EA signs exclusive contract with NFL
 

Wow. This is bullshit. This leads to them having the exclusive rights to team and player names.

ESPN will have to create fake teams and fake names next year.

This is especially upsetting knowing ESPN is the superior game.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/sport...ory?id=1945691

woah, that's pretty big news considering how well the NFL games sell.

I guess EA was feeling the heat after that price drop the ESPN games slapped them in the face with earlier the year.

Wow, that is insane, but considering all I play is Madden and all I have is a Cube which doesn't contain the 2k series, it doesn't affect me.

The worst part is, you can forget seeing another price war again. Get ready to fork out $60, at least, for next year's edition.

I don't know. I still think ESPN can get around it by signing individual "stars" and while using different team names and logos still be able to market the game. Quality DOES matter, as does price so I can see something coming out of ESPN that will rival EA.

It's probably going to end up like the baseball games where yeah, one may have the league BUT the other will get the NFL players union, and still be able to use the players names.

But we'll see.

Fuck you EA and the NFL, you money and power hungry whores. I hope you crash and burn.

To EA, I'll never purchase anything published, developed, or financially backed by your monopolist company again. If you ever actually put out a game that's half decent anytime soon instead of shitting out the same rehashed garbage every single year, I'll pirate it.

EDIT: Sign this petition: http://www.petitiononline.com/nfleacon/petition.html

Looks like I wont be playing a football game for a few years.

I agree thats absolute bullshit. I thought ESPN was the better football game, and at 20 bucks a pop you just couldn't pass that up. To me, this sounds like someone is scared and has to be a monopolizing little bitch.

Is it possible to buy the rights to bullshit games? 'Cause that may make things a little harder for EA.

Why the big deal? If people are mad with them, they need to buy one of the non-franchised games, so what if your team has a made up name and none of the players can sell out. Your playing a game, go for gameplay quality, not a name on the screen. Instead of complaining about it, why not get together with a bunch of people, and email or call the companies that produce competing football games and let them know that there is still a market for their *better* product, even if it doesn't have a "official licensing".
If a company does something you don't like, don't buy their product, buy the competition's.

I won't be buying this game. Exclusive rights deals like this give one competitor the edge over another, basically giving them a monopoly in the market. Had EA thought about improving the game play, and lowering prices, this wouldn't have happened, but they are a greedy company.

I just read this, today.

I'm pissed beyond words. Anyone who has given the 2K series half a chance has loved it, myself included. It BLOWS madden out of the water in nearly every way possible. EEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for the petition BTW.

I still say maybe not this year but before the contract ends the players union will cry the owners are making more than the players and break away with a contract all their own.

Baseball has done it.

Ok, hear me out . . .

I've thought about this, and what if, since there are loopholes in the contract about online such and such . . What if SEGA took their 2k6 availible through premium downloadedable content (granted X-Box only probably) Charge 20 bucks and then you download the Entire game to your Box. With people already having modded box's capible of such things does that sound like such an impossibility? Think about it.

The thing that stands out for me is that team names and logos must be generic..

Players can generally be edited and tweaked by the users so that they are "real" (IE NCAA Football rosters, etc.), but the team names and logos are likely unchangeable in game, and thus causes this to really hurt IMO.

While I think the potential to play a non-liscensed, but superb, NFL game would be great, I think it would only succeed if they don't try and market it as a realistic NFL game.. If they (Sega) try to sell future NFL games as if they are realistic, I think they will fail, because it's almost like they are falsely advertising.

It's a very unfortunate situation.. Monopolies are rarely good, and EA made minimal upgrades to it's football game each year, even with competetion from Sega. Now that Sega is out of the picture, they literally can release nothing more than a roster update for $60 and get away with it, because they have the brand recognition required to do so.

There's always the Arena League or Canadian Football.

Don't really know how the college system works but are the college type games affected by this? Could ESPN buy the rights for College games?

A CFL game would rock

I don't think the college game and it's players are as easy to "buy" due to the fact that they are college players, and thus not playing for money.

I'm sure it's much more complicated than that, but I would think it would be a logical step for ESPN to shift to the college game now that their NFL hopes are pretty much shut down.

I don't like this move at all, as it just increases the chances that EA will be releasing nothing more than a roster update from year to year, but I am not going to boycott the game either. If next year's game is good, and improved, I'll likely buy it.

It's a very big deal though, and I read EA spent upwards of $300 million on it. Which is likely a big chunk of change, even for them.

I just preordered madden nfl 2006, for 29.99 at a local eb games. So i dont think the price war is going to be that big of a deal.

Nice price, was it a promotion, or was there some other reasoning for this low price?

Their website has it listed at $49.99 and I'm curious if this price of $29.99 is just in your local area, or instead part of a promotion..?

The article states "NFL 2K5 was available in stores in August for $19.95. For three months, the Madden game was priced at $49.95, until the company finally relented on Nov. 8 and lowered it by $20."

I bought Madden 05 within the first 3 month period, so I paid the full price. I don't know for sure if it is $30 everywhere, but the article insinuates it is.
On a related note, I bought NBA Live 05 (EA Sports) for $30 bucks a few weeks ago from Best Buy, I was surprised it was so cheap.

i did not ask, Scott the store manager is a good friend of mine and knew i like the madden games and tole me about it. So I dropped the 30 bucks down and just have to wait for it to come in.

screw EA.. I REFUSE to buy any of their Football offerings any longer. ESPN had a GREAT game and a great price. EA can blow me.

THANK GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

have you guys played ESPN games? they SUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i will never play another football game that is not an EA sports game.

NCAA Football and Madden is on a totally different level than ESPN games.

espn games are a fucking waste of money...
you get what you pay for.. and ESPN is TRASH.
ask anybody who knows football and who PLAYS football games.. which company makes the better game.


EA SPORTS BABY!!!!!!
It's In the Game.

Any time competetion is removed, it's a bad thing for the consumer IMO.

Regardless if the opposition's game is good or not.

Exactly. I don't care for Madden or ESPN but the above statement is so true.

--jaded

that is such bullshit.. but you know what EA you wont get my 60 bucks, im burning your madden 06 to my HD.

damn i hope ESPN gets exclusive deals with NBA so that EA can stop making that whack ass NBA Live

Have YOU played ESPN? Sounds like you're such a Madden fanboy that you haven't even bothered.

this reminds me of the old NES days with phony players and phony teams
Espn could go with "Toledo Greedy Bastards" or "Hoboken Cheatin' Executives"

You're right, EA's yearly-rehashed-garbage can't touch SEGA's games.

I've played both and like Madden better, but I still think this whole thing is buillshit.

names and logos do matter, the whole experience of the game is being Ray lewis and randy moss and all the bigtime players and doing awesome plays. I think it'd be quite a different experience to be playing as player #54 on the chicago lemonheads

Being a Bears fan I laughed so hard I have saliva on the keyboard. And people are looking at me weird. :thumbsup:

--jaded

EA can go screw themselves, cause I'm not spending a dime on their Madden games. I haven't yet, and I damn sure won't now that they're serving themselves ahead of the consumers. So much for the free market.

I can honestly say I've never bought a Madden football and I sure now I never will. Sure I've played Madden on friends systems, and it wasn't bad. I'm just a cheapo and a die hard Sega fan. I still have NFL2k on my Dreamcast for crying out load.

Anyway, I honestly can't wait to see next years Madden and how people respond to it. I know I won't buy it, but I just want to see if EA is gonna DO anything to improve the game now that they're solo makers for the NFL. Like someone else mentioned I wonder what EA is going to do for Basketball...

I have a feeling most of you guys saying you won't buy Madden anymore will buy it when you are in need of a NFL game with official teams, players, and up to date stats. You are not going to go buy an unofficial game with fake teams and players when Madden is the only NFL game on the market. The temptation would be too strong.

not buying a damn thing. Going to blockbuster rent madden '05...burn it to my HD..return it back to blockbuster. i dont play football on xbl that much so i wont be missing anything. and with all the characters i create in my franchise mode i dont care what the names of the teams are, as long as they play like they are supposed to play.

I don't play a lot of football on my console but when I do I'm to fire up this years ESPN. Plenty of people online make up to date saves of players names and teams each season. I don't see why I can't download that off the web. *shrugs* I'm more of a college football gamer anyway. :)

EA is planning on dominating the world soon. They are going to purchase 20% of UbiSoft as well. Ubi is one of my favirote gaming companies, hopefully EA will stop at that because I don't want the quality of Ubi's games to diminish.

http://cube.ign.com/articles/574/574483p1.html

You're right about that, but eventually the gameplay will be out-dated.

i have PURCHASED both ESPN Football 2k4 and 2k5.

TRASH i tell ya!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

fucking waste of money!!! i should've learned my lesson when i bought 2k4.

2k5 is trash also...


--------------------------

EA is a very good company. they business practices might not appeal to everyone but they make great games.

Maxis is also apart of EA, and they make great games also (Sims, Simcity)

Ok this really burns me... EA is a good company, I have bought previous Maddens and other EA games and they are very good quality. Why would they have to start a monopoly war on exclusive licenses, I hope ESPN gets basketball so it becomes a little more fair.

I will tell you this I will not buy a 59.99 football (or any other game) If it was 29.99 or 19.99 I would buy it but sure as hell wouldn't pay that much for it.

EA can go *&@K itself

Actually the fanboy sounds like an EA employee... is your signature the company line friend?

EA buys 20% of Ubisoft
 

http://money.cnn.com/2004/12/20/tech...reut/index.htm

Didn't want to make a thread since this kinda deals with EA's "Monopoly" on gaming.

Heard about the shares purchase from my coworkers. This blows, since EA's attitude towards their employees, as detailed in EA spouse and Joe Straitiff's livejournals, is less than exemplary. Ubisoft was getting that way, but changed their attitude, from what I was told. If EA acquires Ubisoft, I hope that Ubisoft's employee reform at least stays around.

ok Madden definetly blows away ESPN 2k5 i have them both and trust me ESPN is just horrible

I in the Madden camp... love em. But now they can do whatever they want. 2005 will be the last game I buy from the EA NFL series. I'll get NCAA next year.

I hoped that ESPN's competition would drive EA to make a bigger, better Madden game--Not make minor improvements to each year's edition. Silly me. Just shut down the market.

Madden 2006's Slogan? "It's in the *only* game."

Besides, I'm set as long as ESPN/Sega keeps up the quality of their NHL games. :)

ugh, i just deleted a really interesting news article from my inbox.

basically what it said was this:

EA's plans for exclusive rights isn't limited to the NFL. Apparently, EA approached and was declined by the NBA for exclusive rights to their players. The reason the NBA gave was that they didn't think EA's NBA live was good enough and that an exclusivity deal would cause them to loose mone. Another company already signed a deal for licensing with the MLB. It's not exclusive by any means but the fact that another company has this deal means EA can't get exclusive rights to the

Nevertheless, EA tried to get exclusive rights to NBA players, and whether or not they failed makes me lose respect for the company. Furthermore, the Ubisoft situation and the class action lawsuit against EA for overtime comp and what not doesn't help either. Not to mention that they've been lacking in creativity for some while....

I read something about this too, it was something about some company getting a deal to make three games with the MLB name

EA did try to get an exclusive contract for the NBA and there first offer was rejected. However, who knows they might try again. If EA does get the deal I really want to know how much they spend, because unlike the NFL several companies make NBA sim and arcade games(Midway, Acclaim, 989 Sports, SCEA, Konami, Sega, MS, etc.). That's a lot of money to make up for in my book.

I think they are dropping the Madden name as well...

Ea buying the right to eliminate competition is the wrong thing to do. This is coming from a fan of the madden series. Personally i liked ESPN's game even though i liked Madden better. ESPN games were onthe rise Visually, Gameplay wise, and presentation. The 20$ price tag was not hurting either and forcing EA to lower their price. I dont know about you guys, but i rather pay less for games rathar than more which is what is looking like is going to happen.

This has really upset me. I was a fan of both games, despite the fact I was more used to playing the madden games. I just can't believe they would go out and sideswipe the other companies like this, especially the sega/espn games, rather than focusing on making improvements to outshine them. I have no idea about the law for this sort of thing, but I would almost think there would be some basis for the makers of the ESPN game to sue the NFL over this. While the NFL should have the right to negotiate contracts however they want, there was probably a reasonable expectation that they would be allowed to renew a contract with the NFL for future years. The developmental costs put into the ESPN games are probably pretty ginormous, and the money is given to that with the reasonable expectation to be able to publish the game as a NFL game. Now the NFL by signing exclusively with another company out of the blue has caused much of that money to be wasted, hence maybe a chance for a lawsuit?!?

Competition in these games is very important to prevent stagnation. Also there should be an expectation by a company that the money they've been investing since the beginning of the series would be applicable to future releases as well, rather than having the rug torn out from them.

Aaagh, I'm still too frustrated by this to maintain coherence, so I'll stop now.

And you know what's funny? Even with all the competition, each reiteration of Madden each year seemed little more than just a roster update. God knows what's going to happen now that they have no competition....

Good job NBA for rejecting EA's exclusive deal. Now only if the NFL weren't such fucking idiots.

Hey, cool, they've got the NCAA rights now, too. To me, this really eliminates any competition at all for the next 6 years. I don't think another company could realistically compete with fictional names and teams.

http://money.cnn.com/2005/04/11/tech...ltech/ea_ncaa/

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!!!

now i am completely irate. i don't even know what else to say...

Ditto, you just can't replace a strong name like Urlacher :P