Amazon Is Looking To Buy Electronic Arts, Report Says (usatoday.com) 48
An anonymous reader shares a report: According to GLHF sources, Amazon will announce today that it has put in a formal offer to acquire Electronic Arts (EA), the publisher behind Apex Legends, FIFA, Madden, and more. Rumors have been circling online for a few weeks about a potential EA buyout, with Apple, Disney, and Amazon listed as potential buyers. As per our sources, Amazon has finally made an offer. It's a smart business move from Amazon, which is also making big moves in television. After the success of The Witcher and Arcane on Netflix -- both shows built around big video games -- Amazon could potentially use EA's franchises as settings for new shows. Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Dead Space -- there's plenty of potential in EA's library for transmedia opportunities.
Murdering franchises on a totally new level (Score:4, Informative)
If you thought EA was hoovering up studios, milking their IP 'til it's been slaughtered and then throwing the husk away only to buy the next studio and trashing another set of beloved franchises, I guess we're gonna see that at a totally new level now.
Then again, could not have happened to a more deserving company than EA.
Re: Murdering franchises on a totally new level (Score:2)
Re: Murdering franchises on a totally new level (Score:5, Interesting)
In the talks were Amazon, Apple, and Disney.
And EA wasn't do it because they don't make enough money, but because such a merger, that would bring better access to technologies (Amazon and Apple) and or IPs (Disney) from those companies, brings promises profit maximization. Most of which of course will benefit the management.
Re: Murdering franchises on a totally new level (Score:4, Informative)
EA had been looking to consolidate with another mega corporation for some months now.
In the talks were Amazon, Apple, and Disney.
And EA wasn't do it because they don't make enough money, but because such a merger, that would bring better access to technologies (Amazon and Apple) and or IPs (Disney) from those companies, brings promises profit maximization. Most of which of course will benefit the management.
EA have been on the brink of losing their major sports franchises for years now. That's their cash cow. Next years FIFA clone will be the last one as FIFA has withdrawn the franchise. That'll kill EA Sports outside the US, if the NFL decides to do the same, it'll be goodbye EA. Not even the latest Call of Snorefare will make enough money. Hence EA was looking to get someone else to take over and let it all fall apart on their watch whilst the old execs float away with millions.
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That's Activision-Blizzard. EA's equivalent is the Battlefield series.
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That's Activision-Blizzard. EA's equivalent is the Battlefield series.
Thanks.
In my defence I stopped paying any attention to both of them over a decade ago.
I believe all the cool kids are playing Valorant/Overwatch these days.
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I'm still waiting for a sequel to LHX attack chopper!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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I'll see your LHX and raise you older (and slightly better received) Strike Fleet [wikipedia.org]. I have good memories of watching both, back in the day.
Although I see that LHX was developed & published in-house, Strike Fleet was apparently developed by LucasArts and published by EA. IIRC, Strike Fleet fit entirely on a single 360kB floppy for MS DOS and a double sided C=64 diskette. I also didn't realize the main programmer behind LHX went on to make Chuck Yeager's Air Combat [wikipedia.org] one year later.
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Or the exec at Amazon was upset that a beloved franchise hadn't suffered enough; squeeze it dry of all money until it stops twitching!
Episodic Content (Score:3)
This makes sense for Amazon, which needs some sure things to hold down their games library. These sports games that players are basically guaranteed to purchase every year are that, and they are EA's bread and butter [sportbible.com].
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It's not the yearly purchase, it's the dream team gacha.
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Good for Amazon, sure, but bad for everyone else.
We need a real trust-buster like Teddy Roosevelt again.
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Yes, this endless market consolidation is harmful to everyone but the wealthiest people, in every way. And it's actually harmful to them in some ways too, because it leads to bigger crashes, which have problematic real-world effects.
Back to a World of Conglomerates (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Back to a World of Conglomerates (Score:5, Informative)
What other industry is Amazon going to dabble in? They are getting too big for their own good. No one can do everything well. Eventually too much diversification destroys a company if they don't do it themselves by breaking up.
True, but a lot depends how they structure and manage the organization. Assuming you can manage any acquisition the same way you do the storefront will lead to disaster. Realizing they are different but there are areas that can benefit from collaboration and managing appropriately can be very successful. It's all about setting up the right structures and approaches.
Re:Back to a World of Conglomerates (Score:5, Interesting)
So for the moment, Microsoft and Amazon will be two of the world's biggest game developers. With neither company being known for adept management of acquisitions, I wonder how long it'll be until these massive purchases become tax write-offs.
One can hope that this at least this might theoretically provide room in the market for more independent developers to break through.
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Amazon is a great example of a company that does a lot of things that Wall Street doesn't like. If Amazon weren't wildly successful, you'd hear big complaints about how they don't return cash to shareholders.
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> getting too big [to] do everything well...
You don't have to do well when you control the store front: you rig your brands' placement and bundling. MS is also too big to do all its stuff well, but at least the suckage is "integrated", weee!"
Oh God, MS Teams would never fucking make it as a stand-alone product. It's ClownWare. Eventually people figure it out because they have to (it was bundled in "really terrific deal"), but there's so many WTF moments on the way.
lots of laughs (Score:2)
After trying two or three times failing to spin up a game distribution service to attach to prime, they decided it would be easier to just buy one. If this goes through, look forward to playing EAs back catalog on the lumia with an amazon prime sub.
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lol sorry, the luma is just so forgettable.
Meh (Score:2)
Don't make American TV based off video games. You are bad at it. They all suck. Give it to some anime studio. Those people can do video games to TV,
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The Netflix Witcher show (season 1) was really good. Maybe the best season of TV I've ever seen. There's no reason to think that a series like Mass Effect couldn't also be turned into a great TV series of movie franchise.
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ME would make a terrible show. The point of that series is to show that your gaming choices somewhat matter. The main character is bland. (Duh. They can be one of 6 classes and the game has the forever stupid morality bar.)
It should look pretty. But that really it has going for it.
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Well, Halo didn't turn out so good. Neither has Resident Evil, so don't be so sure...
My first thought was... (Score:3)
"Well, at least it can't get any worse." My second thought was, "It can ALWAYS get worse."
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... and so can slashdot, with their parroting of things like calling this a "smart business move" ...
Ultima (Score:2)
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I wonder what Mr Garriott would do with the Ultima series.
How was Tabula Rasa btw?
Makes Sense (Score:1)
Even if Amazon can't drive synergy from picking up EA, the deal will be accretive given EA's much lower P/E. Also, Amazon is supposedly spending $500M/year on gaming without much to show for it. They've had a lot more success buying gaming properties (Twitch) than they've had starting their own (Amazon Game Studios). And don't forget that EA owns some IP that could be used for Amazon's streaming service or as exclusive game IP for Amazon's inevitable VR device.
So... no original content, Amazon? (Score:2)
Yeah, because successful original content is hard.
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Yeah, because successful original content is hard.
Amazon gaming studios tried, and failed (miserably, may I add) to develop original content...
Not every single thing that amazon does is a homerun like retail or cloud (think of ther cell phone with parallax, all hipe, omnishambles, DOA).
Maybe, under a new EA Stewardship, some of the projects languishing inside Amazon Game Studios can be reinvigorated and successfully launched, leading to original content (as we all want).
Also, the Luna game streaming service could get a shot in the arm by having "semi-exclu
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I wasn't referring to game titles at all because they appear to want to make movies based on video games. How often has that been a successful approach?
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So... no original content, Amazon?
Yeah, because successful original content is hard.
I wasn't referring to game titles at all because they appear to want to make movies based on video games. How often has that been a successful approach?
Sorry, my telepathic habilities are not scheduled to manifest until 20 years from now... In the meantime I can only comment based on what I read, not based of what was in the mind of the person writing... ;-) :-P
Good riddance to them if it happens (Score:2)
EA has fucked up enough games and small studios I've liked the last couple decades that I hope Amazon is able to pull this off and lays off EA's entire senior staff. If those people hadnt had guaranteed cash cows like Madden to hold up the company EA's stock holders probably would have let them go a long time ago anyways.
I cant imagine Amazon being any worse and they might turn out to be better.
Not happening (Score:2)
So says David Faber and he's almost always right on these things... https://www.cnbc.com/2022/08/2... [cnbc.com]
A few small corrections to TFS (Score:2)
1.) EA WAS the publisher behind FIFA, but is not anymore.
2.) The Witcher video games were based in a set of short stories and novels. So was the TV series, it was based on the Books, not the video games...
And I hope the best for Amazon in this endeavour. If capitalism has to lead to M&As, I'd rather have mergers like this one that lead to Oligopolies, than M&As that lead to monopolies (say, disney buying Fox, or bethseda acquiring Id and Zenimax, you get my drift)...
PS: Nothing against capitalism. I
EA being EAd (Score:2)
I hope EA does a game that don't go very well, amazon gets pissed off and dissolve the company completely, just to steal the talent in it for their AWS stuff or something.
Wing Commander! (Score:2)
Amazon could potentially use EA's franchises as settings for new shows. Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Dead Space -- there's plenty of potential in EA's library for transmedia opportunities.
Forget those, bring out some of the good old stuff! I wanna see a decent Wing Commander adaptation, not that shit move from the 90s! Do the whole campaign from the first game, get Mark Hamill and Tom Wilson to do the voiceovers as they provide mission context and backstory like they're doing a lecture or something! Do some Privateer tie ins!
The space battles would be epic, and with modern CGI the Kilrathi models would be amazing! Maybe the drummed up support will finally get us a Wing Commander remaster
And just as quickly, people are denying it. (Score:2)
https://massivelyop.com/2022/0... [massivelyop.com]
So, no telling what's going on any more.
Any speculation about an Amazon console? (Score:2)
A budget, subsidized even, console that came bundled with free games could get Amazon to make more inroads with the youngest consumers. Amazon could have EA still make their AAA titles, but now port them to Amazon's devices.
One of the strangest aq's (Score:2)
"Coca Cola Teleommunications" existed in the late 1980s for a very short time before it turned back into Columbia/Tri-Star. For a while before Columbia was "a unit of the Coca Cola Corporation".
That one is a head scratcher for me.
I did not think it was possible (Score:2)
I did not think it was possible to make EA a shittier company. I may be wrong about that.