EA: Mirror’s Edge and Dead Space “Didn’t Meet Expectations”
Electronic Arts executive Frank Gibeau has said that 2008′s Mirror’s Edge and Dead Space “didn’t quite meet [the] expectations” that were set out before launch.
Speaking to Develop, Gibeau said while “both of those games had some degree of success” it was not enough. With first-person free-running game Mirror’s Edge, Gibeau said “there were issues with the learning curve, the difficulty, the narrative, and then there was no multiplayer either.” He added that “if you’re going to be bold with that kind of concept, you need to take it as far as it can go in development.”
“What I learned from Mirror’s Edge is that you have to execute, you have to spend more time on a game to ensure it’s polished, and you need to have the depth and persistence of an online game,” Gibeau said.
On Dead Space (which unlike Mirror’s Edge was profitable), Gibeau said that the problems were different: “It made money for us, but didn’t hit expectations. We felt like we had an IP that struck a chord, and one that hit quality, but again it missed multiplayer modes.”
“So when we re-worked Dead Space,” Gibeau said, “we looked at how to make it a better idea, how do we make the story more engrossing, how do we build Isaac as a character, how do we make this game a success online.”
He finished by saying that EA won’t “give up” on those two franchises, however. “A new idea obviously has a lot of risk attached to it, but if you get it all right it can be huge.”
Gibeau’s comments about “lots of risk attached” with new IP is something that a lot of game companies are aware of at the moment. Ubisoft have said that it will be focusing on existing IP instead of bringing out new titles and Activision is the king of what could be argued as “flogging a dead horse” with the Call of Duty series; releasing the same game with some tweaks every 12 months. (Bring it, CoD fans).
That’s something EA were famous for a few years ago, mind, and Mirror’s Edge was seen as a brave move away from yearly, iterative publishing. Let’s hope they don’t wuss out and keep pushing new ideas and not relying on well-known franchises to bring in the cash. Ahem, Medal of Honor…
ME had problems way ahead of a missing MP, namely its faulty gameplay. Parcour is something that draws on taking energy from a former move to boost the next move – which is the most naturalistic combo system you can get. Mirrors Edge made you tackle one jump after another, with a jarring control system.
Go play a few rounds of “DeFrag” on quake 3, and you get some serious parcour feeling. It may not be realistic, but it gets the FEEL and FLOW right, which ME failed at miserably. Funny thing is, the ipad version of ME actually manages to do exactly that right in a way….
And Dead Space made money – it just wasn’t enough for them. That is just plain old greed. And mostly it is for the worse. Not every game out there needs MP, Dead Space being one of them.
“We felt like we had an IP that struck a chord, and one that hit quality, but again it missed multiplayer modes.”
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
So the problem with ME and DS is no multiplayer to force people to buy map packs and online passes for?
I am their target audience and I never heard about mirrors edge until ages after it launched, for all EA-Activision-Blizzard-Fascism Incs money they still fail at marketing anywhere outside America.
Actually come to think about it, all game companies suck at marketing outside America and (maybe) England.
The only game advertising we get in New Zealand comes from EB Games, and its minimal.