EA Shutting Down Servers... Again

N

Nesrie

CAGiversary!
Electronic Arts announced that by Feb. 2 it will take away online play from several sports games released in 2008 or earlier, thus negating any real reason to keep playing them and pushing customers to buying newer releases.
Here's the list of hobbled games, as reported by IGN:

“
UEFA Champions League 07 PC and x360
Facebreaker x360 and PS3
Fantasy Football 09 x360 and PS3
FIFA 07 PSP, PS2, PC
Fight Night Round 3 PS2
Madden 08 Wii
Madden 08 PC
Madden 09 Xbox1
Madden 09 Wii and PSP
March Madness 07 x360
NBA 07 PSP, x360
NBA 08 PS2, PSP, Wii
NBA 09 Wii - Europe only
NBA Street (2007) PS3 and x360
NCAA Football 08 PS2
NCAA Football 09 PS2
NASCAR 08 PS2
NASCAR 09 PS2
NASCAR 09 PS3 and x360 - Europe Only
NFL Tour PS3 and x360
NHL 07 PSP and x360
NHL 08 PC
Tiger Woods 07 PC
Madden 09 x360 and PS3
Madden 07 Xbox 360
​
Click to expand...

Taken from the consumerist (who's moderator Roz is surreal)

In any event, yet another reason to hate EA. I thought their download services was reason enough to avoid most their products. Might be a good reason to avoid their other online titles too, RockBand anyone? They gonna yank the plug for RB1 when RB 3 comesout?
​
 
I'm kind of surprised they're taking Facebreaker's online away, my little brother just got that for Christmas and has been loving playing it online with his friend.

But other than that, I'm surprised that Nascar games are played in Europe.
 
Well EA has a pretty poor showing for any of its titles on Wii, except a couple of its music titles... this is not going to convince anyone to change their mind.
 
Guess it's time to merge the PS3 thread into this one since the topic really covers all platforms.

Don't know if I already said it over there, but it's hard for me to imagine the costs of running these are anything more than a drop in the bucket for EA and it's a shame because they do make damn good sports games. But that's what happens when there's no legitimate competition to push each other over the edge.

Not a Nascar fan, but I'm thrilled to see that EA stopped making their title around the same time GT5 announced that they would include Nascar. Competition is good for everyone.
 
[quote name='Nesrie'] Might be a good reason to avoid their other online titles too, RockBand anyone? They gonna yank the plug for RB1 when RB 3 comesout?[/QUOTE]
They don't have anything to do with Rock Band besides publishing/promotion. Harmonix/MTV owns and runs everything else about the series.
 
I don't really see why this is a reason to hate EA. Why should they waste money on servers for games that aren't being played. NBA Street, Madden 09 and Facebreaker would be the only games that I think should be given a chance but again if they aren't being played why keep them going?
 
[quote name='slickkill77']I don't really see why this is a reason to hate EA. Why should they waste money on servers for games that aren't being played. NBA Street, Madden 09 and Facebreaker would be the only games that I think should be given a chance but again if they aren't being played why keep them going?[/QUOTE]

Well becaues at least for the PC platform, there is absolutely no reason to force players to use proprietary servers and exclude direct IP. There was also no reason for them not to use Microsofts servers for the Xbox titles except the ability to pull the plug early on, which is what they did. There are a lot of publishers that don't yank their servers a couple years out, even if a title sells terribly, and there are many more, on PC, that provides legal means to offload those server costs to third parties and/or allow local hosting. EA hates supporting servers, and they want to push people into newer titles. I've got games on the PC released in the 90s that still have their servers up...

Yeah it can be merged with the PS3 thread, but it obviously affects more than one conosole.

Interesting about RB. I only knew EA published it, I wasn't sure who controls the back end.
 
People will find a reason to hate EA no matter what. Most of the people complaining about this will be the same ones who complain Madden is the best selling game each year. Most of these games are old sports game and probably doesn't affect the target audience.

On that note. How long should a company keep servers up for the online portion of a game, or an online only game such as Warhawk or Socom. People mention Facebreaker, but how many people really play that for them to realistically keep the servers online indefinitely.
 
Like others, I'm mostly neutral on this, considering it's almost all old sports games. And I realize some of them are things that have not been replaced by newer games, like NBA Street, but I own it, and even like last year I could never find anyone to play with.
 
[quote name='Nesrie']Well becaues at least for the PC platform, there is absolutely no reason to force players to use proprietary servers and exclude direct IP. There was also no reason for them not to use Microsofts servers for the Xbox titles except the ability to pull the plug early on, which is what they did. There are a lot of publishers that don't yank their servers a couple years out, even if a title sells terribly, and there are many more, on PC, that provides legal means to offload those server costs to third parties and/or allow local hosting. EA hates supporting servers, and they want to push people into newer titles. I've got games on the PC released in the 90s that still have their servers up...

Yeah it can be merged with the PS3 thread, but it obviously affects more than one conosole.

Interesting about RB. I only knew EA published it, I wasn't sure who controls the back end.[/QUOTE]

This doesn't really affect me since I don't play these games, but I agree with Nesrie. There were/are other options for them that wouldn't require them maintaining servers for the games, but would still let the players keep playing.
 
i can't believe they are shutting down Madden 09 already. They must really want people to buy the new game because I think sales were a little down this year for Madden. Total BS. I think most fo the other games are understandable but I do not get this one.
 
[quote name='flybrione']i can't believe they are shutting down Madden 09 already. They must really want people to buy the new game because I think sales were a little down this year for Madden. Total BS. I think most fo the other games are understandable but I do not get this one.[/QUOTE]

Could it be, that by the time they are shutting down Madden 09 (in April) that nearly 2 full NFL seasons have passed since 09's release? How long would you expect them to support something like that?
 
[quote name='msdmoney']This doesn't really affect me since I don't play these games, but I agree with Nesrie. There were/are other options for them that wouldn't require them maintaining servers for the games, but would still let the players keep playing.[/QUOTE]

Well I don't play sports games either. I guess I am at the point where something doesn't actually have to directly affect me for me to care (like you)and using a publisher's proprietory server is becoming a more common practice to combat piracy (so they say), but in the case of series with annual releases, I think that's bull. They just want to push people to buy new games, and EA specifically opted not to use the Xbox's microsoft run games. I am not sure how the PS3 network is setup, but the PC is certainly capable of hosting it's own game. And while EA is the largest publisher, there are plenty of companies in no. 2, 3, 4, etc. that don't yank the plugs on there servers like this.
 
[quote name='mtxbass1']Could it be, that by the time they are shutting down Madden 09 (in April) that nearly 2 full NFL seasons have passed since 09's release? How long would you expect them to support something like that?[/QUOTE]

Never mind the fact it is for Madden 09 for Xbox1, Wii and PSP. All three of those games flopped, those three combined sold less than Madden 09 PS2.
 
[quote name='spoo']Never mind the fact it is for Madden 09 for Xbox1, Wii and PSP. All three of those games flopped, those three combined sold less than Madden 09 PS2.[/QUOTE]

Madden 09 for 360 and PS3 is further down the list.
 
[quote name='msdmoney']Madden 09 for 360 and PS3 is further down the list.[/QUOTE]

Dang I'm blind, I will take back my comment then. I can see why they would shut down most of these but Madden 09 for PS3 & 360 should be popular enough to wait another year before being shut down.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
bread's done
Back
Top