Electronic Arts Acquires BioWare, Pandemic
 

Imagine the BioWare team working on Sims 3...

Jesus Christ.

I loathe EA, but I love Bioware. This is indeed a sad day. Here's to hoping EA only provides money to Bioware and Pandemic Studios and doesn't tank them.

Or hopefully they can buy themselves or be spun-off like Bungie recently was.

Shitty news and agreed Prophecy.

I still have to give some credit to EA for skate. It's a good game. I really, really hope they don't run BioWare into the ground.

By the end of the generation we will have Activision and Electornic Arts. Each with sub-divisions of the companies they've acquired.

I'm personally ready for Mass Effect 1, 2, 3, 3: 2nd edition, 4, 5, 5:reloaded, 6, 6: first strike, 6: 2nd war, 6: war is hell, and 7

And creativity and innovation die another death in the name of corpratization and generic mass production. EA will rape and bastardize every good idea that ever came from these two studios, and leave us with the messy leftovers packaged in a bright, shiny box. And for some unintelligable reason, we all will shell out our hard earned cash and thank EA for the opportunity to do so.

how to sell out in 2008

start game company, make a good game, watch EA and Activision buy you out.

EA got a new CEO earlier this year and he seem to agree about the lack of originality of current games. I don't know what he's doing to change that, but hopefully he's trying. I can imagine two Scenarios. One, We See Mass Effect 14 before 2010. The other we see Bioware's next game has a larger budget and fewer bugs without losing MUCH of it's fun factor.. I'm hoping for the latter.

Who are you referring to selling out?
If it's Bioware or Pandemic they had no say so in this acquisition.


Anyway, back to the OP, after looking at what EA has done to Westwood Studios, Bullfrog, DICE, Origin Systems and their own line of sports games - I am honestly concerned about the future of these two studios.

I can only think of two studios off hand that EA has bought and not seriously hurt, Mythic and Criterion Games. However, I think Mythic has yet to release a game under EA, with Warhammer Online being their first(Anyone know for sure?).

One other thing I'm curious about is how employees will be treated, thanks to the wonders of the interweb, EA has been documented as one of the worst companies in video games to work for while Bioware is considered one of the best. Polar opposites in how they see working on video games.

Ah, well in closing to my rant let's hope France keeps EA's dirty paws off of Ubisoft or we might be seeing EA Bioware, EA Pandemic and EA Ubisoft.

Edit: Interesting article on the purchase.
EA Buys BioWare: Insider Views

Actually.. After EA Purchased Criterion Games, They released Burnout 3, Burnout Revenge, Burnout Dominator, and they're working on Burnout Paradise.. :)

Mythic has yet to release a game with EA.

This is pretty depressing indeed. I suppose if hell did break lose, the Bioware employees could always run away and start they're own new company?

Am I being too naive and hopeful?

They could, but sadly look at the IPs they'd leave in the hands of EA.