What exactly was EA's reason for not supporting the Dreamcast?

It just dawned on me: EA never really supported the Dreamcast. EA, a company that has supported the most doomed (Read: N-Gage) consoles, never supported one of the major consoles when it was released. Was there any particular reason for it?

 

Hell they supported the gizmondo! I think it was because of low sales on the saturn that they decided not to release on the DC.

 

They didn't want to ruin their relationship with Sony who was just about to release the PS2 (or something like that)

I think they also had some issues during the Saturn-era

 

I remember EA waiting to "see how the DC does" and then perhaps ride the wagon. They were essentialy waiting to see how much of an impact the PS2 will have on the DC, and they (rightfuly) kept away from the platform (from a business stand-point)

 

The thing is that with them staying away from the DC in the first place didn't help when the PS2 came out.

Yakumo

 

I read somewhere that the Prez said if DC sold X million units he'd start making games for it, the went back on his word.

 

If the sims were coming out on the DC (exclusively or not), at that time, along with your usual FIFA etc, good things might have happened for the DC.

In the end though, I think SEGA gave up on the DC really easily the day the old man died.

 

There were a combination of factors that led to EA not supporting the Dreamcast, and low sales of their Saturn games was only one of these. I've heard that Bernie Stolar's criticism of certain EA products for the Saturn was partly to blame, though I don't remember if a specific game of theirs had been rejected as a direct result of his AAA software quality policy. Another reason for their snubbing of the Dreamcast was yet again due to Mr. Stolar's actions, in particular his championing of Visual Concepts' rival sports range for the 128-bit system. Of course, poor sales might have been to blame on the Saturn as well, but to be honest what did the sales department at EA expect from a bunch of rushed ports that were clearly inferior to the PlayStation counterparts? EA seemed to wait a while before releasing anything on the Saturn, although nothing like the patience it appeared to be showing the Dreamcast. When exactly did they expect to start making games for it, anyway? Dreamcast had a good three years before things started going obviously wrong, therefore I conclude EA just didn't give a damn in the first place! One last element that could explain EA's reluctance to commit might have something to do with the MegaDrive era copyright protection argument - we all know people in the gaming industry can hold grudges longer than is really necessary, only to sting their supposed partners later on down the line.

P.S. If you're referring to Isao Okawa as the "old man" then I have to agree that Sega did indeed seem to abandon the Dreamcast rather quickly once he'd been laid to rest - was the idea to keep the console running his alone, or did somebody at the company just feel the time was right to move on after his death? I seem to recall Okawa pumping quite a large amount of his own cash into Sega around the mid-to-late Dreamcast period, yet ironically it wasn't enough for the former giant to remain in the hardware business. I seriously doubt Isao's spirit would approve of what Sega has become today...

 

Hehehe..I can't recall where i remember hearing this, but this was shortly after the death of Isao Okawa, that it was his last wish that sega leave the hardware busness...Obliviously this isn't true...but it was just something i heard awhile back

Ryan

 

Just on a side note: EA didn't support the Gizmondo, they got paid big bucks for programming FIFA. The game was published by Gizmondo Europe.

 

didnt ms have the nearlysame problem with the xbox and the xbox 360 (ok there it was the online service of ms which didnt get ea any money)

 

Maybe market penetration? I know that here in Holland the Dreamcast wasnt sold in any of the major toystore-chains; the place where at that time i bought all my gaming stuff (or; my parents).

 

I remember a SEGA insider saying that EA was the only 3rd partie with stock on the PS2 and therefore they wanted the console to win because profits would be even bigger than working with anybody else's system.

Anyway, I know theres no "loyalty" in this bussines, but EA is what it is today thanks to the SEGA and the Genesis, cuz I seriously doubt they could have pulled the same trick with nintendo and the Snes.

Hell yeah! I remember how when it was as low as $99 it was selling like hotcakes. SEGA could've keep the bussines like that and have a nice run until 2003 or 2004 and then release a Dreamcast2.

In my opinion, the only thing they should've done is release a DC with BBA intead of the 56K modem, use the DC-HL engine to make a port of Counter Strike and bundle all that together.

That's a real killer-apt:nod:

 

Too true !! EA are only where they are now due to the Mega Drive. Everyone of EA's games are worse on the SNES. Not that I liked them anyway on the Mega Drive ! Desert Strike my arse !:dance:

Yakumo

 

Sega got out of the hardware business because they had run out of money and not doing so would have meant going bankrupt. The $99 pricepoint was to clear stock and recover some manufacturing costs , even though it was selling at a loss. Don't forget, piracy was a big problem on the DC and that had a huge impact on games sales. It wouldn't surprise me if EA had an issue with this - you could run copied games on the system without a mod chip or even disc swapping. Comparitively it is a lot harder to run pirate software on the PS2 and Xbox.

The DC came with a modem because broadband was just a twinkle in most ISP's eyes back then (1999). Considering HL runs with serious framerate issues in places and CS was a freeware mod at the time it doesn't sound a realistic option. There was a reason HL was canned last minute and I don't think it was because of the DC's demise - the money had already been spent porting it over. It was a quality issue.

 

The price was $99 before the announcement, after that it went as low as $50.

Look I know in europe piracy is everywhere, I went to spain many times and there all the gamers say the PSX and PS2 won only due to how easy is to run pirated games on it.

But in the states things are different: I dont remember any normal gamer or casual one using pirated DC games back in the day, hell they didnt even know those existed.

And I know broadband wasnt that big as it is today, but again I said that as something they should've come up with in 2001 instead of just giving up...

About HL, those quality issues could be fixed easily, and I doubt they didnt release it for that since the PS2 version looks even worse. The fact is, while development isnt cheap, to launch a game into the market is much more expensive: you got all kind of costs: marketing, ads, promotions, product placement, etc...

CS was already a hit in the PC world at the time, and Valve had some rights on it, so I think a port was an easy thing to do.

 

Half Life didn't come out on the DC due to politics from you know who :nod: The code of DC Half Life that most here have played wasn't fully complete. My versions has a little slowdown but no where near what I've read on the net.

Yakumo

 

The idea of piracy bringing down the Dreamcast is quite possibly the largest proverbial red herring in Sega's whole history, especially in relation to Europe. As somebody who fiercely supported the Dreamcast throughout its short life, I can assure you that here in the UK piracy was limited to a few (mostly French) download sites and not half as "mainstream" - if such a word could ever be used - as the almost professional operations that were churning out £5 copies for the PlayStation outside my local train station (perhaps it's for the better that I don't go into further detail and start disclosing names)...

P.S. I definitely agree that EA has a lot to owe MegaDrive-era Sega, but if those rumours of having shares in Sony are true then I presume the company has long since given in to the arrogant stance it is known for today, rendering the paying of such dues about as likely as Gearbox managing to successfully fix all the problems in its later-to-be-cancelled Dreamcast conversion of Half Life!

 

I though Half Life wasn't released so they could write the whole thing off tax wise. At least that's what I recall reading at the time.

 

EA got far away from the DC, that's the reason why this console have the biggest ratio of good game of everyone console library.