The sale of Electronic Arts has been finalized

11659447091 about 3 hours ago 52 commentsRead Article on bbc.com

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Discussion (52 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

tomkarho•about 2 hours ago

End of an era. Who do we vote as the worst company ever now?

oliwarner•25 minutes ago

I'm not sure they're even the worst games company. Ubisoft would give them a run for their money but that's a $30 DLC over a $70 base price I refused to pay for.

No, EA earn every criticism and this move to PE will do absolutely nothing to improve their business practices.

snowram•about 1 hour ago

EA being voted as the worst company has always been funny to me. The world would be a far better place if it was indeed the case.

vunderba•about 1 hour ago

Well at least as far as gaming companies go, Blizzard always seems willing to throw its hat in the ring.

d3Xt3r•about 1 hour ago

In spite of all the hate, I like that Blizzard's games don't use super nasty DRMs (like Denuvo, which EA, Ubisoft and many others use), all their games work perfectly under Linux (Wine/Proton), and they still host live download links to a game that's nearly three decades old (Diablo 2). Like literally yesterday I set up a new Linux laptop and was about to install Project Diablo 2 under Steam, and was pleasantly surprised to see that the HTTP links to the original D2 and D2 LoD setups were still alive, and the Win 9x-era downloader+installer still works just fine. I mean, how cool is that. And I could even log into battle.net and retrieve my CD keys too. For a 26yr old game.

Aardwolf•about 2 hours ago

I guess it'll keep existing with the name EA? "Public investment fund" doesn't sound too fitting for a game company

gspr•about 1 hour ago

Won't Saudi ownership of something bad make it even worse? The era goes on!

hurfdurf•about 1 hour ago

Grave danger of integer overflow (underflow?).

LocalH•about 2 hours ago

I disagree. They're not gonna give up the brand recognition to rename it. They specifically wanted "Electronic Arts". EA has Battlefield, FIFA, The Sims, and Madden. Those four alone are probably responsible for 90% of the company's revenue.

If anything, now you can say that EA is doubly the worst company, especially in gaming.

krige•about 2 hours ago

EA lost FIFA a few years ago. The games are now "FC". They still sell though.

croes•about 1 hour ago

They didn’t lose FIFA, they let go. FIFA lost EA

LocalH•about 1 hour ago

Shit. I had a feeling I was fucking up on one of those. The other three are still massive franchises, though.

rockskon•about 3 hours ago

What a waste of Saudi money.

bestouff•about 2 hours ago

It's not a financial investment. They're buying influence.

nick486•about 2 hours ago

>They're buying influence.

Buying EA for influence? With the reputation EA has in gaming? They're a joke - they're not influencing anything. Its like buying a violin to fix a flat tire.

gambiting•about 1 hour ago

>>With the reputation EA has in gaming?

Do you think your average EA Sports FC or Battlefield player is even aware of that reputation? These games still sell tens of million of copies. Positive influence in Battlefield alone would be huge.

charcircuit•about 2 hours ago

>They're a joke

They are known for making games that sell to a mass audience and monetizing them well.

It's like calling McDonald's a joke. It doesn't take away that they are a successful business affecting many people in the world.

ReactiveJelly•about 2 hours ago

They make all the sports games. Have you noticed all the sports and Mr. Beast type slop that's like "Wow and here we are inn Dubai / Saudi Arabia whatever and it's beautiful and luxurious and we're driving in Lambos waooowww"

If product placement didn't work it wouldn't be an industry

BLKNSLVR•about 1 hour ago

So we can expect Battlefield: Iran sometime soon?

Starting the propaganda for a ground invasion. I wonder if this one one of the crowd-sourced ideas submitted to the DoD?

sph•about 1 hour ago

What do you mean ‘starting the propagand’? It already was a propaganda vehicle, but it will not be the US behind it this time.

kidfiji•about 1 hour ago

Didn't realize gameswashing was a thing like sportswashing, but here we are

gmerc•about 2 hours ago

This. See Bobby Kotik and the Epstein files.

krige•about 2 hours ago

Because the Saudis leveraged this buyout via a massive loan from JP Morgan, EA's debt is now 10 times higher than it was when it was a publicly traded company: $2.2b to $22b.

Turns out the notion that they wouldn’t need humans to make games and they would use AI for most things was a pipe dream and firing staff to be profitable with the huge loan didn't work.

Now they are fucked.

Every company that spends money to buy up companies died and goes defunct because they keep failing to realize that they have to keep spending loads of money to make money and it doesn’t just roll in after acquiring IPs. Not even mobile slop or live service can save them anymore.

neilfrndes•about 2 hours ago

Bending Spoons seems to be doing fine

krige•about 2 hours ago

I meant in the videogame industry.

whatever1•about 2 hours ago

Fuck this corrupt system.

You want to buy a company? Bring your own fucking money. Why do we have to pay for this shit?

hgomersall•about 1 hour ago

What? This is JP Morgan on the hook for it if the loan goes bad.

tgv•about 1 hour ago

You'll have to pay for it anyway. Games will get more expensive, there'll be more micro-transactions, etc. The investors as well as JP Morgan want their money back.

whatever1•about 1 hour ago

No the taxpayer is. We paid the subprime mortgage bill. We will pay the private equity leverage bill too.

lazide•about 1 hour ago

Too big to fail eh? Do you really think if it blows up, the public won’t get sucked in?

LarsDu88•about 2 hours ago

Does this mean we'll finally get a new Sim City?

Morromist•about 1 hour ago

You'll take Skylines 2 and you'll like it.

jredwards•11 minutes ago

I do like it.

sph•about 1 hour ago

Are you that eager to give your money to the Saudis and Kushner?

There’s a whole world of gaming out there.

johanvts•about 2 hours ago

SimCopter really should have priority IMO.

waste_monk•about 1 hour ago

Don't @ me until they bring back Sid Meier's SimGolf

seattle_spring•about 1 hour ago

Bundled with a revived Streets of SimCity please and thank you

_carbyau_•about 2 hours ago

Between Saudi and right wing influence it seems one publisher will be trying to influence social commentary.

lovich•about 2 hours ago

This is being bought by Affinity Partners, the same Kushner led group that’s trying to buy out FIFA?

Is the Trump family just going to own all of our entertainment and military companies?

BLKNSLVR•about 1 hour ago

> Is the Trump family just going to own all of our entertainment and military companies?

Are we the Bad Guys?

Not any more. Now we're the Worse Guys.

anal_reactor•15 minutes ago

I thought I'd care more, but all EA is releasing nowadays is normie slop anyway, so yeah.