Electronic Arts Announces the EA Competitive Gaming Division

[cdj]

FROM ANDREW WILSON

For many of you, the passion for games is defined by competition – a relentless focus on being the best, and leaving your mark on the games you love. It fuels many of the amazing things we see from millions of you playing EA games each day. As this passion continues to grow, we’re committed to creating even more opportunities for you to connect and compete.

Today I am excited to announce that Peter Moore is moving into a new role as Executive Vice President and Chief Competition Officer for Electronic Arts, leading our new EA Competitive Gaming Division (CGD). As the latest step in our journey to put our players first, this group will enable global eSports competitions in our biggest franchises including FIFA, Madden NFL, Battlefield and more. The CGD will be built around three core pillars:

· Competition – To create highly-engaging competitive experiences with our games, officially supported by Electronic Arts.

· Community – To celebrate, connect and grow our community of players across all levels of expertise.

· Entertainment – To develop live events and broadcasting that bring the spectacle of competition to millions of people around the world.

There is no one better in our industry to lead this new effort than Peter. He was an early pioneer in championing competitive gaming programs, such as the FIFA Interactive World Cup and the EA SPORTS Challenge Series, and Peter’s personal passions for the player experience, sports and competition, make him a tremendous leader for this new division. Peter’s team will partner with our development studios, marketers and publishing teams to bring this new platform to life.

We’re also delighted to have Todd Sitrin joining Peter in the role of Senior Vice President and GM of the CGD. Todd is an EA veteran, whose distinguished 14-year career here has included leading our global marketing teams as well as driving marketing and strategy for EA SPORTS. Todd will lead strategy and operations for the CGD, working closely with our development studios to create an exciting competitive platform in our games.

As Peter and Todd begin these critical roles, we are focused on both delivering our commitments for FY16 as well as putting great energy behind this new opportunity. Peter will continue to lead his current organization through the end of FY16 before shifting full time to his new position. We will share further details about the CGD in the coming months.

Competition runs deep in the DNA of Electronic Arts, and our games are already at the center of competitive gaming events at different levels today. FIFA fans around the world continue to compete in the FIFA Interactive World Cup, ESL One is hosting worldwide championships with Battlefield 4, we recently announced the return of the Madden NFL Live Challenge, and our games will be played in dozens of other regional competitions around the world in the next year. EA’s CGD will seek to build a best-in-class program to centralize our efforts with new events, as well as the infrastructure to bring you the world’s preeminent EA competitive experiences.

The formation of the Competitive Gaming Division is a groundbreaking opportunity for Electronic Arts to celebrate your passion for play and competition. I’m excited to see what Peter and the team will share in the months ahead.

[bdoughty]

Electronic Arts announced the elimination of the EA Single Player Gaming Division shortly after.

[CLW]

Electronic Arts announced the elimination of the EA Single Player Gaming Division shortly after.

Yep they only care about MUT at this point. I'm done buying EA games unless/until the game launches with a LEGIT/COMPLETE/COMPETENT/WORKING single player career experience

[jaymo76]

Anyone else find it funny when EA said it "valued competition?"

[baseballplyrmvp]

I just wish they'd give us some kind of hope that they're bringing college football back.

[bdoughty]

I just wish they'd give us some kind of hope that they're bringing college football back.

As much as I would love to see it and college basketball, what incentive do they have in this current market of gaming and extracting the maximum amount of $ from each customer? How could they make a MUT mode for college that people would play and pay for. I guess you could buy up a bunch of college greats but most would be the same players you see in the NFL and NBA games. Not to mention the college games always sold less than the pro games.

My wish is 2Ksports considers a college game to get back into the football market. Dream scenario is EA quits the NBA and makes a college hoops game. Dreams are nice but reality tends to kick in that sports games are simply not in demand like they once were. Madden, FIFA, NBA2K and to an extent MLB: The Show are in demand and can still dominate the charts for months. Anything else is a top 10 the month it releases and is gone next month.

[baseballplyrmvp]

NCAA was profitable even without mut. But since mut is what keeps generating profits, they'd almost have to turn to gimmicks/old cheat codes. I.e...Carrying the LSU card in your deck makes your fans twice as loud. Having Mike Leach as your coach gives a +5 boost to all pass catching ratings for receivers. Stuff like that. I was never really a fan of AP2k8 but I could see them being more likely than Ea to put gimmicky stuff in a college game that would add fun.

They may not have any incentive but the only changes they have to make to the game in order to get around the likeness issue is to randomize the roster. Other than that, NCAA would sell a ton as its dynasty mode was way better than maddens connected careers or whatever it is now. And there's literally tons of shot they can add that would forever change how within dynasty mode (I even have a few ideas within the game itself).

[Rudy]

NCAA basketball did not sell well but football sold two million copies annually . More than all next Gen baseball games combined with ease. It's simply a matter of licensing. Whenever the NCAA corrects that or cuts a deal through lawsuits I think it will happen. But not with ongoing legal battles.

[cdj]

From an interview with Peter Moore:

Q: What changes will you have to make to your games to make them eSports-ready? For example, in FIFA, ensuring teams are fully balanced and the first guy to get Messi doesn’t have an unfair advantage? Or NBA Live, preventing the player with LeBron from simply dominating no matter what?

Mr. Moore: We’re very aware that like all sports, our games need to have an equal playing field when it comes to building competitions. Drafting and team building are really important aspects of this. We’ll make sure the right tools are built into our games to ensure fair competition.

Q: Should your millions of sports game fans – myself being one of them – be concerned that the ways we love to play these games (franchises, online leagues, and so on) will be paid less attention to as you focus more on making them eSports-ready?

Mr. Moore: Building competitive gaming modes will be incremental to the current experience. It’s not about taking anything away, but adding to it. The eSports experience will add even more fun to what you already know and love in our games.

Courtesy: The Sporting News (http://www.sportingnews.com/sport-news/4688431-esports-ea-sports-electronic-arts-peter-more-madden-fifa)



I get the feeling that they will be adding some form of Draft Champions to each game. That seems to be the most fair in terms of keeping teams balanced unless I am overlooking another option.

[JBHuskers]

Yeah you're right, that's probably why they added that mode to test run it for this.