The Madden Monopoly - EA dun goof'd

[Hyuudo]

Spoiler'd for fucking enormous.

Spoiler: show

tl;dr:
EA getting class-action sued for having a monopoly on football sim games. Current proposed settlement is $27m, with $9m going to lawyers and $2m for fees.

Valid claims for the purchase of Madden NFL, NCAA Football, or Arena Football videogames for the Xbox, PlayStation 2, PC, or GameCube platforms (“Sixth Generation Purchasers”) will be valued at $6.79 per new game purchased, up to a total of eight units ($54.32).

Valid claims for the purchase of Madden NFL or NCAA Football videogames for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, or Wii platforms (“Seventh Generation Purchasers”) will be valued at $1.95 per new game purchased, up to a total of eight units ($15.60).

Anyone else get this email or know anything else about it?

Edit: Apparently I missed the thread on this; search came back negative. Either way, looks like this is moving forward. Who's gonna claim their settlement money? Should be enough to pay for a cup of coffee next time you're out and about.

[izembo]

this has always been so full of shit from people not in the industry. price didnt get to 59.99 because they had a monopoly. it went that cause 360/ps3 games arent 49.99 like ps2 games were. nfl only wants one game, there will only ever be one game.

[Correction]

Current proposed settlement is $27m, with $9m going to lawyers and $2m for fees.

Drop in the fucking bucket. What a joke.

[Ksandra]

this has always been so full of shit from people not in the industry. price didnt get to 59.99 because they had a monopoly. it went that cause 360/ps3 games arent 49.99 like ps2 games were. nfl only wants one game, there will only ever be one game.

Ya I never understood people bitching about the cost of current video games. Fuck, Snes games often cost $60 back in the day (I still remember my mom raging about that when she got my the Lion King for my bday lmao). Honestly, the fact they've remained pretty consistent in price is something to be happy about.

[Correction]

this has always been so full of shit from people not in the industry. price didnt get to 59.99 because they had a monopoly. it went that cause 360/ps3 games arent 49.99 like ps2 games were. nfl only wants one game, there will only ever be one game.

The monopoly is still bad for the genre, the publisher and the customer, regardless of the price point. EA, without competition, has almost no incentive to make a better game every year if they can continue to sucker 5-6 million people a year to subscribe to their $60/annum roster updates.

[Metah]

Videogames seem to cost less now than they used to. Neo-Geo cost an arm and a leg back in the day, and I remember my Dad telling me that Legend of Zelda, Super Mario 3, Startropics, all ran him $90 a piece back when I was a baby. So both nominally and realistically, it looks like games cost less than before.

Even so, I think the argument being made is that because EA has such a strong presence in the sports genre, it is a kind of monopoly, because they sign exclusivity deals with all the major sports brands. I don't know how strong the argument is, but I'm always in favour of giving EA another 'fuck you'.

[Lucavi]

Ya I never understood people bitching about the cost of current video games. Fuck, Snes games often cost $60 back in the day (I still remember my mom raging about that when she got my the Lion King for my bday lmao). Honestly, the fact they've remained pretty consistent in price is something to be happy about.

pretty sure I paid more than that for FFVI when it came out. Shit, lets not even talk about games from other systemslie 3DO and jaguar.

[Ksandra]

Videogames seem to cost less now than they used to. Neo-Geo cost an arm and a leg back in the day, and I remember my Dad telling me that Legend of Zelda, Super Mario 3, Startropics, all ran him $90 a piece back when I was a baby. So both nominally and realistically, it looks like games cost less than before.

Even so, I think the argument being made is that because EA has such a strong presence in the sports genre, it is a kind of monopoly, because they sign exclusivity deals with all the major sports brands. I don't know how strong the argument is, but I'm always in favour of giving EA another 'fuck you'.

ya I didn't mean EA in particular, though I have heard people bitch about their costs for the sports games. Just in general, I always found the "cost of video games" to be a bad argument in current conversations. EA in general can suck a dick imo.

HOWEVER, there is that point too, that this isn't just about EA. As izembo said (can't verify but I've heard it before) this also has to do with the nfl not wanting competing games.

Kinda makes sense in a way. I am sure sports players don't want to be showing up for those rigging sessions for 34059834536 games every year.

[Correction]

As izembo said (can't verify but I've heard it before) this also has to do with the nfl not wanting competing games.

It's a very bad decision both by the league and EA to continue with the exclusivity. The sales numbers alone should tell them that.

[6souls]

Videogames seem to cost less now than they used to. Neo-Geo cost an arm and a leg back in the day, and I remember my Dad telling me that Legend of Zelda, Super Mario 3, Startropics, all ran him $90 a piece back when I was a baby. So both nominally and realistically, it looks like games cost less than before.

NEO GEO was a special case. They were basically mini arcade boards the size a little bigger than a VHS tape, they cost $125~ if anyone is curious. NES games were $50~.

[Guitarman]

Man i remember paying $90 for UMK3 at Target when I was a kid. Crazy now that I think about it.

[Correction]

NEO GEO was a special case. They were basically mini arcade boards the size a little bigger than a VHS tape, they cost $125~ if anyone is curious. NES games were $50~.

Also, a large part of the cost was the chips/boards used in the game's manufacture. Particularly during the 16-bit era, lots of custom chips, batteries and save game memory got soldered onto the game boards to add features, driving the costs up considerably.

So yeah, apples to oranges there.

[Null]

this has always been so full of shit from people not in the industry. price didnt get to 59.99 because they had a monopoly. it went that cause 360/ps3 games arent 49.99 like ps2 games were. nfl only wants one game, there will only ever be one game.

Before the latest release they had already announced that other companies will be able to make NFL games in 2014.

[Apelila]

Madden et al are a bad thing because they have a lock down on everything from the team logo's/names to the players themselves.

To make a football game today you'd have to make it completely independent of anything related to professional sports, and even then you'd still likely get sued over software patents or something stupid. All the while there is no incentive for EA to produce anything of quality.

[Brill Weave]

I still have my Neo Geo cartridge system. Never getting rid of it either!!

[Ryko]

Cashing in on this class-action. The 70 bucks will go well toward buying the next madden.

[Ragnus]

I think the real question is "Who cares?" how many different handegg games do there need to be? Madden and NFL Blitz pretty much covers everything you would want to do with the game outside of making a game for the Lingerie Football League. Actually... someone should probably contact the DoA team for that one...

[TacoTaru]

It's not that people are yearning for five different NFL games, it has more to do when not having to compete EA doesn't have to strive for better quality. Look no further than NBA 2k series vs NBA Live. EA has cancelled two of the Live games because "they weren't satisfactory", one of which was cancelled after it was ready to ship. Without the 2k series we probably would have received both games. This has also been highlighted by the fact that EA recently released FIFA '13 on the Wii, but in actuality it was a rerelease of FIFA '12 only slightly tweaked. We don't necessarily want several NFL games as consumers, but without competition we've seen what EA will do and it's not good for anyone but themselves.

[arus2001]

Also, a large part of the cost was the chips/boards used in the game's manufacture. Particularly during the 16-bit era, lots of custom chips, batteries and save game memory got soldered onto the game boards to add features, driving the costs up considerably.

So yeah, apples to oranges there.

Was gonna basically say this, but inversely, what it takes to make a game now is also more expensive than then, so some price increase to discs is expected. The real killer, though, is retail markup. Figure they want double what they pay for, so companies are only getting half what we pay.

[Correction]

Was gonna basically say this, but inversely, what it takes to make a game now is also more expensive than then, so some price increase to discs is expected. The real killer, though, is retail markup. Figure they want double what they pay for, so companies are only getting half what we pay.

Annualized franchies save a ton of those development costs though. It's not like the art/sound assets have to be rebuilt from scratch.