like any huge company, EA is risk-averse. The company has every incentive to play it safe and do a competent job on Madden 2009 or Tiger Woods 2017.

I find the history of the companies and the descriptions of the culture at both Origin and Electronic Arts quite interesting. I hope others here will find this interesting as well. Of course, opinions are welcome.

 

[The Vault Dweller]

When I first saw the thread title I thought "This is either about the companies or a new game with a weird title."

I can tell by your quotes that this is indeed interesting and follows what many here believe.

I'll read it thanks Kotario.

Sincerely,
The Vault Dweller

 

[Briosafreak]

A few hours after that issue was released i send the link to Rosh, he liked it, of course

Very instructive reading, and a good article, very well written.

 

[Ratty Sr.]

This ia an excellent article anyone with even a passing interest in the game industry should read. The bit about Steve Powers photoshopping the photograph of the UVII team is especially poignant.

 

[SimpleMinded]

Great article, though terribly depressing. It really shows the way the industry is sinking and I especially found this disgusting:

"Electronic Arts plans to release 26 new games [in 2005], all but one of them a sequel, including the 16th version of NHL Hockey, the 11th of the racing game Need for Speed and the 13th of the PGA Tour golf game."

Poor Origin .

I liked how Ultima Online was done almost against the will of EA as well. .