You Won't Have John Riccitiello to Kick Around Anymore

Disturbed me abit that he was only most proud of the financially successful games, but i guess that's the way it is.

@jimbo said:

NO! This is the man that brought microtransactions to all the EA Sports games, which lead to infecting the industry.

No, just bad business decisions prevailed.

good. eff him

And then EA went right back to whatever it was doing. Different figurehead, same BS.

Wait... So that voting with your wallet thing worked!?

No it doesn't - they strategically choose games that are trailing off sales-wise, or dead. You're only losing notable profit, if the people you're giving the digital product to would have bought the game otherwise. I bet less than 10% of the SimCity owners they give a free game to, actually represent lost revenue potential.

The end of the fiscal year is nigh, and that's why Riccitello is stepping down. EA have had a terrible couple of years, with SWTOR, their diminishing of the Bioware brand in general, and lackluster sales with major investments like Dead Space. He's been a dead man walking for months.

@bledsoe9mm: I'd bet that's too recent to have any real impact. Also, the giving away of a free game isn't really taking a hit in profit, considering those games aren't necessarily lost business. I can't imagine people playing sim city were inches away from buying a full priced Dead Space 3. It's nice to have a free game, but I'd imagine that when sales numbers come out EA will look at Sim City as a financial success and largely ignore the internet backlash, even if the outcry for shit service is totally warranted.

When I think of what made him leave, my money is on The Old Republic as being the biggest and most significant factor in his departure.

He wasn't Eeeeevil enough. He was the " Diet Coke(TM) " of evil. JUST ONE CALORIE!

This is exactly why he had to go.... regardless of the catastrophe of what happened with SimCity, this business model as a whole is completely ridiculous and simply doesn't win you any fans, it stops people from buying games with the EA brand on the side of the box, and the firing of this man could not have come any quicker in my opinion, but this wont change anything substantially at the core business model of EA. but this guy really was a complete douche and has destroyed many series of games that have fallen under the EA name.

well I doubt he was the root of all of the DLC and online pass nonsense they've been pushing. but hey, you got to start swinging the axe somewhere.

I know that there's this huge negative perception of Riccitello as chairman of EA, but I think this news sucks. Every time I've ever read an interview with the guy he always seemed more interested in making quality games than other people in similar positions (Kotick). Under his leadership we had Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Dead Space, and Mirrors Edge, and there wasn't a damn thing EA was doing 7 years ago that was anywhere near as interesting as those.

@torrim: simcity has nothing to do with it ? probably the straw that broke the camels back , having to give away a 40-60$ game kills the profit in the short term .

Come the 30th John Riccitiello will walk out the front doors of EA Redwood Shores to his car at the visitor's parking space he had to use as they repaint the CEO spot. He'll take one last look at the building with a wistful sigh. Then the cry from an anonymous employee will be heard inside: "NOOO!!!! The Simcity servers are down again!" John will then dive into the drivers seat of his car, peel out of the lot and gun it all the way to the 101.

The /s/ is supposed to be how you signify in the electronic copy that the text is a signature.

Idly curious, has Kotick actually done much bad recently? Feels like I haven't heard of much evil out of Activision for ages.

I mean, they're not exactly the world's most innovative studio, but they seem to be relatively harmless to the wider gaming market. (I don't lay the Diablo auction house at Acti's feet, Blizzard would have been crazy not to try to tap the market for gold/items/etc. Even they can't get it right every time.)

@chose said:

It might have been the straw that broke the camel's back, but I seriously doubt it was a decisive factor. I think he has his resignation redacted ever since SWTOR failed to fill everyone's expectations.

I vote Jeff Green.

You're next Kotick.

@spicyrichter said:

Agreed. I also tend to think the board is (at least) as guilty of most of the business decisions in EA as Riccitello (who was, at least in the beginning, honestly trying to bring new blood to a stagnant lineup), so I would expect things to keep going down from here.

Because he knows it goes into a public SEC filing that shareholders read and websites post. Because a CEO's resignation affects the stock price, and his tone is therefore an important form of damage control.

I can promise you private memos read nothing like this. Like the ones that come out in court hearings.

Everyone who is overly excited about this, remember that the new CEO is going to be chosen by the board of directors and that they will likely still have the same type of person in mind. I have little to no faith that they are interesting in trying to repair their brand.

He is out for the very simple reasons already presented in the article. The fiscal year is up, they under performed and that's all on his plate.

Under a different timeframe the financial success of Sim City might well have prevented this move, at least a while longer.

dat SimCity fallout

Oh. My. God.

Flawless Victory.

I care more about EA games now than I did 7 years ago.

Well, it took me one month to complete one class story arc. While I did have a few alts, I plugged the majority of my time into that one character. I played the shit out the game with a friend and we had an absolute ball. But, we really wanted to get into pvp and the end-game stuff was pretty boring. I hope that Elder Scrolls Online is good. Again, I hope they scale it back a bit and try to do an excellent job on a few aspects and then add to it in the future. TOR simply had too many systems that needed to be amazing for people to really stick with it.

Simply copying World of Warcraft is not a good idea. They need to build out their own niche over time and not expect to dethrone the king in the first six months.

Investor panic over media dropping jaws at Sim City maybe tipped the scale! Sinking-ship-leaving

But Bioware was at the time owned by Elevation Partners, the investor group Johnny Ric was part of before becoming EA CEO. So once again this is really all Bono's fault.

Definitely. He went in with good intentions and up until 2010 or so, things looked pretty good. New exciting IPs were created and quality sequels were coming out. It's shocking how it all went downhill so fast. They're nearly back at square one now, though I'd sure as hell rather play their current output than what they were spitting out last generation, if I had to choose. Part of me hopes Peter Moore will step in and straighten it all out, but I can't help but wonder if EA have simply become too damn big for their own good.

I feel bad for him. Hope he finds success in his next venture.

I can still blame him for a good one or two years of the games and shitty business practices that might pop up and continue to blame him for the shitty business practices that EA have implemented during his tenure. Stepping down doesn't magically absolve him from being a massive piece of shit.

If I could kick him around I would, but I can still hope somebody someday will kick that cunt in the jaw. Literally.

I'd say they fired their CEO over it, but if you think those two are purely coincidental.

So long Riccitiello. It isn't too late: We can still save Electronic Arts. There's still life under that withering carcass, somewhere...

Jeff Green 2013!!

John's resignation reads like a press release about EA games. Why would John mention specific games as if the new CEO would never have heard of them. It's odd...

Thank you for Dead Space Mr. Riccitiello. It was one of the best things to come out of EA in a long time.

If FY14 means Fiscal Year 14, business people are even crazier than video game fans.

The cardinals of EA will now meet for their isolated enclave wherein they will elect the next CEO.

I'm gonna miss him. Early goings this gen were so promising. And then harsh reality set in. Oh well...

Just gonna leave this here.

The second video game collapse has been brewing for a while and now we are closer than ever to the cleansing fires.

It's amazing how gratifying it is to finally read these words.

@retrovirus said:

Yes. He's just the guy to revitalize the image of EA into the digital future!

@snail said:

@mattyftm said:

JEFF GREEN FOR CEO!!!!!

This I can get behind. Screw the Peter Moore supporters.

e-e-e-emptyquote

Sim City has nothing to do with it, I'd bet. If anything, they would see the server stress as a healthy sign that the game has sold well over expectations.

But, wtf on the shout out to Real Racing 3. Is that seriously the pinnacle of their gaming achievement he is claming? Facepalm.

Guess I'll download that star wars mmo... now that I'm actually reminded of it. Shit's free, right?

Well we all saw this coming...

@p_p_o_d said:

Fantastic. Just fantastic.

@oscar__explosion said:

@retrovirus said:

Yes. He's just the guy to revitalize the image of EA into the digital future!

@snail said:

@mattyftm said:

JEFF GREEN FOR CEO!!!!!

This I can get behind. Screw the Peter Moore supporters.

I would be totally on board with this, but after what he was saying about teenage girls on the Tested Dadcast I don't think anyone would make him president of anything. (I still throw all my support at him nonetheless)

To be fair, he was sharing a cautionary tale and that was another dad who said that teenager bit in his story.