Slightly Mad Studios Says EA Tried to Screw Them Over

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monkeymagick

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During an interview with SpotTheOzzie, Ian Bell of Slightly Mad Studios (Project CARS developer) claimed EA tried to f*ck them over. Apparently, EA tried to destroy his company and steal their technology after they were making arrangements to make another sequel for Need for Speed Shift. After being paid 1.5 million, EA decided to cancel the project. That's a pretty sketchy deal for a team that helped resurrect the franchise. EA has yet to comment.

Listen in on the interview (warning some spicy language used).

Ian Bell concluded that EA’s guys are a**holes, that he has no respect for EA, that he’ll never make a deal with them again, that they are horrible human beings and that they are corporate monsters.
 
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Not shocking. Everyone knows EA is terrible.

See, I know the real history about EA and Trip Hawkins. The meaning of the company name. I was there at the start of it all. I'm 49. Back in the days of the C64 ... EA came onto the scene, back then one person could code a game an release it. You had Bards Tale, etc etc. The whole thing with that company was about . EA was all about the gamers are the artists ( coders ) the message was generally we will do the right thing blah blah blah ... yeah .... times have changed
 
SixFootDuo said:
See, I know the real history about EA and Trip Hawkins. The meaning of the company name. I was there at the start of it all. I'm 49. Back in the days of the C64 ... EA came onto the scene, back then one person could code a game an release it. You had Bards Tale, etc etc. The whole thing with that company was about . EA was all about the gamers are the artists ( coders ) the message was generally we will do the right thing blah blah blah ... yeah .... times have changed
Click to expand...

It's not so much that times have changed as that the company went public. Suddenly, being all about the gamers and artists can get you sued into oblivion by the stockholders.
 
The general consumers really don't seem to care about these corporate entities. I wonder if the hoi polloi can only relate to idols and Hollywood stars by and large?
 
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I thought they were such nice guys. Excellent track record in fostering creative young studios and delivering innovative gaming experiences
 
tetris42 said:
Up to their old tricks:

https://www.techspot.com/news/53342-ea-found-guilty-of-recycling-code-from-1988-madden-title.html

The original Madden was them stealing code from later Bethesda developer Robin Antonick and others.

It's the old "we'll publish your game, oh wait, no we cancelled it, so you don't get any money, but we're going to take your code and put it in another game and not pay you" trick.
Click to expand...

"Robin Antonick, one of the game’s primary developers during the franchise's early years, sued EA in 2011 claiming that the publisher stole much of his original code, design, and in-game features. More specifically, many of the offensive and defensive formations, as well as several user plays, may have been gleaned from the 1988 title. Today, a jury sided with Antonick, forcing EA to pay upwards of $11 million in restitution."

Hopefully they are up to their old tricks, be a nice bonus to Slightly Mad :)
 
You know, it is actually refreshing to see another company call out EA on their bullshit. From what I have seen we usually receive PR "they aren't that bad" shit in fear EA would not do business with them again and such.
 
There's a reason I don't buy any EA games any more, last one was Crysis.
 
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"Ian Bell concluded that EA’s guys are a**holes"

It's not just the game studios they've killed--it's the human damage they caused. EA Spouse had an important lesson for people, which seems to have been by and large not learned.
 
SixFootDuo said:
Not shocking. Everyone knows EA is terrible.

See, I know the real history about EA and Trip Hawkins. The meaning of the company name. I was there at the start of it all. I'm 49. Back in the days of the C64 ... EA came onto the scene, back then one person could code a game an release it. You had Bards Tale, etc etc. The whole thing with that company was about . EA was all about the gamers are the artists ( coders ) the message was generally we will do the right thing blah blah blah ... yeah .... times have changed
Click to expand...
I used to like their packaging. The developers were treated like Rockstars - the boxes opened up like an album, showed pictures of the devs, and had a story about them. They also took more risks. A game like MULE would struggle to get published today. Sigh...times changed years ago and aren't coming back.
 
Slightly Mad arn't exactly innocent either when they baited and switched their original supporters into having to fork over more money to get the final product.
 
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