And It Has Begun... (EA serves notice in Madden anti-trust suit)

[CLW]

E-Mail I received today:

EOFFREY PECOVER and ANDREW OWENS v. ELECTRONIC ARTS INC.
U.S. District Court (N.D. Cal. - Oakland Div.)
Case No. 08-cv-02820 CW

If You Purchased Certain Electronic Arts Brand Football Video Games
Between January 1, 2005 to the Present
You May Be a Class Member.

Membership as a class member in the Electronic Arts Litigation is the result of a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, Oakland Division (Case No. 08-cv-02820 CW).

What Is This Class Action About?
The class action lawsuit alleges violations of California's antitrust and consumer protection laws in connection with the sale of certain football video games. Plaintiffs, purchasers of Electronic Arts' football video games, claim that Defendant Electronic Arts entered into a series of exclusive licenses with the National Football League (NFL), National Football League Players' Association (NFLPA), National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA), and Arena Football League (AFL), which Plaintiffs claim foreclosed competition in an alleged football video game market. Plaintiffs allege that this series of exclusive licenses caused customers who purchased certain football video games to be overcharged.
Defendant Electronic Arts has denied any liability and all allegations of misconduct. The Court has not decided whether the Defendants did anything wrong, and this Notice is not an expression of any opinion by the Court about the merits of any of the claims or defenses asserted by any party to this litigation.

Who Are Class Members?
The Class includes all persons who, during the period January 1, 2005 to the present, purchased the Madden NFL, NCAA Football, or Arena Football League brand video games published by Electronic Arts with a release date of January 1, 2005 to the present. Excluded from the class are purchasers of software for mobile devices, persons purchasing directly from Electronic Arts, persons purchasing used copies of the relevant football video games, and Electronic Arts' employees, officers, directors, legal representatives, and wholly or partly owned subsidiaries or affiliated companies.

What Should I Do? (Getting Further Information)
If you believe that you may be a class member (see above "Who Are Class Members"), you should get more detailed information about the class action and its potential effect on you and your rights. Further information can be obtained by going to the following website: www.easportslitigation.com. Additional information about the lawsuit may be obtained from Plaintiffs' Counsel website at www.hbsslaw.com, or by calling Plaintiffs' Counsel at 1-206-623-7292.

To Remain a Class Member
If you are a class member and you do nothing, you will be bound by the court's rulings in the lawsuit, including any final Settlement or Judgment.

To Exclude Yourself from the Class
(Deadline to Request Exclusion: June 25, 2011)
If you are a class member and you want to exclude yourself from the class and keep your right to sue Defendant, you must take further action before June 25, 2011. By that date, you must request exclusion in writing to this address:
Electronic Arts Litigation Exclusion
P.O. Box 8090
San Rafael CA 94912-8090

Or submit a request for exclusion electronically at the following website: www.easportslitigation.com

For further information about excluding yourself from the class go to the following website:
www.easportslitigation.com

Please do not telephone or address inquiries to the Court.
April 6, 2011. By Order of the U.S. District Court (N.D. Cal. - Oakland Div.).

[Coachdenz]

yep just seen that in my inbox as well.

[CLW]

yep just seen that in my inbox as well.

i'm seriously EMBARRASSED to be a lawyer. the jokes used to be funny but in the past few years we have become the jokes and society just keeps feeding the beast. every ill in this world is someone else's fault and they must pay.

[gschwendt]

What's sad is that they don't seem to realize the facts A) NBA 2k10 was $60 despite having competition and B) APF 2K8 was $60. I'm not sure what they think they'll even accomplish out of this.

[CLW]

What's sad is that they don't seem to realize the facts A) NBA 2k10 was $60 despite having competition and B) APF 2K8 was $60. I'm not sure what they think they'll even accomplish out of this.

SIMPLE. Run up EA's legal fees which will be in the millions. EA can either eat that cost and fight (and likely lose out there in wacky liberal land of CA) or pay them the defense cost (or slightly less). The plaintiffs lawyers take their 1/3 (likely millions) and each of the "class" gets $50 bucks.

[morsdraconis]

I quickly deleted that garbage. What a fuckin' joke...

[baseballplyrmvp]

i'm not understanding this entirely....was this email made in an effort to get us to join sam keller's side?

[gschwendt]

i'm not understanding this entirely....was this email made in an effort to get us to join sam keller's side?

Totally different lawsuit. This one is by other guys that are mad because on last gen, 2K sports games were much cheaper ($30 I think) while EA's were the standard $50. They are assuming that if competition were still intact and 2K were to make a football game, then they would charge less than the industry standard $60.

[JeffHCross]

Totally different lawsuit. This one is by other guys that are mad because on last gen, 2K sports games were much cheaper ($30 I think) while EA's were the standard $50. They are assuming that if competition were still intact and 2K were to make a football game, then they would charge less than the industry standard $60.

Worse. That was only for one, maybe two, years. Every other year 2k's game was full price, just like EA's. They're taking the last year of competition -- 2004 -- and assuming that it was the beginning of a trend, rather than a one-off.

Here's Pasta's break down of the claims from December

[cdj]

Also, here is GameSpot's article from today on the matter.

[I OU a Beatn]

I, for one, am thrilled to hear this is finally happening. They have absolutely no chance in Hell of winning, but it's about damn time someone called EA out on their bullshit when it comes to football games. It's been a long time coming as you can not continually pump out minimally improved games year after year after year, especially when you have an exclusive license...and except to not piss anyone off. Hopefully it gets them off their asses and gives them a little motivation to develop something as good as they were able to do during the PS2 days.

EA Sports and Activision are the two huge jokes this generation. The difference? I can buy a good shooter somewhere else if theirs sucks. I've been forced to play below average quality football games for over 4 years now. They either need to step it up and listen to the people who know what they're talking about, or get rid of the exclusive license and let someone else try. There's NO excuse as to why the same things are broken year in and year out.

[steelerfan]

Really?

:facepalm:

[I OU a Beatn]

On another note, I didn't even get the email.

[Solidice]

it was also posted on the NCAAFB site.

http://www.ea.com/ncaa-football/blog/ncaa-litigation

[JeffHCross]

I, for one, am thrilled to hear this is finally happening. They have absolutely no chance in Hell of winning, but it's about damn time someone called EA out on their bullshit when it comes to football games.

Look at the suit again. They're not suing because of quality or anything like that. They're suing because Madden and NCAA are the same price as every other game. Which isn't the same thing as not saying it's worth that much. Basically they're accusing EA of price-gouging. Which is completely different from using an exclusive license to lower quality, which is your argument.

Besides, it's not the first time EA's been sued, so "finally" is a little melodramatic, lol.

[NatureBoy]

If I were the judge on this case, I would rip these guys a new a-hole in wasting the court's time with such nonsense.

[I OU a Beatn]

Look at the suit again. They're not suing because of quality or anything like that. They're suing because Madden and NCAA are the same price as every other game. Which isn't the same thing as not saying it's worth that much. Basically they're accusing EA of price-gouging. Which is completely different from using an exclusive license to lower quality, which is your argument.

Besides, it's not the first time EA's been sued, so "finally" is a little melodramatic, lol.

Doesn't matter, they have no chance of winning regardless of the complaint. I just thoroughly enjoy when someone calls them out on the bullshit that they've been pulling.

Oh well, like I said before, a lawsuit isn't going to make a difference. However, that hit they took in sales last year with NCAA Football may have been enough to send a message. It still baffles me that we're approaching our 5th iteration of NCAA Football on this generation of consoles and we're still missing key features that were prevalent on hardware with much lower abilities.

[JeffHCross]

I just thoroughly enjoy when someone calls them out on the bullshit that they've been pulling.

Except they're ... not. The only ones pulling bullshit regarding this complaint are the actual complainants.

[I OU a Beatn]

If you read the complaint, it basically says that we're getting overcharged year in and year out because of exclusivity. Obviously, that would not happen unless customers were upset with how the game is being developed. I realize none of you are going to understand where I'm coming from, but none of you play online competitively against other human players, which is where the game is truly broken.

I've paid the same $60 the past however many years only to find out that the main portion of the game that I bought it for...the online...is pretty much unplayable. On numerous occasions, I've listed about 10 game breaking issues for each iteration of the game, so I'm not going to go into detail as to how it's broken.

BUT, from that aspect, it IS because of exclusivity that players like myself are indeed getting overcharged. I'm basically paying $60 for a game that doesn't function as it should.

[JBHuskers]

Really?

:facepalm: