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Dont hate Bioware, Hate EA

2

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  • WarmakerWarmaker Member UncommonPosts: 2,246

    The BioWare that *I know*, the BioWare from 1997 until very early 2000s was among the best dev houses out there.

    The BioWare that exists now?  No.  Nowhere near their earlier years.  Sure, the founders are there, but they've lost it, most esp. in recent years.  Their name still has pull, but their games.

    Doesn't it concern you when gamers beg "I hope Bethesda doesn't do a BioWare"?

    "I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)

  • ShadanwolfShadanwolf Member UncommonPosts: 2,392

    OP..no reason to waste your energy "hateing".Strongest message you can send is not giving company's your money.Companys listen to money....or go out of business.The problem is most company decision makers don't know how, or don't care to listen to those who pay their bills.By the time customers start heading for the exits..the  product their selling(the game) has already had its fate determined.

  • Kaijin2k3Kaijin2k3 Member Posts: 558

    OP please read this interview: Eurogamer Interview: The Doctors Talk BioWare Quality & EA Control

    IIRC, in every interview the founding doctors have been quite happy about EA buying them. I understand your point that from the moment EA bought BioWare, the old BioWare ceased to exist and is now just EA. But I also feel that negative feelings towards BioWare (and not specifically EA) are quite valid seeing as this is what they wanted.

  • WarmakerWarmaker Member UncommonPosts: 2,246

    Originally posted by Kaijin2k3

    OP please read this interview: Eurogamer Interview: The Doctors Talk BioWare Quality & EA Control

    IIRC, in every interview the founding doctors have been quite happy about EA buying them. I understand your point that from the moment EA bought BioWare, the old BioWare ceased to exist and is now just EA. But I also feel that negative feelings towards BioWare (and not specifically EA) are quite valid seeing as this is what they wanted.

    Heheh, this makes it even better.  So all the things people have been complaining about BioWare's titles were executed by BioWare themselves and not the Big Bad Evil EA.  Dragon Age 2, SWTOR, etc.  All by the hands of BioWare.

    Nice.

    "I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)

  • djmtottdjmtott Member Posts: 177

    Originally posted by GroovyFlower

    In other words Bioware are such weak minded minions that EA dictate and Bioware obey like a slave?

    They can say NO and EA can't do anything about it. Unless Bioware was so stupid to handover the whole leadership and Bioware are just puppet now in the hands of EA, its Bioware's own fault not EA.

    EA bought Bioware. If I'm the EA boss and you're the Bioware employee and you tell me 'no', I fire you and replace you with someone else.

    They didn't enter into a partnership or some shared power structure. Bioware now is just a division of EA. EA bought Bioware, end of story.

  • ZefireZefire Member Posts: 676

    Originally posted by djmtott

    Originally posted by GroovyFlower

    In other words Bioware are such weak minded minions that EA dictate and Bioware obey like a slave?

    They can say NO and EA can't do anything about it. Unless Bioware was so stupid to handover the whole leadership and Bioware are just puppet now in the hands of EA, its Bioware's own fault not EA.

    EA bought Bioware. If I'm the EA boss and you're the Bioware employee and you tell me 'no', I fire you and replace you with someone else.

    They didn't enter into a partnership or some shared power structure. Bioware now is just a division of EA. EA bought Bioware, end of story.

    We know that.Besides who cares about ea now?Diablo 3 is coming

  • djmtottdjmtott Member Posts: 177

    Originally posted by Zefire

    Originally posted by djmtott

    Originally posted by GroovyFlower

    In other words Bioware are such weak minded minions that EA dictate and Bioware obey like a slave?

    They can say NO and EA can't do anything about it. Unless Bioware was so stupid to handover the whole leadership and Bioware are just puppet now in the hands of EA, its Bioware's own fault not EA.

    EA bought Bioware. If I'm the EA boss and you're the Bioware employee and you tell me 'no', I fire you and replace you with someone else.

    They didn't enter into a partnership or some shared power structure. Bioware now is just a division of EA. EA bought Bioware, end of story.

    We know that.Besides who cares about ea now?Diablo 3 is coming

    Obviously some people do not understand if they think Bioware "can say NO and EA can't do anything about it".

  • KertKert Member UncommonPosts: 71

    As I saw ages ago somewhere (probably here) the company is now called... BEAware.... and don't buy their games.

    I honestly don't care who's fault it is. EA has a history of negativity I think they've become the easy scape goat. But as the OP has pointed out, and I agree... they're the same company now, everyone of them is to blame.

  • OberanMiMOberanMiM Member Posts: 236

    This thread would be more accurately titled.

     

    "Don't hate the EA/BioWare Employee's who are just following instructions from their bosses at  EA"

     

    The sad truth is everyone has a price, And when those in control find their price, its the little guys who suffer.

  • ArtaiosArtaios Member UncommonPosts: 550

    no.
    BW made DA and MA.
    nuff said...

  • NasherUKNasherUK Member UncommonPosts: 480

    Originally posted by Zefire

    Originally posted by djmtott


    Originally posted by GroovyFlower

    In other words Bioware are such weak minded minions that EA dictate and Bioware obey like a slave?

    They can say NO and EA can't do anything about it. Unless Bioware was so stupid to handover the whole leadership and Bioware are just puppet now in the hands of EA, its Bioware's own fault not EA.

    EA bought Bioware. If I'm the EA boss and you're the Bioware employee and you tell me 'no', I fire you and replace you with someone else.

    They didn't enter into a partnership or some shared power structure. Bioware now is just a division of EA. EA bought Bioware, end of story.

    We know that.Besides who cares about ea now?Diablo 3 is coming

    Hate to break it to you, but Diablo 3 is basically just Diablo 2 with modern graphics.  They even gave it away for "free" with a wow subscription along with access to the beta.  It's really nothing that amazing or innovative (much like starcraft 2).

  • This thread make me sick

    First of all. Bioware founder choose to sell themself on the stockmarket  and EA was the buyer. So when everyhing is coming down, then its Bioware itself and its founder there wanted the solution.

     

    Second: There is nothing wrong that the founders want to sell there company they buildt themself  for $860 million dollars. EA probably made a neat deal. They have now access to there personal staff, there license and one less competitor to worried about.

     

    Third: If you dislike Bioware quality games, then dont buy them. Nobody is forcing you to buy there games.

  • UhwopUhwop Member UncommonPosts: 1,791

    Originally posted by stragen001

    Originally posted by dthmn

    Originally posted by stragen001

     

    You are wrong in every way possible. 

    EA is definitally no better, perhaps up to par with how crappy Activision is.

    But to state that it's EA's fault for BioWare having terrible games? That's just BS.

    BioWare never made any good games, and don't use friggin KOTOR to defend that, because that game wasn't all that great either. 

    BioWare was decent at best with games, then slowly progessed to become a hell of alot worse which is where they are now.

    It's not EA's fault, it IS BIoWare's fault for not knowing how to make a proper game.  Companies like iD show the same thing with Rage. How a game like Wolfenstein and DOOM can be the best of games back then, and they turn things into terrible games like RAGE and DOOM 3. 

    EA is nothing but the publisher and has barely any influence over BioWare, get that through your thick BioDrone skull and realize the truth.

    So you are saying that Baldurs Gate series, Planescape Torment, MDK, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, the KOTOR series and ME1 were rubbish?

    I think the majority of people would disagree wtih you on that....

    Also, EA IS Bioware. There is no such thing as Bioware anymore. 

     Bioware tends to have good inital outings with thier games.  It's the follow-ups they have a habbit of dropping the ball on.

    When they do manage to create a sequal that isn't a bust, it's usually because the sequal didn't stray from the original formula; not making any big changes to the gameplay, and usually just pushing the same story along.

    Baldurs gate 2 was exactly the same game as the first, with just a couple of rather minor changes.  I don't know if they had anything to do with the console BG, but that game was pretty crappy.

    Also, planescape was developed by Black Isle studios, which was a division of interplay (atari),   Black isle are the guys that made the original Fallout. 

    Bioware didn't make KOTOR 2, again, that was black isle.

    Guess what else bioware didn't make?  MDK.  They did the sequel, not the original MDK.  Neither MDK, nor the bioware developed MDK2 were that good.

    Jade Empire, while not bad, wasn't exactly a blockbuster either.

    NWN wasn't good becaue it was a good game, it was good because of the modding and online play.  The campaign itself actually kind of sucked, and didn't really look very good.  (They had to rush the release of the game; so they skimped on some of the art and layout.)

    Really don't understand were everyone got this idea that Bioware makes nothing but great games.  They don't, they never have, and thier track record more then shows that.  They've made like 4 games! (Yes, I know, it's not really only 4 games.)  Two of which use rulesets and a setting that's been around since the 70's, D&D.  Then they made ME1, I'll agree, it was a pretty good game, and DA1; which also wasn't bad.  I never played KOTOR, but I'll take everyones word that it was good.

    I won't even get into a rant about how every time I play a bioware game it feels like I'm playing the last bioware game I played since ME1.  Even when the game mechanics aren't the same, they still feel the same.

    Am I really the only person that's noticed that bioware has been rehashing the same gameplay experience over and over for the last decade?  The only thing that ever changes is the setting, and alternating gameplay between 3rd person shooter and hotbar/ diceroll combat, aside from that it's all been running around talking to NPC"s and selecting diffierent responses.

    I'm not suprised ToR isn't living up to it's hype.  It looks like a reskined, online version of Dragon Age, using the exact same gameplay as every other Bioware game made in, well, ever.

  • iceman00iceman00 Member Posts: 1,363

    Originally posted by stragen001

    Recently I have seen a lot of posts, and even news stories on this site being very critical of Bioware, and how they failed to build a proper MMO with SWTOR, screwed up the ending of ME3, and just plain got it wrong with DA2.

    You will notice however that ALL of these games have been released since the excellent and well thought of indi studio Bioware got subsumed into the giant clusterf*ck that is EA.

    Bioware WAS an amazing company and produced some, if not all of my favorite ever games. Everyone remembers and loves games like the Baldurs Gate series, Planescape Torment, MDK, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, the KOTOR series and ME1

    During the time these games were made, Bioware was an independant studio and had full creative and development control of all its titles, and as we can see from the successes above, this was a good thing, that lead to good games.

    When Bioware was bought by EA in 2007 is when everything started going downhill. Now, I dont know how much influence EA had, if any, on DA:O because I believe that it was already well under way, and this and ME2 may be the only exceptions to the rule here being that they were good games, produced after EA bought Bioware. However it is my opinion that this is because EA were pretty much leaving Bioware to their own devices at that point

    However, Every game since will have been highly influenced by EA and it shows. And they have been poor compared to what we were used to when Bioware had full control. 

    Nowadays, Bioware is just a brand of EA. Nothing more. Its just the name. Id imagine a large portion of the management and devs from the independant Bioware of old have moved on and now everything is done EA's way of get it out quick and hype it to hell so that by the time people realise the game is rubbish, we already have their money. Bioware is in fact now an amalgamation of Bioware, Mythic, and EA, and all of Bioware's core values have been lost :(

    TL;DR - Its all EA's Fault, there is no Bioware anymore. 

    In the end, the Bioware boys agreed to being assimilated into the Borg.  They knew EA's reputation.  Take a company, milk the s**t out of it, then leave it bleeding on the side of the road with sub-quality games.  They wanted the Bioware brand, nothing more.  heck, look at their statement that EA wants all future games to be like ME3:  cross-platforming smart phones and tablet apps to add content to the pc/console version of the game.

    The company that was Bioware died with DA:O.  What has existed since has really been a weak company.  even when they start getting a lot of things right (ME3), they screw it up so bad you don't even want to play the previous excellent games, because it reminds you how the story ends.

  • Chrome1980Chrome1980 Member Posts: 511

    Don't hate BW, don't hate EA. Hate is a strong word and i find it amazing that people actually hate video game companies. I hate politicians and those blood suckers in banks and wall streets...the people who actually deserve hate.

  • BoatsmateBoatsmate Member Posts: 208

    image I couldn't agree with you more. I have nothing but good memories of games like Baulders gate. But that Bioware  you see listed on games now isn't anymore what once was that company, anymore than those zombies on "Walking Dead" are the live humans they used to be. Bioware has been taken by the,"Umbrella Corporation", EA. What a pity.

    Ballerinas are always on their toes. Why don't they just get taller ballerinas?

  • iceman00iceman00 Member Posts: 1,363

    Originally posted by Warmaker

    Originally posted by Kaijin2k3

    OP please read this interview: Eurogamer Interview: The Doctors Talk BioWare Quality & EA Control

    IIRC, in every interview the founding doctors have been quite happy about EA buying them. I understand your point that from the moment EA bought BioWare, the old BioWare ceased to exist and is now just EA. But I also feel that negative feelings towards BioWare (and not specifically EA) are quite valid seeing as this is what they wanted.

    Heheh, this makes it even better.  So all the things people have been complaining about BioWare's titles were executed by BioWare themselves and not the Big Bad Evil EA.  Dragon Age 2, SWTOR, etc.  All by the hands of BioWare.

    Nice.

    EA had just as much to do with it.  Why?  Because they provided the money, and had a lot of influence as to how they wanted the game.

    Though TOR was just Bioware being WAAAAYYYY out of their league.  A crap WoW clone is still a crap WoW clone, even if you spend over 250 million.  The storylines weren't compelling enough to be a single player RPG, and the game certainly wasn't an MMO.  This was their attempt at being a "hybrid", and no doubt EA was thrilled with the idea of "streamlining" everything.

  • ElikalElikal Member UncommonPosts: 7,912

    Who is the greater fool, the fool or the one who follows the fool?

    I tend to agree however. I have seen enough companies' great running game series ran into the ground after EA bought them. It is clearly a pattern here. Ultima VIII and IX. *cough*

    People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert

  • Clarissa63Clarissa63 Member Posts: 7

    However, Every game since will have been highly influenced by EA and it shows. And they have been poor compared to what we were used to when Bioware had full control.

  • NeoZcar2NeoZcar2 Member Posts: 136

    Do people still not understand that Bioware has absolutely nothing to do with SW:TOR? Bioware only exsists in one studio up in Canada. EA built a studio in austin, named it Bioware Austin because EA owns Biowares name legally, and staffed the studio with former Mythic and current EA employees.  Bioware is jsut a name they put on the box to get better sales because the name EA means absolutely nothing anymore. Afterall Forbes ranked them as the worst company in North America.

  • DarkVagabondDarkVagabond Member UncommonPosts: 340

  • PyrateLVPyrateLV Member CommonPosts: 1,096

    Why does no one include Lucas Arts in this SWTOR fiasco?

    You know damned well they have influence in what goes on with this game.

    Tried: EQ2 - AC - EU - HZ - TR - MxO - TTO - WURM - SL - VG:SoH - PotBS - PS - AoC - WAR - DDO - SWTOR
    Played: UO - EQ1 - AO - DAoC - NC - CoH/CoV - SWG - WoW - EVE - AA - LotRO - DFO - STO - FE - MO - RIFT
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    ITS TOO HARD! - Matt Firor (ZeniMax)

  • WarmakerWarmaker Member UncommonPosts: 2,246

    Originally posted by PyrateLV

    Why does no one include Lucas Arts in this SWTOR fiasco?

    You know damned well they have influence in what goes on with this game.

    The thread hadn't been really centered on SWTOR yet, just a few mentions.  For that game, I put the blame on all 3 parties:  BioWare, EA, and Lucasarts.  Nobody gets off scot free to me with TOR.  But BioWare are the ones the pull the trigger and implemented the game as it is.  What about all the statements BioWare made in previews of TOR on exactly what the game design was going to be like?  I've complained many times about how they made it clear themselves how they were afraid to stray out of Blizzard's "WoW Shadow."

    That's not EA or Lucasarts talking on those interviews.  That was BioWare's own words justifying exactly what they intended to do.

    Remember the uproar when there was no space game available when fans asked?

    Remember the even larger uproar when the half-a**ed rail-shooter space game was finally unveiled and why they did it?


    Originally posted by Elikal

    Who is the greater fool, the fool or the one who follows the fool?

    I tend to agree however. I have seen enough companies' great running game series ran into the ground after EA bought them. It is clearly a pattern here. Ultima VIII and IX. *cough*

    Elikal, they're both still fools regardless! image

    "I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)

  • RoqocoRoqoco Member Posts: 22

    Maybe it's just that when companies get so large they lose their creative edge and become riven by internal politics; and to make a good original game requires a high degree of risk, which is anathema to large companies:

    SWTOR smacks of a game built to a fixed blueprint that was cast in concrete about half a decade ago to appeal to a particular market segment. And one wonders whether it's a game that it's developers would really want to play themselves? 

     

     

     

  • iceman00iceman00 Member Posts: 1,363

    Originally posted by NeoZcar2

    Do people still not understand that Bioware has absolutely nothing to do with SW:TOR? Bioware only exsists in one studio up in Canada. EA built a studio in austin, named it Bioware Austin because EA owns Biowares name legally, and staffed the studio with former Mythic and current EA employees.  Bioware is jsut a name they put on the box to get better sales because the name EA means absolutely nothing anymore. Afterall Forbes ranked them as the worst company in North America.

    Except for the inconvienent fact that the Bioware top brass frequently traveled to Austin for that, and that the idea of the TOR MMO was hatched before Austin was even opened.  And the way the game was designed was clearly their idea:  break no new ground, just have WoW with voiceovers.

    Really, the storylines aren't that groundbreaking.  The sheer number of various storylines may be, but storylines to MMOs are nothing new.  LOTR did it, as did POTBS to name just two.  (The "main quest" of POTBS was a 1-50 storyline quest that was actually very well written, as most of the dialogue was in that game)

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